Why I care so much about Talent – and why you need to too

Hello and welcome to The Modern GTM Executive by Lunar Executive Search - read by 2,000+ leading Sales, Marketing, and Executive Leaders within Growth-Stage Technology businesses. We’re here to help people redefine their perspective on modern revenue acquisition models, understand what talent & skills are necessary to do so, and how to find the to 10% of GTM Leaders to execute.

Why I care so much about Talent – and why you need to too

This is a shorter newsletter geared primarily towards my Founder/CEO network.     Having excellent talent inside your organization is already a huge advantage vs your competitors. Obviously. But it's rarely the only competitive edge. 

You could have a stronger, more developed software product for your customers. Better connections to venture investors that fund the business and accelerate growth. More sophisticated marketing programs, driven by functional expertise & advanced visibility to prospects. Proprietary data access. Location advantages. Network exponentials.   

But that is all changing rapidly. AI is democratizing the access to and engineering of enterprise-grade technology products at rapid pace. It's making it dramatically more economical, slowly taking away much of the need for large external fundraises. Features can be developed in days or hours, done so with teams one tenth the size. Soon enough – you can literally just speak in plain English to an AI toolset and it will create, optimize, and deploy anything you want.    When technology creation becomes this easy, the edges that used to take years and millions of dollars to build will vanish almost overnight. 

Distribution will get cheaper. Code will become a commodity. Investor relationships won’t matter as much when the capital required to build is a fraction of what it once was. The playing field is flattening fast. 

When technology is no longer the moat, talent exclusively becomes the moat.  

When all else is equal – the people inside your business are the only things that will keep you ahead. 

They bring things that will never be replicated in a technological sense (at least not for some time. Creativity, inspiration, taste, motivation, connection, intuition, leadership, vibes, the nuanced judgement that comes from lived experience – limitless human features that truly create value and benefit humanity.    

Founders who recognize this early and compete hardest for the very best talent - not just to fill seats, but to truly elevate the organization - are going to be the ones who win the next decade. 

We've seen this already manifesting in a number of ways: 

• The Zuckerberg researcher shopping spree

  • Meta has quietly been hiring top AI researchers and engineers at unprecedented salaries, knowing that the people building the models are the real differentiator. 

  • 200M for Ruoming Pang, 100-300M offers to ~10 top OpenAI Researchers, 14.3B Investment into Scale AI (hiring their CEO, Alex Wang, as Chief AI Officer), etc. 

• The OpenAI / io (Jony Ives) acquisition 

  • OpenAI’s move to bring in one of the most visionary product designers (buying his company for 6.5B that literally hasn't sold a product yet) of our time signals that taste and creativity will define the next era of AI products as much as raw technical horsepower. 

• The Anthropic talent exodus from Google 

  • A handful of high-performing researchers left Google to start Anthropic, now one of OpenAI’s top competitors, proving how a single cluster of talent can create an entirely new market force. 

• The Palantir “Special Forces” model 

  • Palantir has built its business around small, elite, highly capable teams who can embed with customers and drive outcomes far beyond their size—showing the power of quality over quantity. 

Strong talent on your team has always been an advantage.  

Now, it's the single greatest advantage you can have. 

Soon, it will be the ONLY advantage you can have. 

My recommendation to leaders to account for this change? Your job now is near exclusively one of a 'Talent Investor'. The same way you’d evaluate capital allocation with rigor, your approach to hiring should be systematic, data-driven, and science-based—because people are the most important investment you’ll make. 

Latest Job Opportunities

We've got a number of active opportunities across our portfolio of software clients at Lunar Executive Search currently.

A few select openings:

• Field CISO / Director of SE - Cyber Vendor - Remote

• Regional Sales Director - MSSP – North Central

• Regional Sales Director - MSSP - TOLA

• Enterprise Account Executive - Manufacturing SaaS – East Coast

• Sales Engineer (Strategic Partnerships) - Cyber Vendor - Remote

• Sales Engineer - Cyber Vendor - Remote

I'm also always look to great candidates for future roles:

• Chief Revenue Officer - Venture/PE-Backed - SaaS/Cyber/AI

• Chief Marketing Officer - Venture/PE-Backed - SaaS/Cyber/AI

• VP of Product Marketing - Venture/PE-Backed - SaaS/Cyber/AI

• VP of Partnerships - Venture/PE-Backed - SaaS/Cyber/AI

Highlights from The GTM Kickback! Podcast

We had a few great interviews on The GTM Kickback! recently, with many more already booked and recorded on the way.

Check them out below:

Want to be a guest? Ping me on LinkedIn! 😎

We're looking for: High-performance GTM Operators, VC/PE Investors in SaaS, and Leading GTM Consultants for early stage technology businesses

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This newsletter is powered by Lunar Executive Search - Finding Premier GTM Talent for Growth Stage Tech Businesses. 

We help disruptive technology companies grow. For venture-funded start-ups and PE-backed enterprise software firms, we have a track record in finding the Top 10% of Sales and Marketing Leadership Talent, and doing so swiftly. 

Reach out to me here: [email protected] 

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Till next time, 

Joey