What a Grasshopper Taught Me About Listening to Customers

What a Grasshopper Taught Me About Listening to Customers

Monday\, November 9th | 6:30–8:00 PM | Source Allies

We all say we listen to customers. But how often do we stop to question whether what we think we know is actually true?

When teams move quickly, assumptions can start sounding a lot like facts. Those assumptions can influence everything from product decisions to customer experience and business strategy.

At our November DSM Web Geeks meetup, Clair Williams-Vavra will share an unexpected lesson from building a food startup that changed how she approaches customer experience. It started with a grasshopper and led to a question she's carried into her work ever since: How do we know?

Drawing on experiences from both startups and large enterprises, Clair will explore three important aspects of understanding customers: balancing value and friction, gathering quality evidence, and recognizing the assumptions we may be making or protecting.

About the Speaker
Clair Williams-Vavra is the Chief Operating Officer at Strategic Innovation Consulting, where she leads business operations and builds the teams, systems, and processes that support growth and delivery for state government clients.

Previously, Clair helped lead enterprise customer experience strategy at a large financial services company, focusing on improvements that delivered meaningful customer value.

Event Details
Date: Monday, November 9th, 2026
Time: 6:30–8:00 PM
Location: Source Allies, Urbandale, IA

Check out https://www.dsmwebgeeks.com/ for details on this and all future events.

We meet the second Monday of every month. Our topics focus on new trends and techniques in web development.