Driven to Care: Andy Fruchterman, Senior Support Systems Analyst I

For our next Driven to Care series, we’re so pleased to feature Andy Fruchterman, Senior Support Systems Analyst I. In today’s fast-paced and ever-evolving world, the importance of dependable support systems cannot be overstated. Andy exemplifies this commitment through his work, ensuring that systems run smoothly and efficiently. In this interview, Andy shares his journey, insights and the driving forces behind his dedication to providing exceptional support, ultimately contributing to the seamless experiences Lark users rely on every day.

I've heard that you came from the service industry. What's your perspective on the value of service industry experience, especially in regards to a customer support role?

Oh, there are so many aspects that carry over. It teaches you humility. It teaches you how to actually actively listen for what somebody might really need and how you can help them. It teaches you to be thoughtful and to think about other people.

There’s also the aspect of being able to separate your frustrations from the work. That’s definitely a huge component of food service. I joke with the team here that you've got a front of the house “face” and you got a back of the house “face”. In the back of the house you can get everything out, you can rant, you can rave, you can be as frustrated as you want with somebody, but get it out of your system so you can focus on actually helping once you're back on the floor. You could be having a terrible day personally, but keep that compartmentalized when you're taking care of somebody else.

So what prompted the move into a more, let's say, formal customer service role?

Good question. After doing food for a while, I really got kind of tired of that lifestyle. You never have a weekend with your friends, right? Your weekends are like Tuesday and Wednesday. You're never on the same hours. You're getting up at noon, and your friends are getting up at 7 in the morning. You're going to bed at 3:00am when they're crashing out at 10:00pm. So I worked temp jobs for a while to figure out what industry might be a good fit, and that’s how I ended up here. The timing wasn't exactly intentional at the time, but now I think the universe placed me here. 

I've told this to some people. It's not public knowledge to everybody who works at Lark, but the weekend after I started, about six years ago now, my best friend's little brother passed away from complications of type 1 diabetes.

It was really overwhelming at that moment. The me that everybody knows and were really just getting to know at that time, which is high energy, tons of positivity, turned into this completely different person from who everybody had just met. As I was struggling with these emotions and sitting in my first all hands at Lark, I found out Lark was focused on helping people with diabetes. In the immediate moment, I was like what is going on? This is really overwhelming. But after that mention, it was clear the universe put me here for a reason. 

So obviously you're in the weeds with our Lark members in your day-to-day. For someone who's thinking about coming into the industry in a similar role or who is going to be working with people in the "front of the house," what are some day-to-day challenges that people should know about?

I think one of the big challenges in health is user data. You have to be very cautious with data, which sometimes means tools and advancements might go a little bit more slowly in digital health. It’s more important to protect the data.

Another challenge is you're working with people on their health. It can be a very high stakes and obviously personal issue for a lot of people. I mean, type two diabetes is a horrendous and terrifying disease. Somebody could be legit scared, right?

Having patience and empathy and understanding goes a really long way towards success in this kind of role. Then, going back to those listening skills, understanding what people are asking for, understanding what they need, that's the focus. Sometimes it can be a little bit tricky or it can be kind of heavy, because health is very personal and people are not always happy. But having that patience, empathy and understanding with those people goes a long way towards building that trust with them and just being helpful.

I mean there's obviously the challenges, but then there's the flip side. Can you highlight a particular example that has been incredibly rewarding when helping one of our Lark members?

Yeah. That's actually a really easy question for us to answer. Customer support is a necessity for pretty much any industry. But for a product like ours, we actually get to see some of the impacts of the product on people's lives.There was a lady who was using the Lark program, plus GLP-1 meds. Combined, she lost 2/3 of her body weight, going from 340 to 140 pounds. It was absolutely amazing to see the before and after pictures. She was so excited. We were so excited. When you see somebody that's really feeling themselves because of something that we've done, you get to share in that feeling with them.

Our customer support team gets to share news like, "Hey, we cut off your risk of type two diabetes and your doctor told you that you can now have kids." That's a different scale of impact you just don't find outside of digital health.

What do you enjoy about managing people? And second, what is something you've learned personally from management experience that was unexpected?

I manage the TEK team, but I'm kind of like a fun uncle, instead of a parent. I say that because Tek has their own staff and they have their own managers, I get to coach them more and make sure they're all equipped with the tools and knowledge they need to deliver the highest quality support. 

One thing that I've really enjoyed about managing this team is how much they love us back. We're a healthcare product. We're working on really detailed things. We're working on making sure we're safeguarding user data. These are serious topics, but we were a fun team and they really appreciated our leadership, the product, and what they actually got to do in terms of helping these users. So it's just been  a lot fun for me to work with them because there's just so much good energy and that's been the case since we started.

What advice would you give to a customer support professional kind of no matter what stage of their career they are in?

I think the piece of advice that I would give would be to always be curious. For a program like ours where tech support is a large part of what the agents do, curiosity is key. Keep asking the why question so that you understand what it is that you're supporting and what the product does. Become an expert on what you do. That way you can recognize those issues and read between the lines and are able to see what somebody is telling you.

The agents who are curious, who try to understand why behind the product behavior, they do so much better than the agents who just want to learn what macro to use for what issue. Because if you're trying to shoehorn every scenario into a macro, you're using a square peg in a round hole. You are not going to have a lot of success.

All right, let's jump into some of these fun questions here. Give me one healthy go-to and then one unhealthy holiday food go-to.

Okay, so Christmas Day we always have baked apples. Just sliced up with some cinnamon, baked in the oven. No additional sugar needed. The apple is super sweet already. Sausage rolls are the less healthy one every Christmas. Got to have sausage rolls.

Is there any holiday ale you are sipping on? 

The Samuel Smith Winter Welcome Ale.

I know you are the resident board game enthusiast. Is there a game you would recommend that is a preferred game to play with family or friends over the holidays?

There is one called Seven Wonders, and it is a draft-based card game where effectively you start with seven cards, I believe. You pick one, pass off the rest. And you're kind of trying to build up a city with different buildings to acquire scores and have the high score at the end of three eras. And the reason it works so well is because the scoring is complicated but simple enough that at a glance at the table, it's hard to tell who's winning. But at the end of the game, it's very easy to calculate everyone's scores. It's just hard to do based on sight in your head. The game play lends to zero conflict or confrontation, right? Everybody acts at the same time, everybody takes their movements at the same time. It also takes about half an hour to play around. So, it's good for the parents if you have young kids, something you might be able to squeeze in during their nap.