Marketers Unleashed

Beyond Marketing: Exploring New Paths for CMOs

• Kathryn • Season 1 • Episode 10

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Join us on Marketers Unleashed as Kathryn Strachan and Rowan Fisk discuss the challenges faced by CMOs and senior marketers considering a career transition. Explore insights on the short tenure of CMOs, the importance of the right environment, and potential C-suite positions to transition into. Rowan shares actionable advice for job seekers, including networking, leveraging interim positions, and creative strategies to stand out in a crowded job market. Tune in for valuable tips on making thoughtful career moves and seeking opportunities that bring happiness and fulfillment.

Social Media Links:

Kathryn Strachan - linkedin.com/in/kathryn-strachan

Rowan Fisk - linkedin.com/in/cmoexecutivesearch

Website: 3search.co.uk

Welcome to Marketers Unleashed, the podcast where marketers break free from the noise and dive deep into the raw truths of the marketing world. We're here to go beyond best practices and uncover the bold ideas, untold stories, and hard lessons that shape real marketing success. From dissecting daring campaigns to confronting the challenges keeping us awake at night. We're unleashing honest, unfiltered conversations to inspire, educate, and challenge you to think differently. Get ready to conquer the untamed side of marketing. I'm your host, Kathryn Strachan, and this is Marketers Unleashed, where we're not just talking marketing, we're redefining it. For anyone who doesn't know me yet, I'm Kathryn Strachan, author of Scaling Success, Building Brands That Break Barriers, international keynote speaker, and fractional CMO for cutting edge brands. I've spent years navigating the ever changing world of marketing, and I've seen it all. As your podcast host, I bring my expertise and curiosity to the table, diving deep into honest conversations with industry leaders to uncover the insights, challenges, and bold ideas shaping our industry. Let's get started. Hello and welcome to Marketers Unleashed. Today I'm here with Rowan Fisk who's going to be telling us a little bit about what it's like to transition from marketing and being a CMO into the CEO. So he's not a CMO himself but he is a partner, senior partner, at a headhunting and recruitment agency. So he knows all about switching it up with your career and making changes within that senior leadership role. So I'm really excited to have Rowan here today. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me. Part two, I'm excited. Yeah, our first episode was all about Getting hired, making the most of your job search, working with recruiters. And it, had some really great insights in it. So much so that I shared it with a lot of my friends before it even went live. And I'm sure all of our audience listening really enjoyed it as well. Well, I had a blast and, I always come at this from a perspective of how can we give as much value back to the community. So, yeah, what goes around comes around with this stuff. if we can help enough people out, good stuff will happen in return. So, yeah, I'm I'm excited to get into it. Yeah, yeah, me too. So today is all about how CMOs and senior marketers can actually transition out of marketing and what happens when you decide that marketing is perhaps not for you or you've had enough of it. There's a really staggering statistic that the CMO position only has an 18 month tenure, which is the shortest c suite tenure and I mean, I, I totally understand marketing can be a little bit of an uphill slog when you've got budget cuts and redundancies. A lot of us have probably thought at some point or another, you know, I've had enough of this. What else can I do with my career? So I mean, if you are one of those CMOs, who has had enough or who wants a new challenge? What other C suite positions might you consider? There's a few things that I'd say. The last two years, I think it's probably been the hardest that it could ever have been to be a CMO. And so I can understand why a lot people are like, screw that, I'm off. My view on this is we've had a huge amount of volatility from a macroeconomic perspective, lots of redundancies a lot of people in really vulnerable positions who, as you say have had to move roles whether they wanted to or not, and I'm sure nobody wants to be in a role for less than 18 months. That's a really bruising process to go through, you know, I've spoken to a lot of downtrodden, vulnerable, disheartened people over the last few years. Firstly there's some cause for cautious optimism. I think the market is in an improving state, maybe I'm too glass half full, but I think marketing is about to go through an interesting renaissance as well. I think one of the reasons that the average tenure is 18 months is because performance marketing has reigned king for the last 10, 15 years in a highly volatile market. and I think brand marketing is starting to see a bit of a resurgence. I've had some really interesting conversations with a bunch of, not just kind of marketing leaders, but also super smart investors over the last six months or so, who have said actually, you know, from a performance marketing perspective. Everything's getting homogenized. Everything's getting AI leveraged. And we're going to need to start investing in brand again to stand out from the pack. And I think that's a good thing for everyone because brand investment requires a gamble. It requires a long term play. It requires a longer playoff. I think the challenge at the moment is everybody can become so obsessed with immediate return on investment that you then get to a place where you look to shuffle things up quicker than the effects of a good marketing strategy will come into place for. And so I think, firstly some cause for cautious optimism, but if you're still one of those that goes. Actually, it's time for me to move on. It's time for me to consider something different. I would think about, a few different things. I guess the first thing I would suggest that you ask yourself is am I in the wrong environment, and that could be a cultural environment. It could be that you're in the wrong business with the wrong leadership that doesn't believe in the power of marketing. It could be that you're in the wrong category. Maybe you spent your life working in financial services and it's regulated and difficult to navigate and corporate and you're battling against governance. Maybe if you worked in faster paced, more agile category, you'd regain your love for it. So I think the first thing to explore is, is it marketing? That's the problem, or is it the environment that I'm in that is then creating the problem? And if you feel like you want to transition away from marketing. I think the great thing is there's a lot of great skills that you have as a marketer. You know, you are a project manager. You are a stakeholder manager. You understand customers, you understand data and so there's a million different possible routes that are available to you then. And the question isn't what's available, but the question should be, well, what's going to make me happy? What's going to bring me joy? I know that's a really simple thing to ask, but if you're not happy doing what you're doing. Then change what you're doing. That might be further progression in a corporate environment, that might be a move into academia, that might be a move into education. There's a lot of different ways that you can take it, but I wouldn't want anyone to spend 5, 10, 15 years in an industry that isn't making them happy. You know, we're here for a good time, not a long time, and careers, you know, will last 30, 40, 50 years if we're lucky. So you've got to make the most of it. Are there C suite roles, though, that are easier for a CMO to transition into? I can see the CMO becoming a CEO because the marketing strategy has to mirror the business strategy, so it's two halves of the same coin. But, you know, if you're already in the C suite, you're already a CMO, what roles within the C suite might be an easier transition? There are naturally roles where your skillset will play better than others. You know, I have seen CMOs move into people roles because ultimately it's about leadership, like Anna Kilmurry, she used to be the chief marketing officer at Clear Score and then, has transitioned between marketing and people very fluently. I think the natural progression up from CMO is a CCO or COO, depending on the context of the business. I think it's quite hard to go straight from CMO to CEO. The way I think about it is, is there's often sort of two rungs on a leadership team. You know, in the top rung, you've got CEO, CFO, COO, and then depending on the context of the business, kind of CRO, CCO, the commercial leader of the organization. Depending on how marketing led an organization is, CMO might sit at the top ladder as well, but unfortunately for a lot of businesses, it's a bit of a poor cousin and would sit in that kind of secondary rung where you might have chief technology officer. Chief HR, Chief People Officer, Chief Marketing Officer, Chief Information Officer. And so people do it, but it is quite tricky to make the jump straight from CMO to CEO. The transitions that I've seen with more frequency and more regularity is moving into more of a commercially focused role like are you going to start to inherit sales, bids, customer relationship management and depending on the context of the business that might be chief revenue officer, chief customer officer, chief client officer, chief commercial officer, or is your skill set around the management of operations? How do you get a business running as efficiently as possible? And for that, a chief operating officer role could be a sensible transition. I would encourage anyone who's thinking about a skill set transition to think; Firstly, what am I good at, and what brings me happiness? From there to then explore opportunities. That makes sense. But I think one of the challenges you run into, especially in the job market, is recruiters and hiring managers are often looking for like a like for like. So, you know, they're hiring for a CMO at a big fintech, they want to hire somebody who has been a CMO at a big fintech. So they're looking for somebody who matches that. Absolutely, 100%, and especially in a crowded market where you're going up against hundreds of other applicants. So how do you make a career change or pivot when your last role maybe wasn't that exact title? It's really hard to do, and often the way that I phrase this with candidates is like, our job is not always to find the best person for the role. Our job is to find the person that presents the least risk. But, at that point, there's so much stress around getting it right, and getting it right quickly and mitigating risk that they'll want to hire the person that can, deliver it instantly. And that's why it's really tough for people like me to present a left field candidate to a business. Particularly then when you layer on this preconception that recruiters will flog their mother for a bit of commission. And want to split square pigs into round holes. You know, if we say to a client that we know this person doesn't necessarily fit your brief, but they're an interesting profile and somebody that we think you should meet. I've got to build a huge amount of trust with that person to even entertain putting them in front of them in the first place. So then if we kind of reverse back through that process, how is it easiest to make the transition? Well, it's easiest to do it in the organization you're already in, right? If you're in a business that where you have delivered great work, where you're a known entity, where you're a safe pair of hands. And where you have proven that you can take on more responsibility and deliver it well. Stick your hand up. Say, hey, it's a real shame that person's left, but I see this as an opportunity for me. I'd love to have a conversation about how I can take some of the responsibility from that role. If you want to make a transition, the easiest way of doing it is with an organization that knows you already. Second, easiest way of doing it is where somebody can vouch for you. Search firms are great and they provide a lot of value. And I would recommend getting registered with a handful of them. But like anyone who's job hunting, the nucleus of their search should be their existing network. sit down Go through all of your connections. Who do I know who would vouch for me? Where are they now? And reconnect with them. as a Brit, I have to like grab other Brits who are like self-deprecating and shake them and be like. You need to ask people for help and they will not only be willing to help you, but they'll go out of their way to help you. They'll enjoy it. You know, if, if somebody reached out to you on LinkedIn and was like, Hey, long time no speak, listen, I'm at a bit of a career crossroads. Your LinkedIn profile popped up and it looks like you're doing really interesting work at this company and as a business that's of personal interest to me, I'd love to grab 20 minutes and take you out for coffee and just understand a little bit more about the organization. Do you think you could find some time either in person or virtually? I I think as long as you had a decent enough relationship with that person, they'd be delighted to have a conversation with you. I think it is about that relationship there, though. Cause I get asked a lot. And I can't help everybody, but if I've worked with them before, if I know them personally or, if they're introduced by somebody who I do know personally, then I'll take the time. relationships are a bit like a bank. You know, you make deposits, and then you can make those withdrawals when you need to. But I want to go back to talking about career changes, so if you're on the job market, is it fair to say that it's maybe not a good time to think about a career pivot? Are you safer if you've got a deadline to find a new role? Are you maybe safer to stick with what you've done and what recruiters and hiring managers are more likely to, to see you for? What's going to be your best bet in that situation? I guess the question would be, what's your objective? If your objective is to find an opportunity as quickly as possible, and you're under a timeline pressure. Go and find the exact same job in one of your direct competitors and apply for it, and you'll probably get it. Now, the question is, Is that going to be interesting work? Probably not. I spend my life thinking about value exchange between two parties, right? Candidate has to give something to a process and they have to get something from a process. Client has to give something to an opportunity and they have to get something from an opportunity. The candidate isn't giving skills to an opportunity that they're not going to get the role in the first place, but if they are getting something from that opportunity, It's not going to interest them enough where they decide that they want to resign from one business to start another. And what they're getting might be a job title, that might be a salary increase, that might be more flexible working patterns, that might be a change in industry. So, there's entirely individual dependent. But the same for an organization, right? They have to offer something to be attractive enough to entice the sort of candidates that they will then want to be able to bring in from the market. I think about that very mindfully, but I don't think a lot of people do necessarily. It's important to think about these two things as separate entities. If your objective is just get a job as soon as possible. Well, you can go and apply for the thing that you did, that you've been doing for the last 20 years. If the objective is to go and find interesting work that's different. Thats a more challenging thing that will take you longer. You'll have to put harder work into being able to deliver it. And I appreciate there's not the luxury necessarily of going, where do I sit on that spectrum? People have mortgages and kids to feed and financial pressures and all that kind of stuff. But I don't think enough people kind of sit back and do that exercise, sort of explore opportunities and often talk themselves into something that, maybe isn't right for them, but where somebody has expressed interest and said that they are interested, and because they're interested, the candidate has attached value to it. You need to independently see that value for yourself. If you want to find a role that is interesting and challenging and is maybe a growth opportunity for you. Whether that's going into a new C suite or perhaps, just taking your career in a slightly different route, apart from tapping into your network, what else can you do to position yourself in the right way? I think you should try and think creatively. Firstly, how do you get to the top of the pile of CVs? Let's say there's 500 applicants , you might be applicant 497, and if you are applicant 497, you are screwed. How do I move from applicant 497 to applicant one? Figure out who the line manager is. Reach out to them directly on LinkedIn. Connect with them. Let them know you've applied to the opportunity. Let them know you are interested. That just means that you're more likely to be considered and more likely to be considered first. It doesn't necessarily mean that they will take the time to then meet you, interview you, assess you, all that kind of stuff. So then what can you do that will make that person think, Oh, okay, all right this is interesting. Let's have a chat with them. I love leaving video messages on LinkedIn. Either voice notes or video messages on LinkedIn. They humanize you, they stand you out from the pack. People are likely to at least listen to them and think mindfully before making a decision on whether to progress you or not. And that might be leaning in and saying that I know I'm a bit left field for this, but these are the reasons that I think it'd be interesting for us to have a conversation, or I know I'm left field for this, but here's a deck that I produced for you, or whatever. If you really think this is an interesting opportunity, showing the time commitment, the interest commitment, and the thoughtfulness, I think is a worthwhile exercise. You can't do it for everything, but if you do it intelligently and selectively, at least you're increasing your chances. What final advice would you have for job seekers on the market? What kind of actionable insights can they take from you today? Look, I think the first thing to in there. It's improving. It'll get better, promise! It'll get better. Yeah, I mean, and look, I mean, march onwards, we see the most resignations. We see the most new hiring strategies. We're the largest now marketing and digital recruitment agency in the UK. We have rich data as a result. We can see that things are getting busier month on month. It has been some busy months, there have been some quiet months, but the mood music is shifting both in terms of the volume of work that we receive as a firm, but also, you know, I spend all day speaking to CMOs. And people who were struggling to find a role 12 months ago not just a role, but like an interview are now in multiple processes. Like stuff is moving in the right direction. So, firstly, to be, you know, open minded and consider every opportunity, but also to just be really patient and wait for the right thing. And I think the longer you wait, the better the market is, the more it will improve, the more opportunities will present themselves to you. I think there's great value in doing interim work in a market like this, where there's a bit of uncertainty, interim tends to do pretty well. And it keeps your cash flow going, which allows you to be more selective about permanent opportunities to take on. And then aside from that, network like crazy, meet loads of people, ask for help. It's a tough, vulnerable, exposing place to be as a job hunter. And it's and it is okay to feel anxious and worried. You can only control what you can control. So if you are speaking to the right people with enough frequency, showing up in the right places, good stuff will come to you. There are some great candidates out there that businesses are going to be backflipping with excitement over when they end up signing them. So, hang in there. We'd love to speak to people in market and actively looking for new roles. So, yeah, fingers crossed. You find something great. Yeah, I mean, it's worth waiting for the right thing because it's really going to be how you shape and define your career. As you said earlier, it's easier to go into a new role or go into a new direction within your current company than it is to do it on the open market. So, I mean, where you land is, is really important. I love that advice as well around taking interim positions as a way to kind of transition before you find a full time role or, you know, to tie you over while you look. Or to try before you buy as well. Right? There's a lot of businesses out there that are very nervous about making a permanent appointment, but if you hire somebody on an interim basis and they do great work, why wouldn't you want to stick around for longer? So I think removing the barrier to entry can be a really valuable exercise as well. Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, thank you so much for joining us today. Some really great My pleasure. actionable insights and I love talking with you. I learn something new every time I do. So thank you so much for joining us today. Pleasure. Thank you for having me. That's a wrap for this episode of Marketers Unleashed. Thank you for tuning in and diving deep with us into the Unleashed world of marketing. We hope you're leaving with fresh insights, new ideas, and maybe even a few a ha moments to feel your next big move. If you've enjoyed today's conversation, don't forget to hit that subscribe button so you never miss a new episode. And hey, we'd love to hear from you. Drop us a review or connect with us on LinkedIn to share your thoughts. And join in the conversation. Until next time, keep thinking bold, challenging the norms, and unleashing your inner marketer. After all, what's the worst that'll happen? I'm your host, Kathryn Strachan. Over and out.