A data breach created a support crisis with roughly 3,000 open tickets and a three-week delay. Customer trust had deteriorated, the team was under sustained pressure and normal support operations were no longer sufficient.
As Customer Support Team Lead, I was responsible for the team, daily operations and the recovery structure.
The challenge.
The immediate problem was volume. The deeper problem was maintaining consistent decisions, escalations and communication while pressure was highest.
The approach.
Create a recovery operating rhythm.
Structured the backlog and priorities so the team could work through the crisis without losing sight of the most urgent customer risks.
Keep a 20+ person team effective.
Owned recruitment, onboarding, coaching and day-to-day leadership while supporting the team through high-pressure conditions.
Stabilize workflows and escalation.
Optimized Zendesk configuration, macros and structured escalation systems to improve response consistency and operational stability.
Rebuild the customer relationship.
Combined backlog recovery with clearer communication and more reliable service execution.
Result.
The roughly 3,000-ticket backlog was cleared, operations stabilized and Trustpilot improved from about 2.4 to 4.0. The experience became a lasting lesson in how volume exposes every unclear ownership decision in a support system.