Welcome to the GTM Launchpad newsletter! Each week I will share a sales play to help you grow your business, level up your sales game and succeed in the trenches

Burnout Isn’t the Problem
Your Revenue System Is

I’ve had the same conversation on repeat over the last two weeks

Different companies
Different titles
Same underlying tension

A founder told me
“My pipeline should feel better than this”

A sales director told me
“The team is busy..but it doesnt feel productive”

and then an SDR DMed me and said
“just everything man just feel like I suck”

Everyone points to burnout
But burnout isn’t the root cause

Its the symptom

What’s actually breaking down is the revenue system underneath the work and December is brutal in the best possible way! It exposes that truth fast!

Not because people suddenly lose motivation…
but because weak systems stop hiding behind volume

When clarity is missing

• effort turns into thrash

• pressure replaces priority

• activity replaces progress

and the people inside the system? They end up paying the price

Whether you

• lead an SDR team

• manage AEs

• sell as a founder

• or are the sales motion yourself

The pattern is the same

Burnout shows up in people…
But it starts in systems

This issue isn’t about “doing more” or “pushing harder”

But…it is about fixing the parts of your GTM motion that quietly drain energy, focus and confidence long before anyone quits

Let’s break it down shall we?

The Truth About Burnout (That Most Leaders Miss)

When leaders talk about burnout it usually sounds like this

• “Reps don’t have enough grit”

• “People just don’t want to work like they used to”

• “We need more activity”

• “They’re not hungry enough”

That framing is lazy and worse it’s just plain wrong

Because burnout isn’t caused by effort

It’s caused when effort stops turning into progress

Bad GTM environments do one thing exceptionally well

👉 They blame individuals while ignoring broken systems

Good operators do the opposite

What Broken Revenue Systems Actually Look Like

Across the teams I coach from founders selling solo to scaled sales orgs the same gaps show up again and again

Burnout appears first in SDRs because they’re closest to the friction…
…but the root cause lives upstream

Here’s what’s usually happening

• Vanity metrics > meaningful outcomes

• Activity worship instead of quality execution

• Unrealistic targets tied to the wrong behaviors

• Little to no coaching (just inspection)

• No clear path forward just pressure to “hit the number”

• Emotional toll of rejection ignored completely

Leaders call this a “performance issue”

but…it’s not

It’s a system failure

Founders feel it as stalled pipeline
AEs feel it as late-stage drag
SDRs feel it as rejection fatigue

Same fire
Different smoke

What Operators Do Differently

High performing revenue orgs don’t “manage burnout”

They design environments where it doesn’t take root

Here’s what that looks like in practice

1️⃣ Quota That Teaches the Right Behavior

Not just “more meetings”

Quota aligned to

• focus

• fit

• conversation quality

• learning velocity

2️⃣ Real Coaching (not KPI theater)

Weekly or bi-weekly coaching that actually

• sharpens skill

• builds confidence

• removes friction

• gives reps clarity on how to improve

Not “try harder”
Actual direction

3️⃣ Leaders Not Just Managers

Managers track
Leaders develop

Operators hire people who

• coach thinking

• guide execution

• create psychological safety

• invest in reps as long-term assets

4️⃣ A Culture of Experimentation

The best teams

• test messaging

• try new plays

• review honestly

• adjust fast

They don’t punish misses
They punish stagnation

5️⃣ Systems Over Firefighting

Burnout thrives in chaos

Operators build systems that

• reduce guesswork

• create consistency

• protect energy

• compound effort

Bad orgs treat burnout as the symptom
Good orgs fix the environment.

Which Brings Me to This Week’s Sponsor (and why it fits)

Sponsor of the Week | Kondo

One of the most common burnout accelerators I see right now?

Invisible work

Especially on LinkedIn….

Reps move conversations into DMs…
Founders follow up manually…
Pipeline lives in inboxes…
and leadership has zero visibility

That’s not just messy. That’s pipeline leakage

Kondo solves this by turning LinkedIn DMs into a visible, coachable activity layer

For leaders that means

• visibility into real conversations

• no more “black hole” follow ups

• consistent execution without micromanaging

• scaling human outreach without automation spam

This isn’t about inbox cleanliness

It’s about
👉 accountability
👉 coaching
👉 pipeline integrity

If your team uses LinkedIn and I know most of you do this fills a critical GTM blind spot

Here’s my referral link (they’ll give you a free month)

👉 https://www.kondo.app

Explore. Engage. Evolve.

A few things from the trenches worth your attention this week

Speed-to-Lead Isn’t a Nice-to-Have
It’s a Revenue Lever

I ran a short clip this week with the Spara team that hit on something most teams still underestimate

Inbound isn’t “easy pipeline”
It’s a race and most teams are jogging

When someone raises their hand the clock starts immediately

Wait an hour? They’re already checking competitors
Wait a day? You were never in the deal

The biggest fix isn’t AI or more tools…it’s this question

“Can your reps take a meaningful first action within 15 mins…with context?

Routing…enrichment…a simple first touch
That’s what stops pipeline leakage before it starts

If inbound is part of your motion (even a small one) this is worth a watch

👉 Full breakdown here: https://www.spara.co/blog/zero-leak-inbound

We Tested Mobile Validation Here’s the Honest Take

Instead of debating mobile validation from the sidelines we ran a real experiment

No cherry-picking
No parallel dialing
One brand new SDR
5,000 dials over six weeks

Here’s what we learned

• Mobile validation isn’t magic

• It doesn’t replace fundamentals

• It does meaningfully change the math when used intentionally

SureConnect consistently outperformed baseline data and gave a brand new rep faster reps, more confidence and momentum when the market was quieter

The takeaway?

Mobile validation isn’t an “always-on” solution
It’s a situational weapon

Use it to

• ramp new reps

• break call slumps

• run focused outbound sprints

Don’t use it as a crutch

Outbound isn’t dead
It’s just more intentional now

Here is my post with full breakdown of what we saw

A Fun Reminder That Careers Aren’t Linear

This one’s lighter but it stuck with me

Qwilr turned my entire career into an 8-bit video game
Like… a literal cartridge showed up at my house

It was fun, nostalgic and honestly a good reset

When you see your career as a game you remember

• the messy middle

• the weird roles

• the jumps that didn’t land

• the ones that finally did

December is chaotic
Everyone’s tired
Everyone’s sprinting

This was a reminder to zoom out and respect the path

If you want to try it (and laugh at your old job titles)

👉 https://quest.qwilr.com

Tom’s Play of the Week

The Energy Leak Audit

Burnout doesn’t come from doing too much

It comes from doing too much of the wrong things without clarity

This play helps you find where your revenue system is quietly draining energy, confidence, and momentum before it turns into burnout

The Move (30 minutes total)

Do this yourself… or run it with your team

Open a blank doc and answer these three questions honestly

1️⃣ What work is consuming the most energy right now?

Not what should matter but what’s actually heavy

Examples

• Chasing unqualified deals

• Endless follow ups going nowhere

• Context switching between too many accounts

• Manual steps that feel unnecessary

• Pressure to “just do more”

If it feels exhausting write it down

2️⃣ Which of these are system problems not people problems?

This is the key step most leaders skip

Ask

• Is this caused by unclear priorities?

• Broken handoffs?

• Bad routing?

• Weak targeting?

• Missing context?

• No coaching cadence?

• No definition of “good” activity?

If the answer isn’t “this person lacks effort” congrats you’ve found a system leak

3️⃣ What’s ONE constraint you can remove this week?

Not a full overhaul
Not a 2026 initiative

One thing

Examples

• Narrow focus to 10 accounts instead of 40

• Kill one low-impact meeting

• Define what “good outbound” looks like

• Simplify 1st touch expectations

• Add context before action

• Remove one manual step that shouldn’t exist

Burnout fades when clarity increases

The Rule

If a system requires constant pressure to function…

…it’s already broken

Fix the system → pressure drops → performance stabilizes

That’s the work

Why This Play Works

Most teams respond to burnout by

• pushing harder

• motivating louder

• adding urgency

Operators respond by

• removing friction

• tightening focus

• simplifying execution

This play does the latter

Run it once. You’ll immediately see where the real work is

Let Me Land This

If there’s one thing I hope you take from this issue it’s this

Burnout isnt a personal failure
It’s feedback

Feedback that something in the system isn’t supporting the work anymore

December has a way of surfacing that truth fast

Not because people suddenly stop caring
but because weak systems can’t hide behind volume forever

If your pipeline feels heavy…
If your team feels tired but busy…
If you feel drained running the motion…

Don’t ask people to dig deeper

Ask the system to do better

Tighten focus
Remove friction
Coach behavior
Fix the environment

That’s how energy comes back
That’s how confidence returns
That’s how January starts strong without burnout as the cost

I’ll be doing the same on my end this week

Coaching
Building
Staying present
Fixing what matters

See you next Monday

Let’s finish clean

🤙

Thanks for reading. See you again next week at 8 am MST!

- Tom Slocum ✌️

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Curious what this could look like for your org?
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