Making The Grade

By ScaleWise, Tom Glason

Less than 1 in 100 Startups manage to achieve funding beyond Series D or an exit.

Investors typically expect 8 out of 10 of the businesses they invest in to fail.

It’s time to make building a busin... more

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FAQs about Making The Grade:

How many episodes does Making The Grade have?

The podcast currently has 16 episodes available.

Making The Grade episodes:

February 26, 2026 Ego, Cash & GTM Discipline: Paul Fifield’s unfiltered lessons from building scalable businesses
What actually breaks a startup between £1m and £10m ARR isn’t usually the thing founders are obsessing over.
In this Making the Grade episode, we’re joined by Paul Fifield - one of the UK’s most experienced go-to-market leaders, and someone who’s lived the full spectrum from predictable revenue playbooks, to rocketship growth, brutal crashes, and the rebuild that follows.
Paul unpacks two defining failures in his career, and the patterns he now sees repeatedly in early-stage SaaS: messy data, woolly ICPs, uncontrolled SDR targeting, false confidence from renewals, and leadership decisions driven by ego rather than fundamentals.
Paul also shares why the GTM playbook is changing fast, what modern CRO capability looks like in 2026, and why AI won’t save teams that haven’t done the foundational work first.
If you’re a founder, CRO, VP Sales, or an Operator trying to help a business graduate from Series A to Series B - this one is a masterclass in what to do, what to avoid, and what to take seriously before the market forces you to.
📚 Episode Chapters
03:04 - Lessons from Failures and Successes
24:04 - The impact of ego in leadership
28:13 - Scaling strategies from $1M to $10M
35:05 - The evolving role of the CRO
41:06 - Leaning into fractional talent as a startup

🎧 Continue listening…
Make sure you listen to Designing an AI-first Business - Bethany Ayers on hiring stage-fit leaders & the GTM playbooks that actually work in the AI era
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
45min
February 19, 2026 Designing an AI-first Business - Bethany Ayers on hiring stage-fit leaders & the GTM playbooks that actually work in the AI era
Bethany Ayers isn’t experimenting with AI at the edges of Metomic; she’s using it to redesign how the company operates, with an ambitious goal of becoming an AI-first company.
In this episode of Making the Grade, Bethany Ayers, CEO of Metomic, joins us to unpack what it really means to build an AI-first organisation, and how it impacts hiring decisions, GTM design, and leadership accountability.
Beth shares why her default is now AI before headcount, how Metomic is using AI coworkers to strip out busy work across SDRs, engineering, marketing, and leadership, and why one SDR can now deliver the output of two to three.
But this isn’t an AI hype conversation. Beth is equally candid about the fundamentals that don’t change: why stage-fit exec hiring still breaks scale-ups, why founders step away from sales too early (or not at all), and why clarity on ICP, pipeline targets, and operating rhythm matters more than ever.
If you’re rethinking how to scale with fewer people, higher leverage, and sharper focus, this episode offers a clear, practical blueprint, without pretending the trade-offs don’t exist.
📚 Episode Chapters:
01:50 - Hiring the right Sales Leadership
03:22 - Evolving GTM Strategies
16:45 - The intersection of Product and Sales
22:04 - Leveraging AI in your Sales Team
30:35 - Future of Work: Balancing AI and People
36:10 - Diversity in Leadership

⛳ Mentioned in today’s episode:
Metomic: https://www.metomic.io/

🎧 Continue listening…
Make sure you listen to Building for efficient growth - Pavilion’s honest growth journey & the real problem behind the short CRO tenure with Sam Jacobs
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
43min
February 12, 2026Building for efficient growth - Pavilion’s honest growth journey & the real problem behind the short CRO tenure with Sam Jacobs
Most growth stories celebrate momentum, but very few actually share the behind-the-scenes of what happens when momentum stalls.
In this Making The Grade episode, we’re joined by Sam Jacobs, Founder & CEO of Pavilion - the community built to give in-seat GTM leaders the peers, frameworks, and rooms they need to operate under real pressure.
Sam takes us on a journey from the early days of Revenue Collective dinners to Pavilion’s Covid-era surge. But there’s no skipping the hard bits in this episode. Sam shares the painful consequences of growing too fast, loosening ICP, and chasing scale for growth’s sake.
This is a rare, unfiltered conversation about what happens when your biggest strength gets diluted, and how you rebuild when churn becomes the signal you can’t ignore.
No matter whether you’re a Founder currently building or a GTM Leader facing the various challenges the market throws at you, there’s endless practical advice in this episode, ready for you to apply straight away.

📚 Episode Chapters
01:15 - Pavilion’s origin story
09:23 - Scaling mistakes & lost focus
19:08 - The short CRO tenure
22:20 - Building P&L Fluency for Revenue Leaders
29:00 - Sustainable GTM Strategies
39:34 - Planning for a successful exit

⛳ Mentioned in today’s episode:
Pavilion: https://www.joinpavilion.com/
Intro to P&L Fluency: https://www.joinpavilion.com/pavilion-university/intro-to-pl-fluency

🎧 Continue listening…
Make sure you listen to What it really takes to win in the US - Honest lessons from Natalie Johnson
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
43min
February 05, 2026What it really takes to win in the US - Honest lessons from Natalie Johnson
US expansion is one of the fastest ways for a venture-backed SaaS company to accelerate growth…or blow up months of momentum, burn a painful chunk of cash, and leave a trail of “scar tissue” behind.
In this Making the Grade episode, Tom Glason sits down with Natalie Johnson, a seasoned revenue leader who’s lived the 1 to 10 million ARR journey multiple times - across the UK and the US - and now leads revenue at one of Europe’s fastest-scaling AI companies, AutogenAI.
In this episode, Natalie unpacks what actually works when expanding into the US, why outbound still works and why AI is not an IT rollout but an organisational transformation that rewires how modern revenue teams operate.
If you’re scaling through the messy middle and considering the US leap, this one’s packed with battle-tested guidance you can apply immediately.
📚 Episode Chapters
01:15 - Lessons from two scaling journeys
03:12 - US expansion mistakes
16:26 - Navigating the messy middle
26:08 - Autogen AI’s Growth Engine
30:46 - Outbound strategies that actually work
35:34 - Hiring Revenue Leaders in 2026

⛳ Mentioned in today’s episode:
AutogenAI: https://autogenai.com/uk/
Glyphic: https://www.glyphic.ai/

🎧 Continue listening…
Make sure you listen to Season 1 Sean Williams - From $60m exit to building an er-defining AI company
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
44min
February 03, 2026 Making The Grade - Season 2 Trailer
Welcome back to Season 2 of Making The Grade.
This season, we’re digging into what it really takes to scale beyond early traction… the ups and downs of the journey from £1 million to £10 million in ARR… and why so many startups are struggling to make that leap.
Each week, we're joined by experienced Founders, Investors, and senior Go-To-Market leaders to unpack the lessons, trade-offs, and decisions that define the £1m to £10m stage.
We’ll explore how to build effective GTM functions and hire truly stage-fit talent, how AI is reshaping go-to-market, what changes we can expect to see in 2026, and what capital-efficient scaling actually looks like in practice.
All with one core question in mind:

How do you build an enduring B2B SaaS business that scales sustainably, stays capital-efficient, and creates real exit optionality?
Expect honest conversations, hard-won insights, and practical advice you can apply straight away, because scaling can be done differently.
Our first episode of the new season will be dropping on Thursday, February 5th, so make sure you hit subscribe to be notified of when it's ready!
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
7min
October 02, 2025 From CMO to CRO: Florence Broderick on balancing growth with efficiency and the metrics that actually matter
What does it really take to make the leap from CMO to CRO and to build a revenue function that actually scales?
In the final episode of Season 1, Tom is joined by Florence Broderick, CRO at General Index, to unpack what it actually takes to make the transition to CRO and what founders should know before hiring their first CRO.
Florence shares candid insights from her transition to CRO, why she believes marketing leaders can make exceptional CROs, and how she’s balancing growth with capital efficiency in 2025 and beyond.
If you’re a founder or GTM leader navigating growth right now, you won’t want to miss this episode.

Episode Chapters
02:30 - Flo’s career journey from dreams of big corporates to CRO
08:30 - Managing imposter syndrome in a new role
14:30 - Building her CRO playbook
22:10 - What every CRO should nail in their first 90 days
27:30 - Why ‘rockstar CVs’ often fail
31:45 - The CRO skills that matter most in 2025
38:10 - AI that uses the needle & metrics that matter
46:50 - Getting more women into sales
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
52min
September 25, 2025 From $60m Exit to Building an Era-Defining AI Company: Sean Williams on lessons from a start-up exit to building again with AutogenAI
What do you think of when you hear ‘exited Founder’?
Someone travelling the world or sitting on a remote island sipping cocktails?
Today’s Making The Grade guest may change your perspective…
We’re joined by Sean Williams, Co-Founder & CEO of AutogenAI, the AI bid writing software. Before AutogenAI, Sean co-founded Corndell Ltd, which he grew from scratch to 350 people and sold to THI Holdings for $60m.
In this episode, Sean discusses how to build with an exit in mind, why you need to keep control while fundraising and why US expansion isn’t as easy as some Founders might think.
Episode Chapters
02:18 - From bid writer to CEO - Sean’s career journey
08:40 - Post-exit reality & why Sean decided to jump back in the Founder seat
14:36 - Selling a business during Covid
18:57 - More about AutogenAI and the opportunity
23:12 - Fundraising without losing control
27:26 - US expansion do’s & don’ts
29:33 - GTM in the AI-era - what actually works
33:43 - Hiring GTM leaders
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
44min
September 18, 2025 Scaling Lean in a $500B Market: Ed Bartlett on going from zero to one & transitioning out of the CEO seat
In the start-up ecosystem, there are a few truths that never change - scaling is harder than it looks, over-hiring can kill momentum, and knowing when to hand over the CEO reins might be the hardest call of all.
In this episode,Ed Barltett, Founder & CEO of Hicomply, unpacks how to successfully scale with a lean team and build a GTM engine that actually produces an intent-led pipeline.
Ed breaks down why stage-fit leadership beats vanity headcount and how to plan a smooth CEO transition when the time is right.
If you’re a founder starting to think about what might be next for you, then this is the perfect episode to listen to.
Episode Chapters
02:02 - Ed’s path into Tech
10:40 - Finding your niche in a $500B market
12:44 - Comparing the UK and US markets
17:02 - Staying lean & focusing on speed of execution
19:10 - Building a realistic GTM stack in an AI-driven world
31:58 - Founder transition & handing over the CEO reins
36:47 - Exit prep 101 in 2025 and beyond
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
43min
September 11, 2025 Running Your Own Race: Tom Lavery on going from bootstrapped to venture-backed
What does it take to build a category-defining SaaS company when your biggest competitors have raised 40x more funding than you?
In this episode, Tom Lavery, Founder & CEO of Jiminny, joins us to share how he bootstrapped for years before raising, why staying in control beats chasing hype, and how to layer AI into GTM without over-engineering your stack.
Expect pragmatic tactics for capital-efficient growth, candid lessons from fundraising in a downturn, and a no-BS view on what’s truly changed in sales.
Episode Chapters:
03:34 - Jiminny’s origin story
05:53 - Competing in a category with 40x more capital
09:21 - How to pick your investors & navigating the SaaS recession
17:20 - What’s changed in sales
21:18 - Successfully implementing AI
31:18 - The European ecosystem
33:18 - Slowing down and getting hiring right
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
38min
September 04, 2025 Bootstrapping Agorapulse to over $20M ARR with Emeric Ernoult
Start-up headlines are often dominated by fundraising announcements and the latest valuation.
But the Venture Capital route isn’t the only option or the best to take.
In this episode, we’re joined by Emeric Ernoult, Co-Founder & CEO of Agorapulse, one of Europe’s most successful bootstrapped SaaS Founders.
Emeric is a serial entrepreneur and has seen Agorapulse through several pivots and international expansion, all while bootstrapping.
This often painful journey has come with its fair share of lessons - some of which Emeric shares with us in today’s conversation.
This is definitely not a highlights reel, so if you’re currently going through the trenches or facing a pivot, this episode is one you don’t want to miss.
Episode Chapters
03:37 - Building Agorapulse from the ashes of a previous business
07:20 - The signs to know when it’s time to pivot
13:31 - Bootstrapping vs VC funding - the hard truths
17:44 - Understanding VCs beyond the money
23:25 - The Do’s & Don’ts of international expansion
27:28 - Growth metrics that actually matter
34:07 - How AI is transforming data-driven growth
Enjoyed today's episode of Making The Grade?
If you took something valuable from the episode, we'd love for you to...
✔️ Leave us a rating and review on your favourite podcast platform.
✔️ Share your ideas or guest suggestions with us at [email protected]
✔️ Stay in the loop with the latest from Making The Grade and ScaleWise by following us on LinkedIn or YouTube.
See you again next week!
...more
39min

FAQs about Making The Grade:

How many episodes does Making The Grade have?

The podcast currently has 16 episodes available.