GTM over recent years has come a long way from how we first viewed the term.
Go-to-market used to describe a one-time effort to bring a product or service to market. It was (relatively) simple.
Now, GTM is a broad (and evolving) umbrella term that covers all aspects of revenue creation, including the efforts of any function that drives growth. GTM has become a focal point in nearly every facet of an organization. From board room conversations to new business initiatives to the very way companies structure their teams and define roles, GTM has emerged as a way of… well, simply doing business.
While this integrated approach ensures that every part of the organization contributes to overall business success, GTM can quickly become a land of ambiguity and constant experimentation to find “what works.”
TLDR: This has ultimately rendered the search for GTM leadership talent and bullseye candidates far more challenging than it ever used to be, as companies seek leaders capable of steering through uncertainty and driving sustainable growth simultaneously.
According to a recent 2024 Hunt Club Market Survey, companies are in fact gearing up for a number of big changes in the next 12–24 months.
From market expansion to launching a new product to inching toward profitability, every business decision at this time is laddering up to successful execution. And right now, companies are rethinking their GTM strategy with the right GTM leaders in place to do so.
Because, despite having a clear plan or strategy to take on new initiatives or “go to market,” over 61% of these organizations report they lack the right talent to pull it off.
“The ability to make money has become harder. Most of the motions that we've been running in the past aren’t working as well anymore. They're less efficient, and much more costly.So now you've got Sales, Marketing, Customer Success leaders, and other functions who are all trying to figure this out. Nobody really knew how to unify the efforts of these teams into a cohesive movement and drive revenue consistently. Until recently. The next big explosive movement to drive business along happens to be GTM.”Judd Borakove |
To better understand the ways GTM is driving the way companies operate and hire talent, we spoke to 6x C-suite leader and GTM expert, Judd Borakove. Borakove is a seasoned executive, 6x CxO with three exits, and has extensive experience in driving growth and strategic initiatives across various industries.
His expertise lies in GTM strategies, sales performance, and is the host of the podcast, GTM Unfiltered. He shares with us some of the mistakes organizations make when it comes to GTM strategy and the top indicators that might signal orgs have the wrong GTM leaders in place.
One of the biggest signs that indicate an organization may have the wrong GTM leaders in seat is a clear break or dysfunction between critical departments — primarily Sales, Marketing, and Customer Success. These teams are the backbone of any go-to-market strategy, and if they're not operating in sync, it's a red flag for your leadership. Ask yourself:
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“When it comes to GTM, everybody thinks they get it,” Borakove shares. “But then you look under the hood and just ask a couple of questions, it’s clear not everyone is on the same page. If you aren't focused as an organization on internal communication and connectivity between these teams, good luck.”
Another clear sign of misaligned GTM leadership is stalled revenue growth alongside rising customer acquisition costs (or costs in general). Without the right GTM leadership, growth efforts become inefficient, which, as Borakove points out, is a key indicator that the wrong leaders are in place.
“GTM became a lot bigger after the COVID boom faded,” Borakove explains. “During the boom, money was cheap, and it didn’t matter what you were selling—people were buying. But now, with the cost of capital rising and investors no longer throwing money at us, we all had to become efficient and prove that we were a viable business in concept. Everyone’s realizing it all comes down to efficiency now. We went from this bankrolled growth to having to do more with less.”
If your GTM teams are still operating under old growth assumptions, it’s a sign your leadership may not have adapted to the new reality. Strong GTM leadership prioritizes efficiency, optimizing every dollar spent to drive sustainable revenue growth and deliver proportional returns.
This may be harder to detect, as inadequate time and resources are things that aren’t always in the control of GTM leaders. However, if you find that your GTM leaders and your organization at large appear to always seem pressed for time and struggling to allocate resources, this may be a symptom of the wrong GTM leaders at the helm.
When asked about some of the mistakes companies make when trying to determine if they have the right GTM strategies and talent in place, Borakove shared the importance of time and resource management.
“Companies need to allow enough time to prove something out. A lot of times, I see executives and members of companies aren't given enough runway to find the right concept and discover what GTM strategies actually work,” shares Borakove. “If you can give it enough time to experiment and then start building, you're going to find what works for your organization.”
“If your GTM leadership doesn’t understand the partners they’re working with, and if your partners don't speak direct sales or GTM, you're in trouble.”Judd Borakove |
In a dynamic market, GTM strategies are not executed in isolation. “Internal or external, there are so many kinds of partnerships that people don't realize are at our disposal. You could co-sell, you could have referrals, you could have resellers, the list goes on,” shares Borakove.
However, without the right GTM leadership, partnerships may be poorly negotiated or misaligned. This could lead to missed opportunities, or worse, partnerships that drain resources without delivering value.
Additionally, weak or nonexistent partnerships are a sign that your leadership may not have the vision or network to leverage external collaborations effectively. If your organization lacks these partnerships or struggles to sustain them, it’s a clear sign you may have the wrong leaders in place.
“Every 5 to 10 years, there's a big explosive movement of what's next that propels businesses forward. Go-to-market is that movement. If you looked back at the one prior to GTM, you had things like ABM and category creation,” says Borakove. “All of those things now fall under GTM. If you think about it, now we've taken a level up to say GTM is the all-encompassing umbrella that all of these other movements and trends fall under.”
The question now is, do you have the right talent to not only keep up but lead this charge? In a world where GTM strategy defines the future of business, the right talent is key to unlocking your company's next phase of growth.
Judd Borakove is a 6x C-suite operator and GTM leader in the Hunt Club ExpertAccess Program, which puts first-string operators in your back pocket for all things talent so you can hire better, smarter, and faster.