I had the "best success" when sales involved me as Customer Success Manager (normally PostSales) within the PreSales phase. When it comes to lifecycle sales, the outcomes, KPI and roadmap criteria should be defined at the beginning of the research stage. and then these priorities:
1) find stakeholder(s) for this project, as many as possible -> leadership
2) find as many use cases / business outcomes as posible -> use cases
3) make sure, that every use case can technically be realized (bring your ideas to life) -> technical readiness
Customer Experience Partner of the Year 2023 Germany Theatre
Certified Customer Success Manager since 2022