The one sentence summary
The power of marketing leaders lies in the space where customer and company needs overlap, and these are skills you can learn (they are not personality traits).
WHAT THE BOOK SAYS
• You have to mobilize 4 things to be a top marketing leader: your boss, your colleagues, your team, and yourself.
• Each area has 4 components (total: 12). They are:
Boss: tackle only big issues, deliver returns no matter what, and work only with the best (shape the agenda).
Colleagues: hit the head and heart, walk the halls, and you go first (to serve customers better).
Team: get the mix right, cover them in trust, and let the outcomes speak (become a leader of leaders).
Yourself: fall in love with your world, know how you inspire, and aim higher (find purpose and inspire others)
• The relative merit of these factors varies, based on this survey.
• When it comes down to the success of the business, the rank order is team (30%), you (25), boss (23), and colleagues (22).
• When it comes to career progression, it’s you (34%), colleagues (32), team (19) and boss (15).
• The power of marketing leaders lies in the space where customer and company needs overlap – the Value Creation Zone, or so-called V-Zone.
WHAT’S GOOD ABOUT IT
• The ‘big five’ personality traits (openness to experience, dependability/self-discipline, extraversion, agreeableness, and emotional resilience) only explain a fraction of success based on this survey (3.3% for business impact and 8.7% for career), so you can learn the skills to be a successful marketing leader.
• There is a test to see how well you do in these areas.
• Three things help: finding the company’s biggest growth levers, throwing the biggest stone, starting small but thinking big.
• LDC = Listen Decide Communicate
• GMOOT = Get me one of those (everyone thinks they can do marketing, and usually want you to copy something already done elsewhere).
• Pricing strategy and tactics is the most valued skill of marketers, but the thing they are worst at.
• Ask for forgiveness, not permission.
• Hold people accountable.
WHAT YOU HAVE TO WATCH
• There is a fair amount of leadership jargon here, but the sentiments are right.