Full Stack CEO

What does it actually take to make your first sales hire at the right time, avoid the classic founder-led-sales traps, and build a sales function that can scale without breaking the business?

In this episode of the Full Stack CEO podcast, Yannick Kpodar sits down with David Ehrlich and Mark Nelson for a candid conversation on product-market fit, sales hiring, comp structure, and how founders can tell the difference between a strong resume and the right operator for their reality.

David brings decades of experience as a founder and CEO, including building Aktana into a global business with hundreds of employees across 50 countries, while Mark shares lessons from a long career spanning enterprise software, consulting, e-commerce, and multiple founder-led ventures. Together, they break down when founders should hire, what to look for in that first salesperson, why “mini founder” ownership matters, and how to avoid bringing in the wrong profile too early.

Main Topics:

• Why founders need to understand their sales cycle before making the first hire.
• The difference between a founder who should keep selling and a founder who needs a partner early.
• Why customer listening matters more than rushing to scale before product-market fit.
• How to think about seniority in the first sales hire, from one strong operator to a VP-level buildout.
• What great salespeople do differently in interviews, including ownership, persistence, and the ability to handle objections.
• Why the best early hires need the right incentives to stick around long enough to create real leverage.

Timestamps:
00:00 — Introduction: why first sales hires are so often mishandled.
01:38 — Mark’s background and how he thinks about sales across software and e-commerce.
02:30 — David’s background, Aktana, and building through AI and data.
04:55 — The most important thing to get right before hiring your first salesperson.
06:04 — When founders should keep selling vs. bring in a partner early.
08:18 — Why product-market fit changes everything.
09:06 — Why founders should think carefully about equity, retention, and early incentives.
11:17 — How Mark approached first hires across different companies.
13:44 — Why salespeople are great at selling themselves.
14:39 — Hiring a “mini CEO” for a region or market.
16:46 — How senior should the first hire be?
18:03 — What Mark looked for when scaling from one salesperson to a team.
21:35 — Why resumes can be misleading in sales hiring.
23:21 — The traits that show up in top sales performers.
28:47 — David on why language, listening, and role play matter in vetting.
31:08 — Why role-play is one of the best ways to test a sales candidate.

Resources & Links:
Full Stack CEO™: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/ceo-operating-room
Pre-Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/pre-seed-track
Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/seed-track
Series A: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/series-a-track
Series B: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/series-b-track
Free Live Training Sessions: https://luma.com/fullstackceo

What does a career built across early internet startups, agency exits, consulting, product leadership, and scaling companies like Acquia, NGINX, Cockroach Labs, SingleStore, Mesosphere, and Tabnine actually look like?

Peter Guagenti — entrepreneur, executive, advisor joins Yannick Kpodar for a conversation on how he’s repeatedly found product-market opportunities, built customer love, and helped companies grow from early revenue to scale.

Peter recently joined Full Stack CEO™ and brings deep experience across strategy, product, marketing, sales, and ops, with five successful exits and early conviction in AI dating back to 2017.

Main Topics:

• Why Peter says his career was never a straight line, and why the journey mattered as much as the outcomes
• The five-exit perspective: what he looks for in companies
• Spotting trends early, from the rise of the internet to open source, cloud, and AI
• Why the first real job of a business is creating and keeping customer relationships
• How two acquisitions came from customer traction and word of mouth, not a classic M&A process
• Why product-market fit is the real unlock, and why revenue is still a struggle until you find it
• How Acquia scaled from about $3M to over $100M, and why product + sales alignment made the difference
• What founders at the seed to Series A stage get wrong when they hire sales leaders too early
• Why Peter joined Full Stack CEO™

Timestamps:

• 00:00 — Introduction: Peter’s background and why his LinkedIn looks like a straight line
• 03:03 — Five exits, many lessons: how he thinks about selecting opportunities
• 04:28 — Early conviction in open source, cloud, and AI
• 06:51 — The first startups and acquisitions: what actually drove those outcomes
• 08:53 — The purpose of a business: create and keep customer relationships
• 09:53 — How customer traction led to acquisition conversations
• 11:23 — How he got to $6M in year one in an earlier startup
• 13:02 — The importance of using your network to drive early deals
• 15:17 — Why product-market fit is the real revenue unlock
• 16:29 — Joining Accenture and building new muscles
• 19:06 — Scaling Acquia from ~$3M to $100M in four years
• 20:20 — What changes when a company moves from founder-led sales to real scale
• 22:03 — The mistake of hiring closers who can’t build a machine
• 25:21 — Why Peter joined Full Stack CEO™

Resources & Links:

• Peter Guagenti on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/peterguagenti

  Full Stack CEO™:

• Membership: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/ceo-operating-room
• Pre-Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/pre-seed-track
• Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/seed-track
• Series A: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/series-a-track
• Free Live Training Sessions: https://luma.com/fullstackceo

What does it actually look like to build a company from zero to 300 employees, get acquired, start over, hit $1M ARR in under a year, and then spend the next decade helping other founders avoid the mistakes you made?

Bill Kahlert — 3x founder, 3x exited, advisor to 24+ B2B SaaS and AI companies through Techstars and Alchemist — joins Yannick Kpodar to share the reality behind the scenes.

Bill recently joined Full Stack CEO™ as an Operator Partner to support B2B SaaS & AI CEOs as they scale from pre-seed to Series B. Learn more at www.full-stack-ceo.com.

Main Topics:

• The real story of the Aalayance acquisition: failed first attempt, stock options wiped out by the dot-com crash, and the lockup nobody told him about
• Why acquisition term sheets always look better on paper, and the earnout trap that leaves founders getting paid nothing
• How Bill went from zero to $1M ARR in under a year at Leadfwd.ai
• The GTM playbook that drove a 70%+ close rate
• The #1 mistake Bill sees across every founder he advises
• What makes Full Stack CEO™ different from the accelerators

Timestamps:

• 00:00 — Introduction of Bill´s career
• 03:02 — From Xerox to Claude Code: watching the internet rise and AI arrive in real time
• 04:04 — The Aalayance acquisition: zero to 300 employees, acquired by HCL
• 05:51 — The dark side of earnouts: how acquirers set KPIs they know you can't hit
• 07:47 — What Bill would tell every founder before signing an acquisition term sheet
• 08:27 — Leadfwd.ai: from zero to $1M ARR in under a year
• 11:36 — The pivot: from inbound to outbound
• 13:23 — The upsell that became the primary sale and how to recognize when to flip your GTM story
• 16:20 — How they hit a 70%+ close rate
• 17:22 — What Bill sees advising across Techstars, Alchemist, and his portfolio
• 18:09 — The Claude Code illusion: why "just go vibe code it" is disingenuous advice
• 21:41 — Why even founders with $500K in pre-seed still can't define their ICP
• 23:40 — Why Bill joined Full Stack CEO™

Resources & Links:

• Bill Kahlert on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/billkahlert

Full Stack CEO™:

• Membership: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/ceo-operating-room
• Pre-Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/pre-seed-track
• Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/seed-track
• Series A: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/series-a-track
• 12-Week Labs: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/labs
• Free Live Training Sessions: https://luma.com/fullstackceo

What does a career built on multiple exits, a 12-year CEO run scaling Aktana to 400+ employees across 50 countries, and the technology that became the foundation of AWS Redshift actually look like from the inside?

David Ehrlich — serial CEO, board member, Stanford & HBS alum — joins Yannick Kpodar for a raw, unfiltered conversation on what it truly takes to build and lead a company from zero to scale in the age of AI.

David recently joined Full Stack CEO™ as an Operator Partner to support B2B SaaS & AI CEOs as they scale from pre-seed to Series B. Learn more at www.full-stack-ceo.com.

Main Topics:

• Why building a company is one of the hardest things a human being can do
• The single most important demarcation line every CEO must understand: pre vs. post PMF
• The Aktana near-death story: no money, no customers, no product — and the pivot that changed everything
• Burn rate discipline: why David coaches founders to resist raising capital for as long as possible
• Key metrics by stage — what to watch pre-PMF vs. post-PMF, and why LTV matters more than CAC early on
• Building in the age of AI: the massive opportunity and the moat problem every AI founder must solve

Timestamps:

• 00:00 — Introduction: does David's career look as good on the inside as it does on paper?
• 02:43 — The brutal reality of starting from nothing
• 04:50 — Advice for CEOs at every stage: pre-seed, seed, and Series A
• 06:23 — The one demarcation line that matters: pre vs. post PMF
• 07:06 — How David knew Aktana hit PMF in early 2015
• 09:32 — Burn rate deep dive: runway, capital discipline, and the trap of raising too early
• 11:19 — What every Series A investor is actually looking for when they review your cap table
• 12:28 — Metrics by stage: what to look at pre vs. post-PMF
• 16:07 — The pivot that saved Aktana
• 16:33 — Building in the age of AI: what's different in 2026
• 19:11 — Why David joined Full Stack CEO™
• 19:44 — CEO longevity: the non-negotiables for staying in the game

Resources & Links:

• David Ehrlich on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidjehrlich

Full Stack CEO™:

• Membership: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/ceo-operating-room
• Pre-Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/pre-seed-track
• Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/seed-track
• Series A: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/series-a-track
• Series B: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/series-b-track
• 12-Week Labs: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/labs
• Free Live Training Sessions: https://luma.com/fullstackceo

Discover the nuanced journey of Indy Sen, a seasoned marketing leader with experience from Salesforce to Canva, Box, Matterport, Google, WeWork, Mulesoft, and 3 x IPOs.

Indy recently joined Full Stack CEO™ as a Operator Partner to support B2B SaaS & AI CEOs as they scale from pre-seed to Series B. Learn more at www.full-stack-ceo.com.

Main Topics:

• The reality behind a successful career: ups, downs, and purposeful moves
• Key learnings from working at top tech companies and scaling startups
• The importance of culture, product quality, and brand consistency
• How setbacks like layoffs and company failures shape resilience
• Managing energy, health, and mindset for sustainable leadership
• Advice for founders in a noisy AI-driven market: pace, focus, and passion
• Indy’s personal journey through loss, reinvention, and community service

Timestamps:

00:00 - Introduction to Indy Sen’s career journey and achievements

02:17 - Learning from successes and failures across companies

03:26 - Most formative experiences in marketing at Salesforce and Canva

04:43 - The critical role of product excellence and company culture

05:54 - Culture as an internal brand promise to employees

07:13 - Overcoming challenges: the WeWork and personal setbacks stories

09:17 - Lessons from layoffs and company crises—grace and perspective

10:51 - Managing energy and health in leadership roles

12:15 - The impact of personal loss and life lessons learned

16:54 - The importance of pacing in entrepreneurship

18:29 - The value of supporting startup communities and mentoring

22:22 - Advice for founders: run your race and stay focused amid FOMO

25:31 - Connecting marathon pacing to long-term startup success

26:45 - Indy’s current projects: newsletter, deconstructing marketing playbooks

Resources & Links:

• Indy Sen's Newsletter - The Remarketables - https://www.theremarketables.com/
• Indy Sen's Website - https://indysen.com
• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/indysen/

Full Stack CEO™:

• Membership: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/ceo-operating-room
• Pre-Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/pre-seed-track
• Seed: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/seed-track
• Series A: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/series-a-track
• Series B: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/series-b-track
• 12-Week Labs: https://www.full-stack-ceo.com/labs
• Free Live Training Sessions: https://luma.com/fullstackceo