Charting the Course for CMO-led Change

In the Tomorrow CMO laboratory I’ve been crafting a lot of points-of-view on what titles are and what they actually mean. And also hammering home my thoughts on “what a marketing leader actually does is so much more important than what you call them, unless you call them really mean and hurtful names and kick sand at them at the beach.” As a result, I’ve certainly turned that eye towards thinking about what a “CMO” or marketing leader actually does. Like, actually.

Yes, we tell stories. And build demand engines. Strip it down, though, and the best marketing leaders are map-makers.

Most organizations hire a marketing leader when they’re in flux. “The business is shifting from product-led to enterprise sales!” Or, “we’ve plateaued and need new growth paths!” Or, my personal favorite, and yeah, lots of paraphrasing ahead, “we’re expanding into this new market and nobody’s ever heard of us, why hath marketing failed us so?”

Truly. This truth of what marketing leaders really do isn’t just about “running campaigns” or programs. It’s literally drawing THE map that shows:

• Where the organization is today (with all the messy truths)

• Where it says it wants to go (often fuzzier than it admits and maybe sometimes no one actually knows anyway, except ‘hockey stick’)

• The routes available in a market… some are quick and short, some are super sketchy and treacherous, and some are straight up “abandon all hope” dead ends

• Most importantly… also the signals along the way that prove we’re still heading north

  
  

I’ve been applying OPERATOR framework ideas towards the work I’m doing now finding my next role. (Someone said they wanted a t-shirt, and it wasn’t just me that said it!) Right now, I’m not just looking for the next role, I’m legit mapping how to get from reaction to progression. Every piece of the framework is a compass point: Objectives, Positioning, Execution Readiness… all the way through to Results.

Here is the thing: Maps don’t eliminate risk. They don’t flatten mountains or calm storms, certainly. But they do give clarity. And clarity turns fear into direction, and direction into action.

Exactly what great marketing leadership does, too.

So whether you’re leading a team through a rebrand, a product shift, or (like me) a personal rebuild, the work is the same: make the map, show the way, and keep moving.