The High-Performing Technical Leader
The High Performing Technical Leader is for founders, CROs, and technical revenue leaders scaling pre-sales and post-sales teams in technical SaaS.
Hosted by Arvi Carkanji, founder of Elite Talent Recruiting, this show goes deep with leaders who are actually building, scaling, and running high-performance technical GTM teams.
From hiring the first Solutions Engineer to managing rapid team expansion, from positioning pre-sales as a revenue function to retaining top talent through growth, we explore the real challenges that define technical revenue leadership.
These are honest conversations with VPs, CROs, founders, and technical leaders who've done the work and are willing to share what it actually takes to win.
Whether you're a founder figuring out your first technical GTM hire, a VP scaling your pre-sales function, or a leader navigating customer success as a revenue lever, you belong here. Let's build.
Episodes
29 episodes
Ep. 29- How Integrations Impact Your Pre-Sales and GTM Team with Cristina Flaschen, CEO of Pandium
Your sales engineers are on the front lines of a problem most revenue leaders don't even see: integration challenges that kill deals before they close.Cristina Flaschen, CEO of Pandium, spent 20+ years as that person—the technical leader...
Ep. 28 How To Build A Predictable SDR Engine Without Burning Out AEs with Gabe Lullo
We talk with Gabe Lullo, founder of Alleyoop, about why sales development is resurging and why SDR work is its own discipline that connects marketing demand to sales closing. We share practical frameworks for building pipeline in an AI-heavy wo...
Ep. 27- How to Build Outcome-Driven Customer Success (Not Reactive CS) with Andrea Mulligan
Your customer success team is only visible when something breaks. Most CS orgs are still stuck in the "I am your advocate" era. In practice, they're just escalation points. When customers are unhappy, CS swoops in to save the day. ...
Ep.26- Jack Porter Googled 'What Is an Account Executive.' Two Years Later WhiteWhale Ran 1,500+ Demos
Most sales leaders are still guessing at top of funnel. More tools, more sequences, more noise, and demo numbers barely move.Jack Porter has the opposite problem. He is 24, co-founded WhiteWhale two years ago, and his team has already r...
Ep. 25- How the Sales Engineer Role Is Evolving in Enterprise SaaS, with Ori Weizman
Enterprise SaaS deals are getting more technical, and more complex, than ever. So who's actually driving them across the finish line?I'm sitting down with Ori Weizman, a sales engineering leader who built out an EMEA region from scratch ...
Ep. 24- Building & Selling Companies: Lessons Every SaaS Founder Needs with Stan Markuze
Most founders know how to build a product.Far fewer know how to build a company that can actually scale and eventually be acquired.On the next episode of PreSales Unplugged: The Leadership Playbook, I'm joined by Stan Ma...
EP. 23- Stop Automating Dysfunction: The Pre-Sales & GTM Evolution with Investor Mark Nix
Most SaaS leaders are betting big on AI right now.But here's the uncomfortable truth: most of those bets won't pay off.Not because the technology isn't real. Because the fundamentals aren't there.I'm sitting down with Ma...
Ep. 22-How to Lead a High-Performance Sales Org Without Owning Every Deal with Alice Heiman
Most revenue problems in SaaS are leadership problems and most leaders don't see it until it's too late.If your team isn't closing, your pipeline is unpredictable, or you're still the one saving every deal, something in your le...
Ep.21- A Friendly Human in Pre-Sales: The Behaviors That Actually Win Deals with Ron Whitson
Most pre-sales pros are incredible at the demo. But the demo isn't why deals die.This Tuesday I'm sitting down with Ron Whitson, an author, speaker, and one of the most experienced pre-sales leaders in the game....
Ep.20- How to Hire Fast, Onboard Right, and Scale an SE Team Without Losing the Culture with Diana Cappello
Most SE leaders are not ready for what fast growth actually demands.You land the budget. You get the headcount approved, the team is crushing it and the company is growing. And then the real work starts.Hiring dec...
Ep.19- From Sales Engineer to VP: How to Builds Teams People Actually Want to Come Back To w/ Tamir Verthim
Most leaders lose their best people and never get them back.The ones who do? They built something different: a culture where people don't just work for you, they want to work with y...
Ep.18- The GTM Plateau Is a Leadership Problem. How to Break Through and Build a Winning Team with Mike Simmons
Most SaaS teams blame the market, the tool, the AI craziness, but they are overlooking one VERY IMPORTANT factor about why their company might be plateuign: Mindset - of the founder AND the team.This Thursday, May 14th at 11AM ...
Ep.17- How to Treat Customer Success as a Revenue Growth Lever and Not Post-Sales Babysitting with Ivan Stefanovski
Most SaaS companies treat Customer Success as a post-sales cleanup crew. The handoff is messy, expectations are misaligned, and by the time CS gets involved.. the damage is already done.On our next episode, I'm bringing on Ivan...
Ep.16- The Future of Pre-Sales Isn’t Human vs AI with Joseph Lee
Joseph Lee, founder of Supademo, joins me live to break down how the buying journey in SaaS is rapidly changing and why traditional demos are no longer enough.We dive into his founder journey, the realities of bootstrapping, an...
Ep.15- How to Build a High-Performing BD Engine in 2026 with Danyal Cremerious
2026 is more competitive than ever… and it’s not slowing down. Everyone keeps saying “personalize your outreach.”But AI made that easy. Which ironically made most “personalization” feel even more generic.<...
Ep.14- Inside the RevOps Playbooks of Top Tech Teams with Jacki Leahy
Picture this: The company is growing, deals are coming in, revenue is moving… but behind the scenes, everything is duct-taped together.Google Sheets are breaking. Forecasting is guesswork. And leadership is flying blind.
Ep.13- Art of the technical evaluation for presales metrics and AI integration, with Steve Davis
Competition in SaaS has gotten a lot tighter. Especially when it comes to running a strong POCs. A strong POC can be the difference between winning a deal… or losing it to a competitor.And most of the time, that falls on your Sales Engi...
Ep.12- How to build a AI-Native Companies with Community-Led GTM in 2026 w/ Ben Hills, Founder of Iris AI
What does it actually look like to build a company in an AI-first world… instead of bolting AI on later?Most founders talk about AI as a feature. Ben Hills built Iris AI with it at the core.And most B2B SaaS...
Ep.11- How PreSales Leaders Scale Without Disconnecting from Customers with Scott Jaworski
Should you be a leader or an individual contributor? In a perfect world, you’d choose one.But startups aren’t perfect... and that’s okay.Sometimes the player-coach model is the only way to scale without losing touch. The problem...
Ep.10- How SE Leaders Scale Teams, Influence GTM, and Stay Ahead of AI (with Chris Mabry)
In this episode of Pre Sales Unplugged: The Leadership Playbook, Arvi Carkanji (Founder of Elite Talent) sits down with Chris Mabry, Vice President of Solutions and Partnerships, to break down what actually separates a good...
Ep.9- Stop being a "Demo Person" and become a "Trusted Technical Advisor" for your clients and your team with Ramzi Marjaba
Join me and Ramzi Marjaba, Consultant, Solution Engineer Coach for a live conversation focused on what it really takes to be a high-performing Sales Engineer.We’ll talk through: → What helps teams operate as one and avoid s...
Ep.8- How Top Performers Stay Consistent When They Feel Like Quitting
In this solo episode, Arvi Carkanji breaks down the real version of mindset toughness that shows up in SaaS when the pipeline is messy, deals go dark, and you still have to perform even when your brain is not cooperating.You will hear a ...
Ep.7- How Elite SEs Think, Adapt, and Win Deals with David Schultz
In this episode of Pre-Sales Unplugged: The Leadership Playbook, host Arvi Carkanji sits down with David Schultz, Head of Solution Consulting at Employe, to break down what it really takes to build a career and lead ...
Ep.6- What the Top SaaS CROs Are Doing Differently in 2026 with Matt Green
Join me and Join me and Matt Green, CRO & Co-Founder of Sales Assembly, for a tactical look at what’s working in today’s GTM landscape. Matt works with hundreds of CROs and VPs of Sales and sees what separates winning teams from the rest.
Ep.5- The Revenue Impact of Enablement Most Teams Miss with Yotam Rotgoltz
In this episode with Yotam Rotgoltz ...we explore how unconventional careers lead to strong pre-sales leaders, why enablement is the first thing to break in startups, and how AI helps teams move faster without replacing human judgment.