New episode on the Vibescaling Podcast - Ghazi Masood, CRO @ Replit.
Part of our inspiration for naming our firm was taken from what we thought was a term coined by Replit - vibe coding.
Ghazi corrected me on the pod - Karpathy actually coined the term back in 2023.
Either way, Replit is truly one of the darlings of the AI era. We wrote a piece in early 2025 on how we were vibe coding sales apps in Replit - and it's been incredible to see how far they've come since. Reports say ~$16M ARR at end of 2024, ~$250M by late 2025, and a reported $1B ARR target by end of 2026. Insanity.
With that - getting Ghazi on the pod felt like the right move.
It was exciting to dive deep on this one + thank you all for the kind words on the pod - we'll keep shipping these weekly.
See below for past and future guests:
Some of our previous guests:
Todd Busler, CEO @ Champify - see here
Raphael Parker, former CRO @ Mandolin (former founding GTM hire @ Segment) - see here
Kyle Parrish, former VP of Sales @ Figma, see here
Liam Mulcahy, GTM operating partner @ Kleiner Perkins, see here
Pat Forquer, CRO @ Legora, see here
Mike Donohue, CRO @ Maven, see here
Tomer Chernia, VP of GTM @ Cursor, see here
Jack Gashi, VP of Sales @ Avoca, see here
Eleanor Dorfman, VP of GTM @ Anthropic, see here
Some of our future guests for Season One:
Kyle Norton, CRO @ Owner.com (recorded, in edits now)
Jason Miller, VP of Sales @ Unify (recorded, in edits now)
Jason Gelman, Operating Partner @ Primary Ventures (recorded, in edits now)
Evan Cassidy, VP of Sales @ Decagon (recorded, in edits now)
Mike Heller, Partner @ Floodgate (former Dropbox & Clearbit GTM) (recorded, in edits now)
Jaquelyn Goldberg, VP of Sales @ Unframe (recorded, in edits now)
Liam Mulcahy coming on for round 2!
Rob Saliterman, VP of Sales @ Harvey
Mark Ebert, SVP of Revenue @ Profound
James White, VP of Sales @ Rogo
Mark Goldberger, VP of Sales @ Metaview
Roy Matthew, VP of Sales @ Gumloop
Maggie Hott, GTM Leadership @ OpenAI
Lauren Schwartz, Head of Sales @ Anthropic (former GTM @ Segment/Fivetran)
& others from our portfolio companies @ vibescaling
And many more in the pipeline - if you know any good leaders who fit this, shoot me a DM on LI or reply to this email. We’ll keep openings rolling and be super open to suggestions for similar guests.
We film in-person in SF & NYC at legit podcast studios and have hired a new post-production agency, so the quality will be high - see below for a snippet in-studio behind the scenes.
Interviewing the awesome Ghazi Masood for this episode, CRO @ Replit, in our NYC studio in February
Links To Sections
Ghazi’s Background
Ghazi Masood is the CRO at Replit, one of the most talked-about companies in the AI era, building what they consider to be the only credible end-to-end vibe coding solution for enterprises.
Before Replit, Ghazi was VP of Sales at Retool, where he helped scale one of the most elite GTM teams in developer tooling.
Before that, he spent 4+ years at Auth0, joining early and leading all aspects of revenue growth for the Americas - scaling from $28M to $300M+ in 4 years before Okta acquired Auth0 for $6.5B in 2021.
Ghazi is one of the most respected GTM leaders in the developer tooling and technical products space - it was fun to dive into his philosophy on hiring nontraditional sellers, why most companies staff for aspiration instead of demand, and how the AI era is fundamentally changing the way enterprise sales orgs are built.
Interesting Takeaways
Culture is the competitive moat. Ghazi's formula at Auth0 and Retool: work hard, play hard, do it together. The off-sites in Cabo and Cancun weren't just perks - they were culture-infusing moments where sales methodology got rolled out, series rounds got announced, and a crew got built that still talks about those days.
Product passion beats sales experience. Two of Replit's top sellers have zero sales background. One came from the Marine Corps, one was a schoolteacher - both had built extensively in Replit and could make customers feel the same excitement. The former teacher just won rookie of the year at their first-ever sales kickoff.
Developers hate salespeople. So stop sending them salespeople. The unlock at Auth0 and Replit was positioning reps as product advocates. Show up as someone who genuinely lives in the product and you're a peer, not a threat. That's what gets you past a developer's default defenses.
Sellers need to carry demos themselves now. Ghazi expects AEs to pull up Replit, drop a prompt, and show what the agent can do - no SE needed for the first half of the conversation. You own the first 50%. The SE comes in for deployment options and security, not to run a demo you should've been able to do yourself.
Staff demand, not aspiration. Hiring before the pipeline math works is one of the most common founder mistakes Ghazi sees. Do the napkin math first - inbound, outbound, PLG signals, events. If you can't feed the reps, the reps will fail.
Hire senior people too early and you'll walk them off a cliff. The right early profile: someone who's done the enterprise motion, wants to do 0 to 1, and will get their hands dirty until the flywheel gets going. Not a VP who needs a machine that's already built.
Back channeling over references - always. Ghazi never calls the references candidates send. He goes through his own network. What he's actually looking for beyond quota attainment: how did they show up every day, were they collaborative, did they stay through the hard parts?
Discussed In This Episode
Why Replit's #1 seller closed $3.5M and had never sold a day in his life - and what that actually means for how AI companies should hire
The "panel presentation" interview format and why Ghazi makes every candidate show what they've built in Replit before they get the job
Staff demand, not aspiration - and the back of the napkin math every sales leader needs to do before hiring their first rep
Why Ghazi renamed his SEs to "Field Engineers" and rewrote the traditional pre/post-sales model
The work hard, play hard culture that made Auth0 special - and how he's rebuilding it at Replit
Back channeling done right - and why he never calls the references candidates give him
Why tenure is the most underrated signal in a sales resume right now
The founder mistake he sees over and over: hiring a VP of Sales too early
How Replit is using its own product internally - from CPQ tools to SDR call scripts
Why distribution is the new moat (not technology) - and what that means for how you build a GTM org in 2025
Timestamps
(00:00) Intro, What Replit Is Building & Why Ghazi Joined
(04:00) Building the Auth0 Culture: Work Hard, Play Hard & The Off-Sites That Actually Mattered
(12:00) From Auth0 to Retool: What Great GTM Culture Actually Looks Like
(18:00) Why Replit's Best Reps Have Never Sold Anything and How Ghazi Finds Them
(26:00) The Panel Presentation: Ghazi's Highest-Signal Interview Step
(32:00) How AI Is Changing the Sales Org Structure and Why Field Engineers are Replacing SEs
(38:00) Staff Demand, Not Aspiration: The Back of The Napkin Math Every Founder Needs to Do
(44:00) What to Ask in a VP of Sales Interview to Know If the Pipeline Is Real
(50:00) Back Channeling, Tenure & How Ghazi Actually Evaluates Candidates
(56:00) Hiring Senior Sales Leaders Too Early, Distribution Is the Moat & The Advice He Keeps Giving Founders Who Won't Listen
Thanks for tuning in!
If you enjoy it, please give us a rating, review, or follow on Spotify/YouTube/Apple Podcasts - it really helps us grow this.
For those who are new, my name is Chris Balestras, partner @ Vibescaling - a GTM advisory, recruiting, media, and investing firm, working with seed through series C AI-natives to help them grow.
Where to find Vibescaling:
We work with many of the hottest AI-native startups in various capacities, and for those who are interested, shoot me an email at [email protected] or a DM on LI.
🫡 cheers,
Chris