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

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