---
title: "I Don't Want Your Product. I Want Your Expertise."
episode: 102
podcast: "The LeanScale Podcast"
publisher: "LeanScale"
guest: "Noah Marks"
guest_title: "SVP of Customer Success & Operations"
date_published: 2026-08-24
date_modified: 2026-09-03
duration: 00:59:39
word_count: 11096
topics: ["revenue-operations", "gtm-strategy", "ai-in-gtm", "sales-leadership"]
canonical_url: https://www.leanscale.team/knowledge/podcast/noah-marks-gtm-council-buy-expertise-not-products/
source: "LeanScale Knowledge Hub — https://www.leanscale.team/knowledge"
license: "Free to quote and cite with attribution to The LeanScale Podcast."
---

# I Don't Want Your Product. I Want Your Expertise. — Full Transcript

> Episode 102 of The LeanScale Podcast, with Noah Marks.
> Published August 24, 2026 · 00:59:39 · 11096 words.
> Machine-transcribed and **not diarized** — speaker attribution is inferred, so verify
> attribution against the audio before quoting a specific person.
> Structured breakdown: https://www.leanscale.team/knowledge/podcast/noah-marks-gtm-council-buy-expertise-not-products/

## 00:00 — Cold open + intro

**[0:00]** "If you want to seem like a god, become the pipeline czar at your company."

**[0:04]** "Really understand the dynamics of how it works, the coverage you need, the pipe gen you need,

**[0:11]** who's really building it."

**[0:12]** Noah Marks has spent the last decade building the go-to-market engine inside some of the most

**[0:18]** recognizable names in B2B software. Salesforce, Okta, Walkme, Udemy, and Diligent.

**[0:24]** He is also the co-founder of GTM Council, which started 10 years ago as a dozen

**[0:29]** ops leaders comparing notes because nobody else would tell them the truth about the tools they

**[0:35]** were being forced to implement. Let's do the things that you need to do at this stage.

**[0:38]** "You're playing house, and guess what? Everyone else is doing the same, and I'll buy a coffee

**[0:44]** to anybody who will come and tell me differently on these two things. If you investigated your

**[0:50]** sales org and you looked at the three biggest weaknesses of any sales team or an individual,

**[0:58]** I will guarantee you there are three things. One, I'll tell you this, I think that if you have a

**[1:04]** product that can get vibe-coded by a CRO, you do not have a product. You may have a product,

**[1:12]** you don't have a product. Like, let's let's let's."

**[1:14]** "Where do you think the gap is from taking that and turning it into something that can

**[1:17]** actually help you?"

**[1:18]** "They should be, and I think that was the challenge. I think there was too many vendors

**[1:22]** over the past decade where the CEOs were really good CEOs, but they weren't operators, and that

**[1:29]** was a big challenge. Good ops person, you should help the entire company do well,

**[1:34]** and therefore the evaluation goes up, and everybody wins."

**[1:39]** "One hundred percent. My CRO, Tom Miller, he used to say, 'If you torture the data long enough,

**[1:44]** it'll tell you anything you want to do.' And I think I've definitely seen that play out a few times."

**[1:52]** (Music)

**[2:00]** Noah Marks has spent the last decade building the go-to-market engine inside some of the most

**[2:05]** recognizable names in B2B software, Salesforce, Okta, Wacme, Udemy, and Diligent, and he is doing

**[2:12]** it again at ECI Solution Software. He is also the co-founder of GTM Council, which started

**[2:19]** 10 years ago as a dozen ops leaders comparing notes because nobody else would tell them the

**[2:24]** truth about the tools they were being forced to implement, and has since grown into one of the

**[2:29]** most sharpest rooms in go-to-market, along with its podcast, Stacked GTM. What makes Noah unique is

**[2:36]** that he sits on both sides of the table, the operator who is always a step ahead of what

**[2:41]** the software could actually do, and the executive who signs the checks, and he has landed on a

**[2:47]** conclusion that should make every vendor nervous. He does not want to buy products anymore. He wants

**[2:52]** to buy expertise. In this episode, we get into why the software industry is quickly becoming a

**[2:58]** services industry, how to tell what is real from what is noise, and where an operator should actually

## 03:04 — "I don't ever want to buy a vendor again"

**[3:04]** be spending money over the next 12 months. Noah, you said something during our prep call. I have

**[3:11]** not been able to stop thinking about, "I don't ever want to buy a vendor again. I want to buy

**[3:18]** their expertise." What broke for you that got you there? It's interesting. I think maybe others

**[3:27]** might have gotten to the same realization faster than me, so I don't want to brag about how long

**[3:33]** it took me to get there, but I think the challenge was most vendors, when you implement their product

**[3:39]** or most when you are the customer of a vendor and you're implementing their product, you're at most

**[3:45]** probably tapping into 50, 60 percent of the capability, and then it's upon you to continue

**[3:52]** to learn about that product. Go to their customer conferences, learn about their features and

**[3:56]** functionality, so you have to have a team just to know how to use that product. Then you have to

**[4:02]** have another team that understands the expertise around what you do with that product, and then you

**[4:08]** have to have a leader that's designing the strategy about where does that product sit in. To me, if

**[4:14]** somebody's providing me a product for my go-to market, they hopefully, if I've partnered with

**[4:20]** them, have the expertise around that space much more than me and are able to then take what's

**[4:27]** happening in the market and tell me what I should be doing. Tell me how I should leverage compensation

**[4:35]** attainment towards changing my territory design. I don't want to have to be the one always on the

**[4:40]** hook creating what's out there, but if you truly are a vendor that understands your space, understands

**[4:46]** your ICP, and has real thought leadership, I should be learning from you, and so I don't want to buy

**[4:51]** another tool. I want to buy that expertise, and as far as that expertise, I'm willing to spend more

**[4:58]** if you become that Palantir forward engineer service offering that helps me get up to speed,

**[5:05]** but then also becomes part of my operating rhythm, and so that's the new era. That's the moat that's

**[5:12]** going to separate the new class of AI companies out there from all the rest. It's that expertise

**[5:18]** and the thought leadership that individuals like myself can learn from, as opposed to always being

**[5:24]** on point, being the thought leader ourselves. Yeah, I think RevOps operators sitting in the

**[5:30]** role, we have real problems that we have to solve, and so many times the vendor promises that it can

**[5:35]** be solved by the tool, but anyone who's been in RevOps longer than a week knows that the tool is

**[5:41]** like 10% of the battle. It's how are you going to set it up? How are you going to lay out the process?

**[5:46]** How are you going to enable the team? How are you going to handle change management? There's so much

**[5:50]** more that comes after it. Was there anything in particular where you took a step back and you're

**[5:56]** like, "There's no reason this should be this hard, and there's no reason I should be coming up with

**[6:02]** this stuff from scratch. I should be able to lean on my partner for this." Yeah, and it was that

## 06:07 — The $1M comp team that still handed the problem back

**[6:07]** compensation discussion where in a prior company I had, I think, five or six folks and an expensive

**[6:13]** tool, and it was probably a million dollars of investment every year just to run compensation,

**[6:20]** and while the team was phenomenal, like I would hire the team again in an instant,

**[6:24]** the challenge there was when we got done with the attainment charts and looking at the distribution

**[6:33]** and the design, it ultimately came back to me to figure out then what do I do with this information

**[6:39]** or how do I take the attainment curve of a part of our business and relate that to other parts

**[6:46]** that should be driving similar outcomes, and how do we learn from this? And I realized I was like,

**[6:51]** "Why am I doing this?" And then there was a bunch of conversations that I was having with some of

**[6:56]** some of our peers, which was, "Who are the vendors out there that are the thought leaders that are

**[7:02]** actually folks that I want to listen to and learn from?" Because I realized over the past

**[7:07]** 10, 15 years, a lot of the operators, we've spent so much time as formal and informal advisors to a

**[7:13]** lot of the companies and vendors we've worked with because we're trying to push them in the

**[7:17]** direction that leads to where we need them to be. And I think after a while, I was like,

**[7:22]** "I'm frustrated that it still has to come to me to push a vendor." I want the vendor to come

**[7:26]** and blow my mind. And as folks that, like us operators, we're thinking about this stuff 24/7,

**[7:33]** but we're thinking about everything 24/7. So somebody that's coming in with a slice

**[7:38]** of my mind share, you should be better than me. You should be thinking and blowing my mind in

**[7:45]** a way that hasn't before to give me that understanding of what to do. And it really

**[7:50]** was around compensation. And I was like, "I got the distribution and the great metrics and here's

**[7:54]** what's going on." And now it's up to me to think through what is next year's comp plan look like.

**[8:00]** And I'm like, "There's got to be a better way, right? You just do this time and time again."

**[8:05]** And I'm like, "I don't know. Tell me what my comp plan should be. Tell me what's really working."

**[8:10]** Because I've stolen all my great ideas from everybody else I've ever worked with,

**[8:19]** but I know there's things that I'm probably not thinking of. And so my blind spot or my black swan

**[8:24]** out there, tell me the things that I'm not thinking about, that I don't know and I'm not aware of,

**[8:30]** that could transform the capabilities and the performance of myself and my team specifically.

**[8:37]** What do you think the gap is? Because you're right. They're sitting there solving the same

**[8:40]** problem or at least attempting to having a solution for it for hundreds, sometimes thousands

**[8:45]** of different companies. They should be tapped into exactly how teams are doing their compensation

**[8:52]** plan and forming an opinion by having that bird's eye view. Where do you think the gap is from

## 08:57 — Why GTM vendors stalled: CEOs who never sat in the seat

**[8:57]** taking that and turning it into something that can actually help you? They should be. And I think

**[9:01]** that was the challenge. I think there was too many vendors over the past decade where the CEOs were

**[9:07]** really good CEOs, but they weren't operators and that was a big challenge. They didn't sit in us.

**[9:13]** And I think I've threatened many times with some of you all as to, "Let's go out and just build our

**[9:18]** own tool because it doesn't exist." And that's the challenge is you need somebody who's lived

**[9:24]** our life, who's gone through it, who's like, "You know what? I got an idea. We can do this

**[9:27]** completely differently. We can do this so much better." And I think that's the challenge. You

**[9:33]** have good CEOs who are good at running a company, but you really want somebody who's a deep thought

**[9:38]** leader. And in the times where there's maybe not a pure co-founder that's on the technical side,

**[9:46]** who has been in that spot, I think you might lose some of those dynamics. And then what I've seen,

**[9:51]** unfortunately, is I've seen some of these companies who I thought were the greatest things

**[9:56]** since sliced bread get distracted because their investors wanted them to pivot to do more or

**[10:03]** broaden their TAM. And that just took away from the capabilities that I was really needing from

**[10:08]** them. So by trying to make a more profitable business that was detrimental to my world.

**[10:15]** And I think that's what I'm looking for in that next generation of CEO, of founder, of folks that

**[10:22]** understand the things I'm going through, the things I will go through. And just like ops,

**[10:27]** our role is to think about stuff that should be happening in the next year so that when we get

**[10:31]** there, we've already solved it. We've thought about that and we've addressed it and we're well

**[10:35]** beyond that. I need to find a partner that's very similar. And so my approach and my current company

**[10:41]** has been drastically different of how I'm going and talking to customers. I'm looking at thought

**[10:45]** leaders first and then the technology and capability second, knowing full well that

**[10:50]** some of the stuff we're going to be building and some of the stuff we're going to be buying.

**[10:54]** And over the next one to two years, it's going to be a very dynamic environment for that. But

**[11:00]** that's what I'm fundamentally looking at first. I want to learn something from the partner that

**[11:04]** I'm selecting to help me in this journey. It is really interesting with the barrier entry of

**[11:11]** building tech really, really decreasing. I mean, before you had to go raise money,

**[11:15]** get a 10 person engineering team to build something that could even begin to solve a problem.

**[11:20]** And now you can really get there something production grade relatively quickly. And a lot

**[11:27]** of the people that are developing those are the people who are building it for themselves,

**[11:31]** their operators. They feel like they have the real problem. What do you think this dynamic means

## 11:37 — Build vs. buy inside GTM Council

**[11:37]** for the software industry in general? Any big trends you think we're going to see?

**[11:45]** That's a good question. I think, I mean, the biggest topic in the GTM council for anything we

**[11:51]** go to always comes back to build versus buy. And that's the reality because you can build just

**[11:58]** about anything and you can build it to what you think you need to have it today. But should you

**[12:05]** be doing it and do you have the ability to continue evolving it to what it needs to be in the future?

**[12:11]** And if I can't find a business partner that is going to take me there, then I'm just going to

**[12:16]** do it. I now have the capability as I threatened to do in the past, I don't need to go create a new

**[12:20]** company. I can just build it myself. And I think that's, I'm in the position that so many of us

**[12:26]** are in. And there's a lot of folks that are far more forward than me where they are going to build

**[12:31]** their entire tech stack exactly how they want it. I'm trying to balance that because I do think

**[12:37]** there are infrastructure pieces that I want somebody else thinking about for me. And I'm

**[12:42]** willing to pay that premium as opposed to paying an individual on my team to do it. But I think

**[12:47]** it's that evolution of what becomes something that you continue to buy and what becomes something

**[12:52]** that you inherently build yourself. That's the biggest dynamic. But I do think for a good portion

**[13:00]** of the next couple of years, AI is not necessarily a standalone thing. It is just one more capability

**[13:09]** in your go-to-market tech stack. So SalesOps maybe was in charge of your GTM stack historically,

**[13:14]** buying various vendors. Building is just another capability. And how we get there is less important

**[13:21]** about than what the outcome ultimately is. And if it's going to drive us to better outcomes to build,

**[13:26]** then let's do it. I think to come back to your core question was what's changing. We now have

**[13:33]** the power to get past where technology was preventing us to get historically, which is

**[13:40]** maybe that last 30% of personalization that really speaks to our world. We're now able to do that.

**[13:47]** And whether or not we do it the full 100% or we just take existing infrastructure and we personalize

**[13:51]** it, it's up to us. And over the next couple of years, what evolves, I have no idea, but it's going

**[13:59]** to be really exciting. And I think if you're not staying on the forefront, you're probably going

**[14:03]** to fall behind. Yeah. Well, I think we'll all have a fun time guessing and seeing what's going on.

**[14:10]** Are there any companies in the GTM tech space today that you see doing a really good job

**[14:17]** of building good tech, but also layering in that service and being a thought leader

**[14:23]** and being a thought partner in solving the problem that they built their company around?

**[14:28]** It's interesting. So over the last, I would say year, year and a half, I've been actively talking

**[14:35]** to all the companies that I interact with telling them about this concept. And I think Jake Saper

**[14:41]** from Emergence wrote a really good article a few months back. I wrote something similar before that,

**[14:48]** but his was much better in every way talking about this concept. And so I went to all the

**[14:54]** companies I talked to or advise and was pushing them like, this is what I want. Are you guys going

**[15:00]** this direction? And it was really amazing that a lot of them had already been thinking about it,

**[15:04]** but maybe more so in a, we're just going to do the administration, not so much in providing

**[15:10]** you back the expertise. And that was the push that I've been having, but lately, I mean, I just,

**[15:15]** in the last two weeks, not to like just call out specific companies when there haven't been any,

**[15:21]** but I know that conversations I've had with companies, full cast, which is by the way,

**[15:28]** a sponsor of go to market council. They've been listening for a while. I've known that team since

**[15:32]** we were both at Salesforce together. So there's a long history there. I know Gong is coming out

**[15:37]** with that sort of situation. What are some other organizations that I know Vasco is offering that

**[15:47]** in a conversation. And there was a few more that folks have been kind of talking through.

**[15:52]** I think Gumloop was one in there. It's just, it's interesting. Everyone I now talk to,

**[15:57]** whether they've come in, and a lot of these companies have come and talked to the GTM council,

**[16:01]** which is how I've had the conversations. But all of them have come back to say, yeah,

**[16:05]** this is something that we now understand is a real value. And I think what's interesting,

## 16:10 — Is services revenue still SaaS?

**[16:10]** I love your thought, but I think services revenue, as long as it's reoccurring, is still SaaS.

**[16:18]** It's services as a software, as a service. And as long as it's something that's reoccurring,

**[16:24]** I think the ability for companies to kind of package that together. Because honestly,

**[16:27]** from my perspective, I don't care what software. I don't care what's AI built. I don't care what's

**[16:31]** a human. I'm just trying to get to the answer. And I think it's probably upon the vendor maybe to

**[16:38]** figure out how to optimize their backend so that they can innovate quicker and they can do things

**[16:44]** faster. But I think by them embedding with their customer, they're going to be so much better

**[16:50]** because they're going to actually know what's happening and have real world insight. It's like

**[16:57]** this is kind of a weird analogy, but I've been thinking about it lately, which is the challenge

**[17:01]** of a BDR, like the outbound prospecting junior salesperson in your organization,

**[17:07]** the challenge with them is they only get to the qualification stage of an opportunity. And then

**[17:12]** they go back and they try to find somebody new. And the value of them staying in that opportunity

**[17:17]** through close, they learn so much more in the bottom half of that funnel that helps them become

**[17:23]** so much better. I think it's the same way. When you're selling your product to your customer,

**[17:27]** if you're able to then join them and sit side by side and really understand how they're using it

**[17:33]** and understand the pains and the value and what they're thinking about, you're going to make so

**[17:38]** much better of a product at the end of the day. So I think it's, I would say, I think it's a comment

**[17:44]** upon all vendors. If you want to stay relevant and because anybody, your mode of technology is gone.

**[17:51]** So unless you have a distribution network or something of scale that kind of keeps competitors

**[17:56]** at bay, your expertise is that's the final, that's the final note, I think.

**[18:03]** I have a lot of thoughts on everything you just said. First, I'll talk about the virtuous cycle

**[18:09]** of going in and owning the problem, just the way you framed it. And if you spend all day drinking

**[18:17]** your own champagne, so yes, you have the software, you have the solution, you have the tech, but

**[18:22]** you're also going a step deeper and taking it upon yourself to solve the actual problem that that's

**[18:28]** trying to solve for and own it to the end. You are going to get inspired with every new thing because

**[18:35]** you're going to feel viscerally the pain of what it takes to actually solve the problem that you're

**[18:41]** trying to build a company around. So I think to your point, going in and leaning in and building

**[18:48]** that into the fabric of your company is only going to make your product better and product being the

**[18:54]** overarching service plus the software, whatever it takes to solve it. Now, in terms of service revenue

## 19:02 — The margin math: 90% software meets the AI bill

**[19:02]** versus software revenue, there's some assumptions that are made, but first principles, people don't

**[19:08]** care if the revenue is high margin and recurring and what's happening in the software revenue side,

**[19:16]** margins are getting lower because you're needing to integrate some level of AI capabilities that's

**[19:21]** likely being run by one of the LLMs. So now your margin is going from that 90% range down to

**[19:26]** potentially that 70, 60% range. There are a lot of really good high performing services companies

**[19:32]** that can do services at that 60 to 70% gross margin range. If it's recurring as well, there's

**[19:39]** no reason the multiples should be that different, especially because it doesn't take as much

**[19:43]** investment in the building of the IP on the software side like it used to. That's the only

**[19:47]** other argument where maybe this is worth more. So apples to apples, if you have same gross margin,

**[19:55]** same level of recurability, and it's solving a real problem that will actually likely extend

**[20:02]** the LTV of your customer, then it should be even more valuable for a company to invest in this harm.

**[20:11]** And think about even the churn risk, right? If I have somebody embedded on my team,

**[20:16]** and I lose that person, I lose that capability. So if you're a vendor in here driving real value,

**[20:24]** there is zero churn risk in your future. So I think the GDR, NDR, GR, NR, whatever your term is

**[20:33]** that you use for retention, basically go through the roof because you're going to make better,

**[20:38]** happier customers. And I think there's an element where no product ever does all the

## 20:44 — Favorite product beats best product

**[20:44]** things you want it to do. But I think the reality is, and I remember learning this when I first

**[20:49]** started getting introduced back in my banking days with Tableau, is it wasn't about being the best

**[20:55]** product, it's about being the favorite product. And if you really know and you're really like,

**[20:59]** you have the expertise of your customers, then you really get to understand and you get some

**[21:05]** passes. If you don't do this today, it's just technology. But if you're there for me and you're

**[21:10]** helping support me, get to where I need to get to. I mean, the company I work for now, ECI,

**[21:15]** it's been around for decades and it's just they built this expertise around all these vertical

**[21:19]** markets that helps these SMB and mid-market companies survive. And that's the secret sauce.

**[21:25]** It's the technology, but it's like really understanding it. I think some of this gets

**[21:30]** missed when it's like we can just build technology and then throw it over the wall and go on and

**[21:35]** build more technology. You got to think about the outcomes. And I think that gets overplayed a little

**[21:41]** bit in phrasing, but the reality is if you don't know the ultimate end goal of the impact of what

**[21:48]** you're doing, whether you're a vendor or anybody, then I think you're just missing out of what you

**[21:54]** should be. Yeah, I completely agree. Maybe we could take it a step deeper. I'd like for anyone who's in

**[22:03]** the go-to-market tech space right now, if you're representing your go-to-market solution, if you're

**[22:08]** the founder CEO of a go-to-market solution, I'd really like you to listen to what Noah says next.

**[22:13]** What exactly do you think they need to do and at what depth do they need to own the problem on the

## 22:21 — Full accountability: buy the outcome, not the tool

**[22:21]** customer side? I think full accountability needs to rely with that vendor. Fundamentally,

**[22:28]** to your starting question, I don't want to buy a vendor. The concept that you're just giving me

**[22:36]** a tool is not enough. I want to buy the outcome and I'm willing to pay for the outcome. And that's

**[22:41]** ultimately what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to drive revenue growth. I'm trying to drive customer

**[22:47]** success. I'm trying to drive top line metrics and the tools at my disposal have just multiplied.

**[22:53]** Now, I now have a lot more capabilities at my fingertips. I don't need more tools. Nobody needs

**[23:00]** tools. The tools are there just to try to deliver whatever it is that we can gain. I need somebody

**[23:06]** to come in and say, "I am going to help you drive the best compensation plans in the industry."

**[23:14]** And guess what? That compensation plan is going to help you design better territories. And those

**[23:18]** better territories and comp plan are going to get better distribution for your sales reps. They're

**[23:22]** going to make more money. They're going to have more people in the middle to the top range. So,

**[23:27]** you're going to have less churn and turnover in your team. It's just going to keep perpetuating

**[23:32]** and building and building and building. And it all starts with like, "Oh, it's just a comp tool."

**[23:37]** No, no, you got to rethink. Everything that we're delivering has a greater purpose and a greater

**[23:44]** impact. And typically, it's up to the ops leaders to absorb all of those data sets and try to

**[23:50]** translate that into what's next. So, that's what I want. I want the full accountability to come in

**[23:56]** there. And if you're willing... I remember, man, it was in the Doc Bus era when the first generation

**[24:04]** of companies were like, "We'll tie the price of our product to your success." And I'm like,

**[24:10]** "I love the idea." And I was on the sales side at that time. No CFO bought it because like, "Well,

**[24:15]** we don't know what that's going to cost us." But that's what I inherently want. I want somebody

**[24:19]** who's vested in my success, hands down. If you're not, and if you're not really caring what I'm

**[24:24]** caring about, then there's too many other products that do similar to what you do. And they'll be

**[24:30]** similar. There'll be more, maybe a dozen more next week. The rate of new tools in the GTM space is

**[24:38]** astronomical. It's literally all we do all day long. I've been running LeanScale for five years.

**[24:43]** We have a team embedded in these companies, and it's hard for us to keep up with all the new tools.

**[24:49]** And we run into new ones every single day. But I think you're right. I think it's, yes, build,

**[24:54]** tech that makes processes efficient and can run fast and run at high quality, but also have the

**[25:01]** people on the team that can come in, lean in and help, and then have an opinion about how to solve

**[25:07]** the problem on the operation side. And I think the companies that do that really well, I think

**[25:12]** they're going to thrive in the next couple of years. Yeah, I agree. And I think there's another

**[25:15]** element there, which is you don't have to know all the problem, but if you have customers that

**[25:19]** you're working with, you can package a first level of best practice, like some default capabilities

**[25:25]** out of the box, which is like even the concept of having to ask a question of AI to tell me what's

**[25:34]** going on. You tell me what's going on. Like why am I doing this? There's a weird, it's probably

**[25:46]** more of a getting them a new show, but it's, there are things that are just baseline best practices

**[25:53]** that apply to 70% of the universe. Package those up, package what you know. If you don't package

**[25:59]** it, I'm going to assume you don't know it, but start off the bat and then allow us to kind of

**[26:04]** tweak that as we go. But in order to do that, you're going to have to do some more legwork.

**[26:08]** You're going to have to sit in our shoes. You're going to have to really understand our pain points.

**[26:12]** But the problem is if you don't, we're just going to go build it. Let's talk about the building

## 26:18 — "If a CRO can vibe code it, you don't have a product"

**[26:18]** part because I have spoken to, I've spoken to a few CROs and I'm assuming they must have some

**[26:25]** decent technical background, but they've completely vibe coded their entire tech stack. Now I think

**[26:29]** there's a ceiling to that. I don't think you can do that, especially if you're in industries that

**[26:33]** have a compliance regulation, you need to talk to, but how do you do the build versus buy equation

**[26:41]** in your head? And what is everyone in GTM council saying when it comes to build versus buy? How do

**[26:48]** you navigate that decision? I will tell you this. I think that if you have a product that can get vibe

**[26:58]** coded by a CRO, you do not have a product or you may have a product. Let's be honest. Right now,

**[27:09]** that's the challenge. I think in the sales part of the funnel, which is it's not rocket science.

**[27:17]** There's not that many things that really boost, get you the 80% of your productivity and your

**[27:25]** performance. You need to capture data into your CRM. You need to be able to know what questions

**[27:37]** to ask your prospects and ask your customers. You need to eliminate all the administration.

**[27:43]** I mean, I don't know any survey I've ever read that's less than like two thirds of a sales reps

**[27:48]** time is spent doing administrative work. Clean that off the table. But those are sort of easy

**[27:54]** cloud tasks, like just to administrate some of those things. I don't know how many people have

**[28:00]** come in and say, I built a deal desk agent. I'm like, yeah, exactly. That makes total sense.

**[28:06]** Those pieces I think are easy. I think those are the easiest areas to play. So if you are in the

**[28:12]** sales portion of technology, I think that's probably the biggest thing at risk is that

**[28:19]** a lot of things can be vibe coded because it's a bandwidth. It's a capacity time.

**[28:24]** If your rep is able to be on twice as many calls, or you're able to serve them twice as many good

**[28:30]** calls, or they're able to find twice as many good candidates by not having to do all the other stuff,

**[28:35]** which is zero value, which is stuff we've had to do. Then I think you've unlocked a lot of potential

**[28:41]** without any headcount. I think that's a real easy one for people to understand. It's the pain is

**[28:45]** simple. The pain is real, but it's a simple, relatively simple solve. I think when you start

**[28:50]** getting to like, like marketing capabilities, which there isn't a lot of agentic capabilities

**[28:56]** to the marketing world yet. And then also on the customer success side, support is certainly a

**[29:02]** self-service mentality. Yes, we're just going to default to self-service, but a lot of people try

**[29:07]** that over a couple of years and realize, well, actually our content sucks. And that's actually

**[29:11]** a disaster. So that actually doesn't work. And so I think there's a lot more nuanced in the

**[29:18]** up funnel and the post sales environment, which is a little bit more complex to how you kind of

**[29:25]** address it. But yeah, I mean, I think everyone can vibe code. My take on vibe coding is like,

**[29:31]** transparently, I'm tired of hearing it because everything that somebody has done is, is not

**[29:37]** unique. It's not, there's been no original idea. I love the fact that everyone's doing it and it's

**[29:41]** exposing everyone to the capabilities of what AI is. I just, I'm getting fatigued on, on LinkedIn,

**[29:47]** as far as all the stuff that people are commenting on, because yes, we get it. Everyone can do it,

**[29:52]** but like, what are you really trying to solve and what are you getting to? And, and yes, you should

**[29:56]** have those things. Absolutely. But I think that's not what we should be focusing on. I think we're

**[30:02]** narrowly focusing on these little shiny objects, but like, what's it really getting us? How do we

**[30:06]** incorporate that in the workflow? That's the stuff that's really important, but it's important that

**[30:11]** people realize that if you can dream it, you can kind of do it today. I'm totally with you. I'm

**[30:18]** exhausted with LinkedIn and I may be participating in a lot of that as well, but that's okay.

**[30:25]** All contributors to the downfall. Yeah, it's part of the show. But I do think,

**[30:32]** I do think there are people who are, yes, getting obsessed with their little MVPs and getting

**[30:37]** obsessed with a unique way of solving the same problem, but at the end of the day,

**[30:43]** it's the strategy. It's the process. It's the change management. It's the management of

**[30:47]** that process and then relentlessly delivering against whatever promises you're making

**[30:52]** externally internally. I mean, I worked at a company that was doing multi-billions in sales

**[31:01]** a year and their entire forecast ran on EA's emailing spreadsheets to each other.

**[31:08]** And they forecasted within half a percentage point. So it worked. You don't have to have

**[31:14]** a cool looking tool in order to do it, but I do think you have to have an opinion about

**[31:20]** the process and the strategy. And then yes, build the relevant tools that make it easier.

**[31:24]** Maybe they could have saved a few of those EA's a few hours of their week.

**[31:30]** I'll reiterate that point that you just mentioned is you have to have a point of view.

## 31:33 — Have a point of view or lose mind share

**[31:33]** I think if you're an operator or a vendor and you do not have a strong point of view,

**[31:37]** you're going to get lost because what's going to happen straight away is you're going to lose

**[31:42]** mindshare. And there's some really interesting vendors out there. We've had some conversations

**[31:47]** with some folks that are really taking a strong position. It may not be the right one. I don't

**[31:52]** know, but it's strong and people are rewarding that perspective because they want somebody who

**[31:59]** has some rationale and some logic behind that rationale for what they're going to do.

**[32:03]** If you don't have a perspective, you're not digging in enough. And I think if you, you know,

**[32:08]** the value of the vibe coding piece is it does, it does allow you to rethink. This isn't just

**[32:13]** iterating on what we've done in the past. This is, oh, we can actually do things completely

**[32:17]** differently. If we could start from scratch, what would we do today that we've always thought about

**[32:24]** and we've always had to do in the past? And that's a real break from tradition and from how we've

**[32:29]** kind of built up, you know, most of the senior folks in the space have kind of built up their

**[32:33]** backgrounds on, which is the things that I knew. I just kept repeating them. And that's, it's super

**[32:38]** dangerous right now, because if you're not rethinking stuff from ground zero, you're also

**[32:44]** maybe missing out on something that could transform your organization. And at the end of the day,

**[32:49]** all of us want to, like five years from now, we want to look back and have built the coolest

**[32:54]** organization that had the best outcomes. And if we don't, it's going to be super frustrating and

**[32:59]** disappointing. And we're going to be full of regret for the rest of our lives because we

**[33:02]** missed the opportunity. But like, there's so much opportunity right now. There's so much noise. So

**[33:08]** for all the vendors out there, you've got to break through. If you're interested in coming to the Go

**[33:13]** to Market Council, I'll do the plug there. Like we're meeting with two vendors a month. And right

**[33:18]** now we're getting a backlog, but we will love to come and understand and we'll provide that feedback.

**[33:23]** There's just too much noise out there. And for the operators, figure out what the strong perspective

**[33:28]** is, what's unique, and just continue to try and iterate because there's no one right answer to any

## 33:34 — Buy the infrastructure, build the intelligence

**[33:34]** of this. Like you asked about the build versus buy in the GTEM Council. There is a just promotion

**[33:40]** amount of folks that are building out of this, but then there's certain aspects of let's buy

**[33:46]** the infrastructure and let's build our intelligence. That's something that's kind of being repeated

**[33:51]** quite a bit. But I think the idea there is focus on the things that make you unique. If it's not

**[33:58]** unique, even though you can build it, is that where you want to spend your time? Focus on the

**[34:02]** things that are really going to transform your business, transform your ability to do something

**[34:07]** nuanced. But to kind of do that, as we all know, you've probably seen with a lot of your clients,

**[34:14]** most people are trying to do like advanced degree AI capabilities and they don't even have the right

**[34:20]** data and they're not looking at the right data and the calculations to get the data actually wrong.

**[34:24]** So it's kind of those foundational layers of like, do you even have the right data that you're looking

**[34:29]** at? Do you have the right systems connected? And then what does that tell you who should do and

**[34:33]** continue to get it right? I'm doing a presentation for UpData partners in a couple of weeks.

**[34:41]** And the title of it is, your AI strategy is a data model problem. These LLMs have plenty of horsepower

**[34:48]** for you to do whatever you want. But I actually really like the way you phrase it. I haven't heard

**[34:53]** it put that way. Buy the infrastructure, build the intelligence layer, set another way to build

**[34:59]** that context layer that can help give the infrastructure what it needs to really perform

**[35:05]** at a high level. And I think that's a good way to do it. Like why vibe code a data warehouse or a CRM?

**[35:11]** I think those things are, they're already built. And to your point, there's an opportunity cost to

**[35:16]** doing that and especially taking it the last mile and doing it well. That's a whole other thing.

**[35:21]** But then yeah, get your intelligence in order, build the context graph, get the semantic layer

**[35:26]** in motion and make sure that any AI layer that you have or any agents that you have

**[35:31]** are building on that. It's exactly like we used to say, hey, do everything at stage fit. Otherwise,

**[35:39]** you're just playing business. So let's not play house or play business right now. Let's do the

## 35:44 — The three weaknesses on every sales team

**[35:44]** things that you need to do at this stage. You're playing house and guess what? Everyone else is

**[35:47]** doing the same. And I'll buy a coffee to anybody who will come and tell me differently on these

**[35:55]** three things. If you investigated your sales org and you looked at the three biggest weaknesses

**[36:03]** of any sales team or an individual, I will guarantee you there are three things. One,

**[36:09]** reps aren't prepared to have the conversations when they jump on a call with a prospect or a

**[36:14]** customer. They haven't done the lay work. Two, they don't know how to ask the discovery questions,

**[36:19]** the right discovery questions, and they don't listen enough to be able to continue to ask

**[36:23]** those questions once the customer or a process has responded. They have their own little script.

**[36:29]** I think the last 10 years, the evolution of the Zoom call, I think it could destroy that

**[36:35]** capability that inherently so many people and the best reps still do have, which is just ask

**[36:40]** questions, be inquisitive, understand what's going on. And the last one is pricing. Every rep is,

**[36:47]** for the most part, very sheepish when it comes to putting out a price and be confident. Understand

**[36:54]** what the value is that you're delivering out to the customer. Stand by the price points that you

**[36:59]** have because it's a high cost point, because it's a high value. I will guarantee if you listen to

**[37:05]** all your calls, you digest the challenges, the top three challenges, it's not product understanding,

**[37:09]** whatever else. It's basic fundamentals around knowing who you're talking to, being inquisitive,

**[37:14]** and really getting to the root pain of what the customer is thinking about. And then when you're

**[37:19]** talking about pricing, just be confident. I've been on... I've listened on so many calls with

**[37:23]** great sales leaders and salespeople who would... The record would skip because they would be like,

**[37:29]** "No, no, this is this high." And they'd just be silent and wait. And the customer prospect might

**[37:33]** say no a couple of times, and then eventually they're going to say yes. And it's just the confidence.

**[37:37]** Like this is what you're delivering, and this is when it comes back to like have an opinion.

**[37:41]** Have a stake in the ground. Really understand what you're delivering and the value.

**[37:44]** And if you can do that, then you can charge premiums and whatever else it is. But anyways,

**[37:49]** that was a little bit of a diatribe on that front. But when you talk about everyone's kind

**[37:53]** of doing the same thing, a lot of character traits are the same across the company,

**[37:58]** same across the industry. Figure out where the nuances is and how you make all those things

**[38:03]** better. No, I think it's fully related. If you're looking at all the problems you could go solve,

**[38:08]** each one has a certain level of leverage of improvement. And I guarantee it's not dialing

**[38:14]** in your N8N flows and building another agent that's going to move the needle. It's doing the

**[38:19]** fundamentals extraordinarily well, time and time again, being disciplined, letting it compound,

**[38:25]** letting it stack. And then that's where you're likely to find the most success.

**[38:30]** I have to ask, since I have, I consider you the godfather of RevOps. I don't know if

**[38:34]** anybody else calls you that, but it's a title of you in my head. You have an extraordinary

**[38:43]** track record and I've listened to you and read your articles. And I feel like you're one of the

**[38:47]** few people who really, really gets what RevOps is at a deep level. Even quoting your article,

**[38:54]** it shouldn't be called RevOps. It's go to market ops, which we have stolen here at Lean Scale.

**[38:58]** So I hope you know that inspired that. But what do you think is foundational? That's always going

**[39:05]** to be there in this RevOps function. And then what do you think we need to add? And maybe speak to

**[39:13]** somebody who's sitting in a director of RevOps, a VP of RevOps role.

**[39:17]** What's sage wisdom? And then what are they going to need to learn next?

**[39:23]** I think it's interesting. I think the source of the answer to that question comes in,

**[39:27]** how all of us ended up getting in, getting here. We took a left turn instead of a right at some

**[39:31]** point in our career. Wait, you didn't major in this in college. I thought you did.

**[39:37]** Yeah, I did the full loop. I was escaping investment banking at the time. So I think

**[39:47]** the piece that I've always strove to understand is what is that role of ops? Because when I was

**[39:53]** getting into it, it was kind of emerging and developing. And it was Salesforce who was sales

**[39:58]** strategy. And I've said this before, but I spent so much of my time with HR and DemandGen and all

**[40:04]** these other roles outside of the sales team that then it was like, well, it's not just sales

**[40:08]** strategy. It's go to market and you build out. I think the challenge that I see, and this question

## 40:16 — A CRO is an architect, not a VP of Sales with a new title

**[40:16]** has come in different forms, which is where does the role of ops sit? And I think that's the one

**[40:23]** that kind of plays back to my mind. For myself, I remember when I was first seven years of my

**[40:28]** career, I was in sales and while being in your twenties and making a lot of money is awesome.

**[40:34]** I would go by the conference room and there'd be folks in their planning on what we're going

**[40:37]** to do next year and how to develop it. And my desire was to be in that room and be a part of

**[40:43]** that and what it makes. And so even my first boss at the time was like, you're not a salesperson,

**[40:47]** like go figure out how to get into that room and what your role is. And so as I kind of evolved

**[40:53]** into that piece, I think ops in a lot of eyes is the folks that are just doing things. And I've

**[41:00]** come into a lot of organizations where that was the default. It was taking instructions from

**[41:04]** somebody and going and doing it. But if we have all the capabilities and by capabilities, I mean,

**[41:11]** we have the access to what's happening across the business from product to marketing and sales and

**[41:21]** post sales and support and professional services. We have all that context and we're thinking

**[41:26]** through the little gaps that sit in between and we're kind of thinking about the whole life cycle.

**[41:30]** What is ultimately the benefit is that is what should we then do with the business? How do we

**[41:34]** transform that into where we're really good next year and where we invest more or maybe where we

**[41:40]** pull back? And oftentimes where I feel the role is limited is, you know, if you're in a, you're

**[41:46]** reporting to a CRO who's focused on that world, you're making the CRO successful, but you're not

**[41:52]** necessarily thinking about everything else. And so I think it's important for this role to sit

**[41:57]** aside from that. And in fact, we're going to do a briefing on the role of the evolution of the

**[42:04]** career of ops because more and more we're seeing ops leaders become CROs. And what's interesting

**[42:10]** to that is I think there are CROs that are really just VPs of sales, right? It's the title just

**[42:16]** changed. Like it was, it was hip to be a head of sales. Now it's hip to be a CRO,

**[42:19]** but fundamentally a CRO is an architect. And that's what you're building out. You're trying

**[42:24]** to connect all the pieces. What does the infrastructure look like and the resources

**[42:28]** I need and how to drive that? A lot of the sales leaders I know hate that stuff. That's not what

**[42:33]** they wanted. They want to be in the deals. They want to be sales leaders. And so what does that

**[42:37]** role really become? So it's actually interesting. There's a lot of GTM council members that have

**[42:41]** evolved into president of GTM or CRO. And I think that's a real possibility, but I do think it's

**[42:48]** that C title that sits at the table, that's helping architect where the business is going.

**[42:54]** It could also certainly be COO. That role has been the weirdest title I've ever known. It's

**[43:01]** been the most disenfranchised title. It seems to be the founder who didn't get the CEO title

**[43:07]** becomes the COO. But functionally, if you're go-to-market leaning, that is very plausible to how

**[43:14]** to think through the infrastructure of what you build out from the company and how you deliver

**[43:19]** that. So I think, again, winding back to your question of what does this role need? I think

**[43:27]** you need to be able to perspective of like, why does this matter? Why do I care about what's going

**[43:32]** on and what does this ultimately mean? And so trying to connect those dots of algorithmic

**[43:37]** problem solving to what does this mean for next year and the year beyond? And what can we do as

**[43:42]** a business? I know what we want to do. I know what the Excel spreadsheet says our three-year plan is,

**[43:46]** but what can we really do and how can we affect it? That's the engine of a business. And so if you

**[43:52]** don't think that you're important in this role, not to grandize this role, it's not rocket science.

**[43:58]** It's just people that are super passionate about building. Like we love building companies

**[44:02]** and we love digging into the details of what it takes. And it's exciting to us and we love the

**[44:07]** frustration for some reason, but it's really exciting when we see those successes. And that's

**[44:14]** what I would hold back to say. Are you in the organization that's leaning in? If you're

**[44:20]** frustrated by the decisions that your executive team is making, you might not be at the right

**[44:24]** company. I've learned that over my career and it's what it is. It's fine. But like oftentimes,

**[44:30]** ops people are brought in because not because things are shiny and rosy. Ops people are often

**[44:35]** brought in because there's some compelling event that said, you know what? We need to invest in

**[44:40]** this role more. We need a more senior person to come in. And so that's the challenge of like,

**[44:44]** how do you then take that and elevate it? So that's my take there. I think it's a really fun role.

**[44:51]** There's no one route to it. There's no one path in it. There's no one perspective of how you

**[44:57]** drive it. But I do think you need to have back to, you need to have an opinion. You need to have a

**[45:02]** perspective. It needs to be logic based. And you want to make a difference. Get up there and stand

**[45:08]** up on your soapbox and fight for what you believe in to be the right answer or the right direction

**[45:15]** to fight for that. Fight for the right answer. And so super fulfilling when it happens,

**[45:21]** super frustrating when it doesn't. I have been through a lot of those ups and downs.

## 45:28 — How to become the pipeline czar

**[45:28]** One venue I feel like gives a RevOps professional a stage to really show off that opinionated

**[45:37]** approach and show some leadership and show some guidance in a given direction is when it comes

**[45:43]** to GTM planning. I feel like of all the projects, all the initiatives, all the things that you could

**[45:49]** go wrap your hands around the one that really gets you the visibility and then gets you in that room

**[45:55]** at that table like you're mentioning and can potentially tee up that next stage. I feel like

**[46:00]** has to happen in planning. Have you found a similar situation in your career watching and others?

**[46:07]** Yes. And in fact, in doing so, I've often I've joined companies mid-year and it's really weird

**[46:14]** because I'm living in somebody else's plan. And so at times you're like, I don't know

**[46:20]** the decision we made to get here, but I'm trying to figure it out. So absolutely. The planning is

**[46:25]** where you need to be able to put all those insights together. And I think that's a great

**[46:30]** area. And I think the other part of planning is the capacity side. There's two sides. There's like,

**[46:37]** where do we want to try to get to? And then how do we build that up on the capacity front? And

**[46:41]** there's the marketing, there's a marketing, I would say pipeline capacity, sales capacity,

**[46:47]** and product capacity. If you triangulate those three together and that the product side too,

**[46:52]** is I think an untapped area as an opportunity for operations. Why does product not get an operator

**[47:00]** that's part of the go to market to think about their world? It's the same world. They just need

**[47:04]** to think about it more on product slices. Salesforce had this back in the day and it's one of the things

**[47:09]** I was like, that was such a brilliant call because you do need that ability to layer. So if you can

**[47:16]** take the product and the pipeline and the sales, I think what's really important is the pipeline

**[47:20]** model at the end of the day for the planning. The pipeline is something that everybody in the

**[47:26]** company can touch. Everybody can impact pipeline, not necessarily for this quarter, but for future

**[47:31]** quarters, whether it's marketing sales, post-sales product. If we know where we're weak or where we're

**[47:37]** strong, we can adjust and make those decisions. If you want to seem like a god, become the pipeline

**[47:42]** czar at your company. Really understand the dynamics of how it works, the coverage you need,

**[47:48]** the pipe gen you need, who's really building it, how does it get built, what happens to it,

**[47:54]** what are the levers that actually impact it, and most importantly, being able to start predicting

**[47:58]** it for quarters and multiple quarters to come because that's literally the only way you can

**[48:03]** forecast future quarters. And if you can start doing that for a CEO, you are effectively the

**[48:09]** golden child. So the planning is where it materializes. If you mess up on that and for

**[48:15]** all those with calendar years ending in December, you should be in deep on that at this point right

**[48:21]** now to put the best foot forward. What are the data you need to get there? What are the considerations

**[48:26]** you need to make? What are the assumptions across the company? And then trying to put that into

**[48:31]** something really actionable. It's super tough, but I will sit right by your comment. It is about the

**[48:39]** planning. I think if you've been in a company where it's done well, you can feel it. And if you've

**[48:45]** let it, it definitely unlocked a million doors for me. And if you've been in a company that hasn't

**[48:52]** done it well, you can really feel the pain of that. And hopefully you only have to go through

**[48:57]** that once or twice. But yeah, I agree with you. I think that just unlocks a lot of career potential,

**[49:05]** unlocks potential for the business as well. And if you can get that pipeline part dialed in

**[49:10]** and can start forecasting, not just, yes, you'll be in good graces with the CEO, CRO, whatever

**[49:17]** you're reporting into, but it also could mean tens of millions to your evaluation.

**[49:22]** Yes. So if you're fundraising, if you're going through an exit process and you can bring,

**[49:28]** turn this into a math problem with real data that you've been running for multiple years,

**[49:32]** and then actually be able to project it, break it down by channel, show the capacity plan,

**[49:37]** show exactly in detail where you're going to target and where you're going to expand and grow.

**[49:42]** That is priceless when you're going through one of those scenarios.

**[49:45]** Yep. You are the source of truth. And I have, I don't know if there's in the, you know, I would

**[49:52]** say 90% of the meetings I've ever shown up like around pipeline health, for example,

**[49:56]** where somebody else didn't come up with a different version of the data that I have. And so by being

**[50:01]** part of the, that pipeline czar concept, you own the source of truth. And that is the way to look

**[50:06]** at the business. And there is no other truth beyond that. And I'll go back to a lesson I learned

**[50:13]** in, in, in finance, which is data is fact, but the, the, it's a very objective data is objective,

**[50:22]** but what you take from that data is very subjective. And the problem with that is you

**[50:27]** could take the same data set and probably create two diametrically opposed outputs based on just

**[50:35]** how you measure it or the timing or whatever it might be, the way you filter it. And so the

**[50:41]** important thing is, is that as an operator, you really understand the levers that control

**[50:47]** the trends that you're seeing and the fundamentals because data can lie and people will, you know,

**[50:53]** the banking scenario is people would start with the answer and build the model to support the

**[50:57]** answer. So if you understand that, then you'll never look at data the same way again and making

**[51:02]** sure that you're, you're leveraging the right assumptions. There's nothing worse than being

**[51:07]** like, oh, we thought this was going to happen this year. And it didn't, and you didn't, you

**[51:11]** didn't address it. And you're like, well, we're four months in, what do we do? We totally messed

**[51:15]** up on our plan. That's, you never want to be in that position. You want to be able to fully vet,

**[51:20]** vet whatever the inputs that are going to go into your planning well in advanced. And it just

**[51:26]** really helps to get everyone on the same page. Everyone's moving really fast, particularly now

**[51:31]** it's, it's not companies being, you know, departmental leads being, being malicious or

**[51:35]** anything. It's just everyone's moving fast and things, things fall apart between the connection

**[51:40]** points of every department. And so you can be that individual that not only provides the glue,

**[51:46]** but provides the insights that helps everybody better. So good ops person, you should help

**[51:50]** the entire company do well. And therefore the valuation goes up and everybody, everybody wins.

**[51:55]** Like we have no other motivation than, than enterprise value at the end of the day.

**[52:00]** One hundred percent. My CRO, Tom Miller, he used to say, if you torture the data long enough,

**[52:06]** it'll tell you anything you want it to. So, and I think I've definitely seen that play out a few

## 52:12 — The origin of GTM Council

**[52:12]** times. I'd love for you to share the history of GTM council. I feel like it's such a unique

**[52:21]** group of operators. It has such a long history in standing. I would love to just hear how that

**[52:28]** got started, what you all are doing today and what the future of that looks like as well.

**[52:32]** Yeah, it was super fun. I mean, it was, it was 10 years ago, I was at Okta,

**[52:37]** Andy Moet was at box and we got connected through our CMOs. Probably each of us was telling,

**[52:43]** go learn from the other person and be better. And so we got together and we were talking and then

**[52:50]** we started realizing that I think we were implementing, I might've been playing at the

**[52:54]** time or something. It was an early iteration. It was just a really brutal product to deal with.

**[52:59]** And so I was just going out there talking to other ops people, like who are the other leaders out

**[53:03]** there that are actually making an impact in this space and that have some like just, I need to

**[53:09]** learn from somebody else because I'm kind of making this stuff as, as we go. And so I, we,

**[53:14]** you know, I started meeting some really cool individuals who are part of the original,

**[53:19]** the OG crew of, of the, of the go to market council. So that's how we started. It was about

**[53:24]** a dozen of us and we would meet regularly and just kind of share ideas and best practices.

**[53:30]** And then we realized the more senior we got in these roles that we weren't able to be as involved

**[53:36]** in like, what are some of the vendors doing out there? And do they have a perspective on this

**[53:40]** market that we should be leaning into an understanding that might change the way we

**[53:45]** build our organization or, or build our emotions out. And the challenge was for us to do that,

**[53:50]** you got to go everything that we built in our market. You got to go talk to an SDR and then

**[53:54]** you got to go take to any, like we were getting the sales pitches and that was frustrating when

**[53:57]** you have the bandwidth. It's like, what if we just took the founders of these companies,

**[54:00]** invited them to come speak with us and wear their ICP. So we're happy to come back and we're all

**[54:05]** had senior titles at the time. So you would have value back to you to understand what we're

**[54:11]** thinking about and what we care about. And it would give us an hour just to really dig deep

**[54:15]** on what's going on. And I, we had this epiphany because like we'd, we'd kind of been doing this

**[54:20]** when I was at Okta with Andreessen would have our team go and do, you know, show up in 30 minutes

**[54:26]** since and showcase for all the, all the, you know, any company that wanted to come in and

**[54:30]** talk to their portfolios, you do these little like road shows and like, that would be really

**[54:34]** interesting, but, but with a different context, like we really want to learn and not the sales

**[54:38]** pitch. We want the investment pitch. We want the, why did you create this company? How are you

**[54:43]** thinking about this? What is it really impacting and changing and how are you doing it differently

**[54:47]** than somebody else? And so we would learn a bunch. The companies would learn a bunch. I think a bunch

**[54:53]** of advisory roles popped out from that. I think a lot of investments actually came from some of

**[54:57]** that. And so we were kind of growing for a while and then we probably had 40 or 50 people. And at

**[55:03]** some point, you know, the tech stack kind of got stale. And so while we were meeting frequently and

**[55:08]** just chatting, there wasn't a lot of new innovation going on. It was kind of that circa 2009 to 2012

**[55:15]** cohort of companies that had kind of emerged that was the last great bastion. But then with AI,

**[55:19]** everything started blossoming again, and there was some really interesting trends and everyone got

**[55:24]** excited. And so we went from 40, 50 people to now we're about 150. And as you mentioned, we, we

**[55:30]** launched the podcast this year, we do the two founders per month, which I think maybe are our

**[55:35]** limit. You know, writing some thought leadership pieces, doing some webinars and briefings. And

**[55:41]** the thing that I think we're really come, we gravitate towards is one, it's just a really strong

**[55:45]** community of folks that are leaning in and want to be thought leaders. But the other thing that's

**[55:50]** been really valuable is, and I'm going to fault Toby at Shopify for this, I'm going to go out

**[55:54]** and just call them out. All these tweets over the last couple of years, just blew up our inboxes,

**[56:01]** because your tweet would be retweeted and sent around by every VC in the Valley to all their

**[56:06]** portfolio companies and saying, why aren't you doing this? And the challenge that we ultimately

**[56:10]** had was, we felt that there was a gap between what AI means to an organization, what the C-suite

**[56:17]** thought they meant, or the CEO thought it meant, versus the opera, the folks that are actually

**[56:21]** doing it. What did it really mean? How's it really happening? And we felt that there was a divide

**[56:26]** there that was causing friction, causing a lot of just commotion and busy activity that wasn't

**[56:33]** leading anywhere. And so we can use this forum to provide some thought leadership about what

**[56:40]** are the ways we can use AI? How are people using it? What are the best practices? What are the

**[56:44]** challenges that are coming across in most of these new tech stack companies that are all embedded,

**[56:49]** embedding AI within them, or just built on AI? And so that became really interesting. We're like,

**[56:53]** let's create that thought leadership buffer that allows the C-suite to really get a glimpse of

**[56:59]** what's happening, but then also can showcase the talent of this community, allow us to learn a

**[57:05]** bunch, and help us be better individuals within our own companies. And so it's been so much fun.

**[57:13]** The podcast we released won a week at this point. And the huddles we're bringing the founders is

**[57:21]** super fun. But even our internal Slack channels, there is some spicy conversations happening. And

**[57:29]** even though we have a lot of, some of the tech vendors have representatives in this council,

**[57:34]** we're not about the vendor, we're about the individual, and everyone says their piece. And

**[57:40]** it's super supportive and collaborative. And it's crazy. It's not crazy. It's just, it's super

**[57:48]** rewarding to see like everybody thriving on this. And it was just this little idea that happened

**[57:54]** upon when we was like, we just need other people to talk to that have similar challenges and problems.

**[57:58]** We need to learn more. So yeah, it's right about 150 folks right now. And it's absolutely been a

**[58:06]** blast. And we're happy so many people are enjoying it. Well, I'm really fired up about what you all

**[58:11]** are doing with GTM council. I think it's, it's what the real operators are doing. It's not the

**[58:16]** hype on LinkedIn, the hype on X, and it's just, Hey, this is actually what's happening in the field.

**[58:22]** And I think it's refreshingly authentic and real. And I'm excited to see the content that you all

**[58:30]** produce. I'm excited to see how you develop and grow over time. And no, this has just been

**[58:37]** absolutely lights out. And I appreciate everything that you brought to this podcast. I think there's

**[58:44]** very few people who really have their feet on the ground and the foundations of what operations and

**[58:52]** strategy is and go to market and have a real keen sense of likely where this stuff is going and what

**[58:58]** you need to do to stay sharp for the future. So I appreciate everything you shared, everything from,

**[59:02]** Hey, I'm not buying vendors anymore. I need you to have expertise. I need you to have everything

**[59:08]** that you need to have the full capability to solve the problems that I have on my side,

**[59:14]** the build versus buy discussion that we have, when should you build once you buy? I really like how

**[59:18]** you framed it with buy the infrastructure, build the intelligence in the context, and then everything

**[59:23]** you're doing with GTM council is just so exciting. So Noah, thank you for being on the podcast. Really

**[59:28]** appreciate it. And can't wait to see what you do next. Thanks, Anthony. Really appreciate it. Thanks

**[59:33]** for inviting me on here and thanks for being a part of the community.