Episode 59 - Summer Cognoscenti Wrap-up with Ian Truscott
Welcome to What's Broken in GTM and How to Fix It with Louis Fernandes and Simon Daniels. Each week, together with occasional guests, we explore the challenges that face go-to-market leaders in SaaS scale-up businesses and suggest solutions to common issues.
Louis marks a milestone before getting into the main topic — next week’s newsletter edition will be his 100th, two years since he started writing it. He also shares news that he’ll be co-hosting the Winning by Design London Impact Roadshow with Jacco van der Kooij and Mike Bugard on 7th October, an invite-only session for senior SaaS revenue, GTM ops and executive leaders.
In a special wrap-up episode, Louis and Simon revisit this year’s Summer Cognoscenti Series to draw out the common threads running through it, joined by returning guest Ian Truscott, managing partner at B2B tech fractional leadership and advisory consultancy VelocityB. Here’s the TL;DL: SaaS doesn’t primarily have an execution problem — it has a governance and operating model problem that manifests itself through execution. The connective tissue running through this summer’s Cognoscenti series has been governance: organisations can optimise individual functions, metrics and tactics while still degrading the performance of the whole system. Under pressure, local optimisation becomes easier to justify, competitive imitation erodes tactical advantage, and faster execution can compound poor choices just as effectively as good ones.
Huge thanks to our fabulous guests: Mark Walker, JD Miller, Kevin Brown, David Keene, Travis Brown and Gerry Hill.
Listen back to all the episodes in the Summer Cognoscenti Series -
Mark Walker on the RevvedUp shutdown
JD Miller on the new CRO playbook
Kevin Brown on governance before scale
David Keene on technology architecture
Travis Brown on governance at scale
Gerry Hill on suppressing your own TAM
Other mentions in this episode:
Ian’s Rockstar CMO podcast and his 5 F’in’ Marketing Fundamentals
The Revenue Operating Governance paper, co-authored by Louis with Kevin Brown and Travis Brown
Simon’s LinkedIn article: How a Throwaway Line About Money Supply Explains the GTM Measurement Trap
Excerpts from the Accenture Song Client Buying Index 2026
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