14. Series 1 | Ep 14 - Mark Green - Vice President of Marketing, EMEA at Rackspace

I had a fascinating conversation with Mark Green, VP of Marketing, EMEA at Rackspace. Authenticity and honesty are important traits for senior leaders in business today and Mark exudes both.
And he doesn't dodge anything, as he covers a wide range of questions from what he looks for in a B2B marketer, how to become a manager for the first time, the most valuable lesson he's learnt in B2B marketing and so much more..

Chapters

• 1:30 If you could just summarise who you are and what sort of experience the audience is about to learn from, that'd be great.
• 3:39 Having interviewed a host of B2B marketeers over the years, what advice would you give them to perform at their best or better, in an interview scenario?
• 6:15 What advice can you give to undergrads starting or trying to find the right path in marketing?
• 8:03 How do you figure out what you want to do marketing career wise, out of university?
• 9:52 How do you get from marketing exec to manager level without experience?
• 11:29 How to move into a role through potential versus experience, so I suppose this is when people are looking to stretch themselves or, they want more responsibility, how do you go about getting that?
• 13:02 What are the most important skills that you want to see in people that you're looking to hire?
• 14:29 What's the most valuable marketing skill you can have?
• 15:41 With social technological changes set to continue at pace, what do you think an aspiring marketeer should be learning now to be in the best position possible to add value to business, in five or ten years time?
• 19:38 How do you manage your marketing career in a company that's very, very short term focused?
• 22:08 I've been a marketing manager without a team for years, and I'm looking for a new challenge, but unsure what to do next. What are my options without taking on a team? Retrain, or specialise?
• 26:28 How do you convince someone your marketing plan is the right thing to do?
• 28:14 How do you get involved in the broad strategic decisions?
• 29:42 When is it safe to move towards strategy and leave the tactical straight hands on tools behind, without jeopardising your value as a marketeer to the organisation?
• 31:56 How important is it to have a marketing mentor and why?
• 34:11 What advice have you received from your mentor that made the most impact?
• 35:58 How to find a marketing mentor when you're already the most senior marketing position in the business?
• 38:49 What's the most valuable lesson you've learned in marketing and how did it come about?
• 41:52 How do big corporates justify spend on difficult to measure campaigns around brand or thought leadership.
• 43:12 How do you deal with all the noise and hype in the market, balanced against the reality of day to day execution which often isn't given due care? i.e. how do we keep up and get better?
• 45:39 How do you manager the work/life balance and how important is it in today's society?
• 50:45 What is the book you recommend the most to B2B marketeers today?
• 53:54 So what parting words of wisdom or advice would you share with our audience?