This article is based on part one of Ken Roden’s insightful interview on GTM-FM. Check it out here!
AI is an undeniable force shaping the business landscape. Leaders across industries are having more conversations about what the future of AI means for their organizations.
With new AI tools emerging all the time, we're spoiled for choice and have the opportunity to learn how to effectively implement these tools to facilitate, automate, and improve existing processes. What once took hours can now take minutes.
However, more importantly, the team leaders guiding these AI-driven changes can create a meaningful and lasting impact on the overall business strategy.
In this evolving landscape, where does go-to-market (GTM) fit? What can leadership do to ensure teams adapt to changes in healthy, meaningful ways? As a marketing leader with over 10 years of experience in B2B marketing, I'm here to help answer these questions and more.
GTM Alliance
The qualities of a great GTM leader
GTM needs strong leadership.
It's a core part of any business – if you don’t succeed in GTM, you can’t succeed as a business. GTM leadership roles involve owning the team and strategy, which can only thrive with effective leadership.
Great GTM leaders have to be able to see the big picture, inspire teams, and ensure value is delivered to customers. You also need a combination of hard (technical) skills and soft (human) skills.
Essential hard skills include:
- Knowing your customers
- Understanding which channels work for your business
- Familiarity with your partner ecosystem and products
However, as tech evolves and AI takes over more GTM processes, leaders will need to invest more in their soft skills. In fact, these soft skills are now referred to as “durable skills” due to their lasting value. Here are a couple of key ones to keep in mind:
- Strong communication
- Effective change management and stakeholder management (especially in large organizations)
- Empathy
Employees are looking for leaders who not only 'talk the talk' and 'walk the walk' but also understand what's happening in the market and demonstrate empathy for their teams' day-to-day experiences.
While hard skills are important for doing the job, soft skills are what make a good leader. People will remember the soft skills and how a leader builds trust and inspires people to follow them. Learning the technical aspects is important, but to truly lead, you have to master the human skills.
The leadership skills gap
Today, there’s a disconnect between GTM leaders and their employees.
For GTM leaders, these human and leadership skills are core to the role. If your employees don't think you have these skills, there's a gap in your ability to lead the organization and connect with employees.
As GTM leaders, we need to focus more on how we show up and what skills we lean into to connect with our employees authentically.
The importance of care and authenticity in leadership
One skill that has differentiated me as a leader is that I genuinely care.
Early in my career, someone I considered a mentor told me I didn't have the "knack for business" because I cared too much and couldn't separate my feelings from my work. However, I've since managed over 100 people directly, and our success stemmed from the fact that I care. There's nothing wrong with caring deeply about your work and your team.
When I’m excited or distressed, I try to manage it appropriately for my team’s sake, but they don’t know what’s going on. They can feel that I care about the work we do and about them as individuals. My authenticity is part of that—they know they'll always get the real me, not a facade.
Employees don't want to be misled or presented with only the best-case scenarios. They want the real deal, to know what's happening because they feel connected to their work. It’s important for them to feel that connection.
Care and authenticity are crucial.
Finding the right culture fit
As a leader, you also need to pay attention to company culture.
Culture fit is incredibly important, but we must have guardrails to eliminate bias and promote inclusive hiring practices. This goes beyond just hiring the types of people who fit your idea of what someone in a particular role is like, as that can lead to biased decisions. When done right, aligning on culture can create high-performing teams.
Too often, I've seen senior leaders join a company and try to blow everything up. They’ll try to justify it by saying, “Well, I’m trying to make this change, and I’m very qualified to do so.”
But the existing culture—whatever that looks like—needs to be respected and joined, not disrupted.
Listening to the market and employees
When we consider how vital GTM is to an organization's success, a key question arises: Should GTM as a whole inform leadership, or should it be the other way around?
The answer lies in listening more to our employees and the market.
While buyers initially signal a preference for a digital-only experience, after shopping without a seller, they're significantly more likely to experience buyer's remorse. In other words, there’s a huge disconnect – buyers say they don't want sellers, but then they regret buying products through self-service.
And we're seeing a major shift in how people make buying decisions.
Charley Gale
Peer reviews used to be all the rage, but they’re becoming less and less influential. Instead, people need to know the person making the recommendation. Plus, they want clear business impact and ROI information before they make a purchasing decision. All this means we need a more human-led approach to GTM.
So, how do GTM leaders incorporate this insight into their strategy? It’s tricky, to say the least!
To address all these changes, GTM leaders need to listen to the market and their employees. This means being in the field, talking to customers, and examining the data presented to us.
The way forward can’t be dictated by leadership alone, nor by GTM teams. It's a two-way street, where GTM leaders listen to and incorporate insights from the market and their employees to shape an effective GTM strategy.
Blending AI and human elements in GTM
Humans are inherently inconsistent and emotional beings, so it's not surprising that our buying behaviors for software reflect those traits.
While B2B buyers can certainly be very pragmatic, they often have an emotional need to solve their own problems – especially senior-level buyers who tend to be more solution-oriented.
As AI tools grow ever more powerful, we can expect to see buyers turning to large language models (like ChatGPT or Claude) to find the best solutions, vendors, and ROI case studies for their needs. That means that we, as go-to-market leaders, need to ensure our solutions are well-represented within these AI tools.
However, the human element will still play a crucial role. Buyers will likely seek out genuine insights and stats from peers they trust, rather than relying solely on potentially incentivized reviews.
Research from Edelman has also found that thought leadership from reputable sources is a powerful tool for helping B2B buyers select software or reconsider existing solutions. That’s interesting because it shows that, while we’re seeing more and more content being mass-produced by AI, there’s still a demand for high-quality, educational content that can inform buying decisions.
We're seeing a shift in buying behaviors and patterns, but the overall buying process remains inherently human.
Key takeaways
To wrap up, great go-to-market leadership in the age of AI requires a blend of hard skills, soft skills, market awareness, and the willingness to embrace change. It's all about striking the right balance between human elements and AI-driven efficiencies. Here are the some key things to remember:
💡 Balance hard and soft skills: Effective GTM leaders must see the big picture, inspire their teams, and ensure customers get real value. Hard skills like product knowledge are table stakes, but mastering “durable” soft skills like communication, empathy, and change management is crucial.
👉👈 Bridge the leadership gap: There's a major leadership skills gap – most employees don't think their GTM leaders have the human skills needed to lead effectively. Leaders need to focus on authentically connecting with their teams.
❤️ Lead with authenticity: Caring about your work and your people, and showing that care through authenticity, is a critical leadership skill. Employees want the real deal, not some sanitized version of you.
👂 Pay attention to the market and your employees: Buyer preferences are shifting rapidly, so you need to gather customer insights and incorporate employee feedback to shape an effective GTM approach.
🤖 Blend AI and human touches: AI tools like ChatGPT will play a big role, but human elements like trusted peer recommendations and thought leadership remain vital for B2B purchasing decisions. Blend AI and human touches for maximum impact.
🧭 Get culture fit right: Getting the culture fit right for your teams is essential. Focus on aligned attitudes and mindsets over narrow role definitions.
I'll be back soon to dive deeper into how AI is transforming the go-to-market landscape and what it means for marketing leaders, so stay tuned!
Can’t wait? Check out part two of my interview on GTM-FM here.
