Episode 8
Building Your Flywheel of Credibility: A Playbook for New CMOs in PE-Backed Companies
On today’s episode, Erica talks with Gary Survis, an Operating Partner with Insight Partners. Erica and Gary discuss how the strongest CMOs limit risk when transitioning into new marketing leadership roles:
- They stand out by demonstrating credibility, collaboration, and curiosity. They're aware that what you don't say in an interview is just as important as what you do say.
- When interviewing, they communicate their experience with this structure: strategy + example + numbers.
- Once in the new CMO role, they realize that no matter what their background is, they have to deliver on their demand gen goals or risk losing their job.
- They have a perspective on AI and know how they will organize their teams and define roles differently for AI-supported marketing.
- They create a "flywheel of credibility."
- They take the time they need to form an assessment – "it'll be the only time in your tenure when you are afforded the luxury of time."
- They follow the "Diagnose, Don't Delude" approach – identifying and surfacing problems rather than sweeping problems under the rug.
- They swiftly make the org changes they need to make: "If you are not successful because the people below you are not strong, you have no one to blame but yourself for not making the changes you know you need to make."
00:00 Welcome to The Get: Season Overview
00:47 Introducing Gary Survis: Insights from an Operating Partner
01:37 De-risking the CMO Hiring Process
02:10 Common Pitfalls in Recruiting Marketing Leaders
05:01 Balancing Strategy and Execution in Marketing
11:00 Key Traits of Successful Marketing Leaders
13:19 The Importance of Curiosity in Leadership
17:15 AI in Marketing: What to Look for in a CMO
19:36 Early Steps for a New CMO
21:41 The Role of AI in Organizational Structure
22:34 Setting and Achieving Goals
24:25 Challenges in Coaching CMOs
26:53 Reflections on Past Marketing Roles
28:56 Marketing Under the CRO: A Controversial Trend
31:13 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
The Get is here to drive smart decisions around recruiting and leadership in B2B SaaS marketing. We explore the trends, tribulations, and triumphs of today’s top marketing leaders in B2B SaaS.
This season’s theme is The Race to Reduce Risk in CMO Recruiting.
The Get’s host is Erica Seidel, who runs The Connective Good, an executive search practice with a hyper-focus on recruiting CMOs and VPs of Marketing, especially in B2B SaaS.
If you are looking to hire a CMO or VP of Marketing of the ‘make money’ variety - rather than the ‘make it pretty’ variety, contact Erica at erica@theconnectivegood.com. You can also follow Erica on LinkedIn or sign up for her newsletter at TheConnectiveGood.com.
The Get is produced by the team at Simpler Media Productions.
This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:
OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy
Transcript
>> Erica Seidel: Hello and welcome to the get. I'm your host,
Speaker:Erica Seidel. This season we
Speaker:focus on the race to reduce risk when it comes to a
Speaker:match between a company and a cmo.
Speaker:How can you find out what you need to find out before
Speaker:saying yes so that you make a match that
Speaker:sticks? So far this season, we've heard from
Speaker:several CMOs about how they reduce risk before
Speaker:saying yes to a role. What's most critical for them to
Speaker:find out? We've talked about the fears that
Speaker:companies have, uh, as they embark on a CMO search.
Speaker:And we've seen a model for how companies and CMO
Speaker:candidates can collaboratively de risk before
Speaker:joining forces. We've heard from current CMOs
Speaker:as well as former CMOs who have gone on
Speaker:to roles like CEO or Chief Commercial
Speaker:officer or chief Revenue officer.
Speaker:Today we'll hear from a former CMO who has been
Speaker:immersed in hiring, uh, CMOs and enabling
Speaker:them for more than eight years as an operating
Speaker:partner at a top investment shop.
Speaker:I'm happy to have Gary Service join me on the
Speaker:show. Gary is an operating partner with Insight
Speaker:Partners. He works across many different
Speaker:portfolio companies, helping them with hiring marketing
Speaker:leaders and with getting their go to market engines humming
Speaker:and bringing in AI to drive impact
Speaker:not just within marketing, but across the business.
Speaker:He's in a great spot to recognize patterns across
Speaker:marketing leaders and across SaaS companies.
Speaker:He's also former CMO at Syncsort.
Speaker:I first saw Gary speak at a pavilion event and thought,
Speaker:ooh, I would love to have him as a guest on the
Speaker:get.
Speaker:Gary, welcome.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Thank you. Thank you. Excited to be here.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: I'd like to talk with you about before
Speaker:marketing leaders are hired and then once they are in
Speaker:the seat, you know, first I will say that listeners on
Speaker:this show, they either want to have a job like yours, so
Speaker:many people want to be an operating partner in marketing,
Speaker:or they want to get hired for a job
Speaker:where you're involved in the recruiting
Speaker:process and then you would be a coach for them. So I think your
Speaker:perspectives are going to be great. You are there
Speaker:to de risk a hire, and that's the whole theme
Speaker:of this season, is de risking the CMO
Speaker:recruiting process. So in your view, how
Speaker:do recruiting processes for marketing leaders go
Speaker:wrong in your experience?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Well, I think the issue
Speaker:for many of our portfolio
Speaker:company leaders, I'm going to call
Speaker:that the founder, CEO
Speaker:leader, is
Speaker:they will go into every
Speaker:search with a very clear
Speaker:idea of what they believe the
Speaker:organization's deficiency is.
Speaker:Now, sometimes that deficiency in
Speaker:marketing is based on
Speaker:a bias of who was ever in that
Speaker:role previously. I often say
Speaker:you can't hire your new
Speaker:person with just a focus on what the
Speaker:other person didn't do. Well, my example is
Speaker:you had someone, they were always late to meetings and
Speaker:that really bothered you. They're always late for meetings. So
Speaker:gosh, we're going to make sure we hire
Speaker:someone who absolutely
Speaker:will not be late. And guess what? They are not late. But you know
Speaker:what? They don't know how to spell you
Speaker:so focused on that one thing that they didn't
Speaker:do that you over rotate
Speaker:in what the job requirement is.
Speaker:That's where we can come in and have a
Speaker:business level discussion based on experience, based on
Speaker:what we're seeing, based on where that company is in
Speaker:their growth arc and help right
Speaker:size, what the requirements are, the
Speaker:competencies are to help them put that in a good
Speaker:rank order that not just reflects whatever the
Speaker:CEO founder sees, but
Speaker:also what we believe the business needs.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Got it? Yeah. So this overcorrecting, do you find that the
Speaker:overcorrecting is often for something interpersonal
Speaker:or something like. That example you brought up was a little bit more
Speaker:interpersonal. Has nothing to do with what's on somebody's
Speaker:resume.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: It's a solid. It depends on that.
Speaker:Sometimes a leader is just
Speaker:annoyed about an interpersonal thing and
Speaker:it overtakes them. But most
Speaker:have a good EQ and understand
Speaker:that they're looking for outcomes.
Speaker:And most likely the issue
Speaker:is the organization is not
Speaker:delivering on particular outcomes
Speaker:that they feel a change in marketing could
Speaker:drive.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Yeah, let me ask you this too. Sometimes
Speaker:I found with my recruiting of CMOs that you have
Speaker:a company where they're. To your
Speaker:point, their previous marketing leader was not performing,
Speaker:so the bar for them is almost laughably
Speaker:low. Oh, we need events to be working better
Speaker:or we just need leads, leads, lead.
Speaker:When actually marketing could be providing a
Speaker:lot more value to them. How do
Speaker:you navigate that? Like uh, do you try to broaden their view
Speaker:of what marketing can do? And I'm wondering like what you say to get them
Speaker:to do that.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Yeah, I think that's one of our highest value
Speaker:adds as we engage with
Speaker:these organizations. I
Speaker:am lucky to work
Speaker:in an organization with over 500
Speaker:portfolio companies. My data
Speaker:points, signal recognition and
Speaker:really just understanding of the different combinations
Speaker:and permutations of organizations
Speaker:is my value add. And I am,
Speaker:um, empowered to push back
Speaker:where others may not against what a
Speaker:CEO wants. If I've seen
Speaker:this story before. So my job
Speaker:is to use examples, you know,
Speaker:anonymized of organizations that
Speaker:may have been similar and what they chose to do, the
Speaker:kind of leader they may have chosen for the
Speaker:marketing function. Also, I think
Speaker:there's a general
Speaker:acceptance that marketing
Speaker:definitely morphs as organizations grow
Speaker:and what the need was when an organization was say,
Speaker:sub $10 million is going to be different from
Speaker:the journey from 10 to 20 and 20 to
Speaker:50, et cetera. Again, bringing the
Speaker:perspective of have you thought about what you might
Speaker:need at this particular point in the
Speaker:journey is another way to have the conversation.
Speaker:I'll tell you what I don't do. What I don't
Speaker:do is say this kind of person.
Speaker:Our job is to have a conversation. Our
Speaker:job is to give information. And by
Speaker:the way, if the CEO founder says,
Speaker:hey, I hear what you're saying, but I really want
Speaker:this, I have to respect that. I
Speaker:don't work at the company, I advise,
Speaker:I give data points. I want you to make your
Speaker:decisions with full information. And so there is
Speaker:where my role lies.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Do you find that founder led
Speaker:companies take a longer or a shorter time
Speaker:to hire a CMO than non
Speaker:founder led companies?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: It depends. I think that
Speaker:the more experienced the founder is and
Speaker:you didn't say first time founder
Speaker:versus multiple
Speaker:company. I think there's a huge difference between the
Speaker:first time founder knowing what they
Speaker:want versus someone who's gone through this before
Speaker:and seen what was successful for them. I think that's the
Speaker:bigger determinant. Less so
Speaker:about founder led versus professional
Speaker:CEO. I also think there's
Speaker:plenty of professional CEOs that bring in
Speaker:baggage from um, previous
Speaker:interactions that may not be
Speaker:relevant for the company they're at. Um, the
Speaker:easiest example of that is you work for a
Speaker:Fortune 500 company at a certain scale
Speaker:as a CEO now you're working at a mid sized company
Speaker:with different resources, different challenges and you may
Speaker:not fully transferred
Speaker:your knowledge and therefore you're looking for someone in the
Speaker:role which ultimately won't be successful because they won't have
Speaker:the resources or they won't have the, the kind
Speaker:of ecosystem that you were coming from.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Yeah, this is so interesting, the whole, you
Speaker:know, scale thing, but yet I've
Speaker:also found that not every company's scale journey from say
Speaker:50 million to a hundred million is the same, right?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Absolutely not.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: It's all of this. It depends.
Speaker:So any other thoughts on what risks
Speaker:that leadership, uh, teams face when they recruit
Speaker:CMOs? Are there other risks that come to mind that need to
Speaker:be addressed?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Yeah, I think there's always the risk
Speaker:of
Speaker:misinterpreting
Speaker:what the organization should be
Speaker:Focusing on. Let me give you an example. There's
Speaker:always, as you know, this great
Speaker:philosophical discussion of do I need
Speaker:a uh, leader that came from product marketing or did I need a leader
Speaker:who came from demand gen? And why would you choose
Speaker:that person? Part of that is
Speaker:what I like to simplify there. And I tell
Speaker:every CMO I hire,
Speaker:I'm not saying this is a threat, I'm saying this as
Speaker:a reality. Deliver on your demand gen
Speaker:goals or lose your job. Also we can
Speaker:have a discussion about the beauty and majesty
Speaker:of all the things that marketing needs to do to
Speaker:deliver. But in
Speaker:reality that sausage making
Speaker:that the CEO and the board probably won't pay
Speaker:attention to, all they will pay attention
Speaker:to is what you deliver. I know
Speaker:the equation is brand plus demand equals
Speaker:growth. You need to build your brand, you need to
Speaker:build a efficient, repeatable demand gen
Speaker:engine and that drives growth.
Speaker:The issue for many organizations is
Speaker:over rotating one way or the other. We need a demand
Speaker:genetic CMO and I'll say
Speaker:maybe, but I prefer a
Speaker:CMO who is more of a player
Speaker:coach. In demand gen. They shouldn't be the
Speaker:ones doing demand gen. They should be able to know what
Speaker:questions to ask, to see around corners, to have
Speaker:experience to get their demand gen team
Speaker:do what they should do. Equally important
Speaker:though they need to have good sense
Speaker:of uh, what the M message and positioning
Speaker:us to be from a strategic level. So you
Speaker:need a strategic brain and a tactical
Speaker:brain and I don't like to compromise on that.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Yeah, it's interesting because so many companies say oh, what we really need
Speaker:is leads, leads, leads or ideally they'll say qualified
Speaker:demand or revenue. Ideally. But then sometimes there's a
Speaker:conversation of well do you just need a director of demand
Speaker:gen?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Yep.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Um, just is too strong of a word but you know what I mean
Speaker:versus that strategery
Speaker:that you get with somebody who can be that player coach. I
Speaker:think that's really important.
Speaker:Can you talk about a really strong B2B
Speaker:SaaS marketing leadership candidate that interviewed with
Speaker:you and a particular example of
Speaker:that person. You don't have to say their name but what did that person do
Speaker:to stand out?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Yeah, so because similar to you,
Speaker:you do a lot of interviews and
Speaker:you have a
Speaker:group of areas uh, of
Speaker:inquiry that deliver
Speaker:bits of knowledge along the way.
Speaker:What I found in the candidates
Speaker:that have stood out to me, there
Speaker:are three things that
Speaker:resonate. The first is
Speaker:I always want someone
Speaker:to speak in terms
Speaker:of strategy and
Speaker:example. I identified this
Speaker:opportunity to build out product
Speaker:marketing because we weren't onboarding our
Speaker:customers well, that they needed more information about
Speaker:our product. It's technical, awesome. But
Speaker:then translate that into numbers and
Speaker:examples after that. After we did that
Speaker:and partnered with our CS team,
Speaker:we saw uh, a 20% increase on
Speaker:retention around that. I want to see the
Speaker:connection between what you did and
Speaker:the impact. Otherwise it
Speaker:seems like you could be making it up for all I know. I want
Speaker:to understand how it really works. That's credibility.
Speaker:The second thing is, uh,
Speaker:how they function in the
Speaker:larger org. They will be part of a leadership
Speaker:team. As I'm sure you know. It's
Speaker:sometimes the things you don't say as much as the
Speaker:things you do say. In this particular case,
Speaker:the people that stand out are the ones that
Speaker:are talking about their collaboration with their
Speaker:sales partner or their
Speaker:product partner in a way that isn't sort
Speaker:of bolted on but is authentic to how
Speaker:they collaborate. If I said to you I'm super
Speaker:collaborative, well, that doesn't mean anything to
Speaker:me unless you've been giving me examples all
Speaker:throughout about how you are collaborating and
Speaker:how you are working with the different folks. And so
Speaker:first was credibility. Second is
Speaker:collaboration. The third piece is
Speaker:a bit harder. How curious you
Speaker:are, how likely are to
Speaker:explore you and I could have an existential
Speaker:discussion about whether or not I need to
Speaker:hire a cybersecurity marker for a
Speaker:cybersecurity marketing job. My
Speaker:thinking is I care about you as a
Speaker:marketer, less so about your subject
Speaker:matter expertise as a cybersecurity
Speaker:marketer. Because if you've proven to
Speaker:me, and this is to my third point,
Speaker:curiosity. If you've proven to
Speaker:me that you're curious, you're
Speaker:capable of learning businesses and your track
Speaker:record shows this. I've done this in this industry, this
Speaker:industry and this industry. You're more valuable
Speaker:to me than someone who just does cybersecurity
Speaker:marketing. The organization has plenty of knowledge
Speaker:in product teams, the CEO, all these
Speaker:folks that can give you the knowledge of this
Speaker:business, what to say to CISOs, what not to
Speaker:say to CISOs. Listen to customers. If you're that
Speaker:person, that is a differentiator to
Speaker:me.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: That's great. So you have your three C's. And it's funny, the one about
Speaker:collaboration and listening to see if
Speaker:somebody has been talking along the way about a
Speaker:collaboration with sales or product. Maybe you found this
Speaker:too. I find that listening to the parentheses
Speaker:helps a lot. In an interview, what somebody says
Speaker:parenthetically really matters a lot. I
Speaker:once interviewed this guy and he had talked
Speaker:about doing a lot of ghost Writing for
Speaker:the CEO. And I thought, God, how does that influence
Speaker:your ego to put somebody else's name on it? And so I asked
Speaker:him and he was like, no, it's fine. If I was in a band, I'd
Speaker:be the bassist in the back, just thumping out the beat.
Speaker:And that was the whole pillar of
Speaker:him getting the job. Because in that moment that I, uh,
Speaker:needed somebody who was going to be like that because the CEO was a
Speaker:strong personality in the world and that was it. And it's
Speaker:just so funny that it's like this parenthetical thing or to
Speaker:your point, something that's not there.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Parenthetically, I agree. And
Speaker:again, I think there are many
Speaker:people that are just incredible interviewers.
Speaker:They're really strong interviewers. And you need to
Speaker:be able to have other
Speaker:tools to break through a solid
Speaker:interviewer to understand the substance,
Speaker:the reality of how they
Speaker:work. I can't say just because someone
Speaker:doesn't mention collaboration in their
Speaker:responses that they're not collaborative, but they're more
Speaker:likely not to be collaborative if they
Speaker:don't.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: By contrast, is there somebody that flamed out
Speaker:recently quite spectacularly that
Speaker:sticks in your head?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: I'm sure you've heard the analogy. Hiring someone's
Speaker:like dating. You know, the first date may be great,
Speaker:second date may be good, but then on the third date
Speaker:you understand something about them that's, ah, unexpected.
Speaker:And you're like, nah, I'm not really sure. I think we're
Speaker:constantly testing our
Speaker:hypotheses and this is where back channel comes
Speaker:in. The flame out isn't as much what
Speaker:they did. It's us
Speaker:leveraging our back channel. And our back channel is not
Speaker:who the candidate gives to us. Obviously our back
Speaker:channel is who we know, who knows
Speaker:them. You can't do anything about that. That's
Speaker:just part of the process.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Fair.
Speaker:And how about your favorite interview question?
Speaker:Do you have one that you ask of people?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: My favorite interview question is actually
Speaker:around the curiosity thing. I like to
Speaker:ask people, tell me about something
Speaker:either in your personal or
Speaker:professional life that you've recently taught yourself.
Speaker:If the answer is nothing, or
Speaker:they haven't really invested in teaching themselves
Speaker:anything, then, uh, it really
Speaker:brings me to an idea of how curious you really are if
Speaker:you're not teaching yourselves new skills all the time.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Okay, I like that with that. I know that you
Speaker:have this focus on AI within
Speaker:marketing and across a business for efficiency and other
Speaker:purposes. What are you looking for, if anything, with respect
Speaker:to AI in a CMO candidate at this phase
Speaker:of the AI Surge.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: So first of all, one thing I'm not looking for is someone who's done it
Speaker:before because no one's done it before. It's hard to have experts
Speaker:in this space because it's a very
Speaker:muscle. They should have a
Speaker:perspective. I insist on having a
Speaker:perspective. That perspective could be,
Speaker:I'm going to go slow for these
Speaker:reasons. I'm going to focus in these
Speaker:areas because I know that's where likely the impact
Speaker:is. But sometimes I speak to people and they're
Speaker:like, yeah, I haven't really got around to experimenting much with
Speaker:AI thing. I know it's going to be important. They're
Speaker:not probably the best candidate.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Okay, I like that. So having like a strategic
Speaker:perspective on it, but
Speaker:being curious, it goes back to your three
Speaker:C's a little bit too, right? Curious and collaborative.
Speaker:Incredible.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: I think today the best
Speaker:way to view AI in
Speaker:marketing is be
Speaker:ready for iteration.
Speaker:Lots of going through and inventing and
Speaker:reinventing because the
Speaker:technology is leaping in
Speaker:discontinuous jumps. So with
Speaker:each new capability comes new
Speaker:implications for marketing. You can also
Speaker:be in a position that says, hey, I got
Speaker:this ChatGPT thing, I'm set.
Speaker:I think the other part,
Speaker:and I forgot to mention this as well,
Speaker:it's critical for me to see that someone
Speaker:recognizes that AI is
Speaker:as much a technical thing as a change
Speaker:management thing. And if they're not signing up for
Speaker:the change management to help
Speaker:their teams through this,
Speaker:then that is either you don't really understand
Speaker:the implications or you're not a mature enough
Speaker:manager to really drive, drive the kind
Speaker:of impact that you should be by leveraging these
Speaker:tools.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Think about, okay, so now you've hired a cmo, they're in their new
Speaker:role. What are the early things that
Speaker:you think a new CMO should do
Speaker:within your portfolio to get off on the right foot,
Speaker:to limit risk right out of the gate?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: There are several places they can focus
Speaker:that are important. The first
Speaker:one is being honest
Speaker:about the time they need
Speaker:to form their
Speaker:hypothesis or beliefs. We
Speaker:default to 30, 60, 90 day
Speaker:plans, which is fine, but that is not a
Speaker:recipe for success. I'd rather you
Speaker:tell me. I need 60 days
Speaker:to talk to enough customers, do enough
Speaker:internal work, travel around the world to understand
Speaker:the differences so that you are making an
Speaker:informed decision. I think this is the only
Speaker:time in a new
Speaker:CMO's tenure that they will
Speaker:be afforded the luxury of
Speaker:time. So if you say you need 60
Speaker:days, take the 60 days.
Speaker:That's number one. Number two, the org,
Speaker:I expect that
Speaker:the marketing leader that comes into place
Speaker:is good at evaluating people,
Speaker:understands how to structure an org
Speaker:and whether they have the right people in the right
Speaker:roles. The right people in the wrong roles
Speaker:are just the wrong people. And
Speaker:I expect a, uh, plan to move
Speaker:quickly to do that
Speaker:because a slow drip of this is bad.
Speaker:Pull the band aid off, make the changes. Know what you
Speaker:need to do. I, uh, say this to every
Speaker:cmo, that
Speaker:in the end, if you're not
Speaker:successful because the people below you are not
Speaker:strong, you have no one to blame but
Speaker:yourself for not making the changes you know you need to
Speaker:make. Take your time,
Speaker:but make decisions pretty quickly
Speaker:about what you need to do. I will add a little
Speaker:AI bonus point on this. I'm
Speaker:encouraging CMOs
Speaker:today to think about whether
Speaker:they want to create a BG or an AG
Speaker:organization before generative or
Speaker:after generative organization. If you
Speaker:choose to do the BG organization, recognize
Speaker:that the responsibilities are going to change, the roles
Speaker:are going to change. Or are you going to try to
Speaker:start moving your organization to the
Speaker:way technology is going to change the
Speaker:structure? For that reason, I encourage
Speaker:them to do a little more forward thinking about
Speaker:what people's roles are really going to be, where you're going to need.
Speaker:Do you need five creative people? Do
Speaker:you need as many writers? Do you
Speaker:need more editors? What do you need? Based on
Speaker:how this technology is moving, you should have a point of view.
Speaker:The last thing I want to talk about
Speaker:is goals. It is
Speaker:critical for marketers to be
Speaker:successful that they
Speaker:put a stake in the sand of what they're going to
Speaker:accomplish. They show progress against
Speaker:it and then, God willing, actually
Speaker:deliver on it. That is what
Speaker:creates trust and confidence in the organization
Speaker:about your leadership. If you don't feel
Speaker:comfortable enough giving the goals and the numbers
Speaker:and the specifics and showing progress regularly
Speaker:against that, the board,
Speaker:and in some cases co, but more likely the board, in the
Speaker:absence of information, assumes nothing
Speaker:is happening. So I'm, uh, making this
Speaker:up. If you have an issue with the
Speaker:pipeline, show me
Speaker:how you're making progress on that. Show
Speaker:me that you put a plan in place. This is where I
Speaker:expected to be by Q4. Here's where we
Speaker:are in Q3 and I believe we're going to hit it.
Speaker:Or be honest and say, I'm not going to hit it. And here's
Speaker:why. If you delude
Speaker:people into thinking you got it and then surprise them,
Speaker:um, that is the surest way to lose trust
Speaker:and confidence.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: I like that. We'll call that diagnose.
Speaker:Don't Delude. Because you're looking for somebody to diagnose
Speaker:the issues and come up with the perspective of
Speaker:how to fix them. That's great.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Part about it is commit. That's the
Speaker:piece that I would add to it is
Speaker:diagnose, don't delude,
Speaker:commit. It's that commit that gives
Speaker:people confidence that you're willing to put your
Speaker:name behind it, put your org behind it.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: And then it creates this kind of flywheel of credibility as
Speaker:you do that.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Yeah, that, uh, would be the goal.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: You offer coaching to various CMOs
Speaker:across all the different companies. Is
Speaker:there a piece of coaching that's hardest for people to put
Speaker:into action? Where you said to yourself, I wish
Speaker:I could get this
Speaker:coaching into their brains and their actions
Speaker:more easily.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: I'll start off by saying in that regard
Speaker:that among people who want to be
Speaker:operating partners, the hardest
Speaker:transition if you're an
Speaker:operator, is the fact that you aren't working in the
Speaker:business, that you can't just go in there and do
Speaker:it. Your job is influencing. Your
Speaker:job is advising, but it's not
Speaker:doing. And that's why some people
Speaker:aspirationally want to be an operating
Speaker:partner. But maybe that's just not
Speaker:right for them. It becomes too frustrating. If
Speaker:every portfolio company took all my advice,
Speaker:that would be amazing. Never happens.
Speaker:And there are a variety of reasons. Sometimes it's
Speaker:skill, sometimes it's will, sometimes
Speaker:it's that they're just having
Speaker:a hard time driving impact. I'll, uh,
Speaker:give an example. There are many examples of this, but
Speaker:one that is common is
Speaker:the organizations that were traditionally
Speaker:doing volume velocity, kind of demand gen,
Speaker:and then saying, I think we want to move up market, I
Speaker:think we want to do more account based.
Speaker:Account based is a says, easy does, hard
Speaker:thing. It is, oh, yeah, I have a
Speaker:list of accounts. We've had lists of accounts for eons.
Speaker:That's not what makes account based. The
Speaker:hard part of account based is
Speaker:how you get marketing and sales working together, making sure
Speaker:you have the right KPIs, figuring out which are the
Speaker:tactics, planning it out in a longer form.
Speaker:There's a lot of things that go into making account
Speaker:based successful. I can do
Speaker:sessions, we can do workshops, I can give you
Speaker:frameworks, I can show you how to do it. I can give examples of
Speaker:companies that have done it. I just can't do it. And some people
Speaker:know how to take that information and action on
Speaker:it, and others struggle.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Well said. Right. A lot of people want to be operating
Speaker:partners. They like the idea. They fancy themselves
Speaker:showing the way and telling others what to do. But you have
Speaker:to stand back a little bit. And, uh, that must be hard.
Speaker:I feel like that's like an emotional maturity piece. That
Speaker:must be a piece of it.
Speaker:Two other questions for you. Can you think about back when
Speaker:you were leading marketing in an
Speaker:operating role like that sync sort, for
Speaker:instance, what coaching now would you give
Speaker:yourself before you took that job? Is there a
Speaker:regret that you have looking back like, oh, okay, if
Speaker:I had only known X or if I had only done Y,
Speaker:I'd feel better about myself.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: What I like about that question is part of what
Speaker:I tell people all the time, that if I were to go back
Speaker:and be a cmo, I would be such a better CMO than
Speaker:I was back then. That is partially
Speaker:because if I said to
Speaker:any candidate, how many companies have you worked
Speaker:for? They'll say, I've worked for seven or eight or whatever
Speaker:it might be. And I've learned these different things.
Speaker:I meet with seven or eight companies every few days.
Speaker:I am getting different
Speaker:combinations of problems
Speaker:and different issues and things
Speaker:that you would think would go one way, go a different way.
Speaker:And my reference base is just so
Speaker:much bigger than it was when I was
Speaker:there. I think what that, uh, would allow
Speaker:me to do is be
Speaker:much more realistic
Speaker:about how I plan out
Speaker:what we are doing. I'll tell you this awful
Speaker:story. I remember we used serious
Speaker:decisions back in the day before Forrester bought them
Speaker:and used their benchmarks.
Speaker:Not having any better benchmarks.
Speaker:I committed to one of the serious decision
Speaker:benchmarks that was there.
Speaker:And the Gary of today would never do that. I
Speaker:understand too well how benchmarks are put
Speaker:together. I understand how I would
Speaker:apply it or what I would do. It was just a
Speaker:massive mistake doing it the way I did
Speaker:it. And that's just one of many because I've made so many
Speaker:mistakes in retrospect that I now
Speaker:know so much more about that I would approach
Speaker:it completely different.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Fabulous. I appreciate that.
Speaker:Last question for you. This is a little bit of a non sequitur,
Speaker:but since I have you thoughts on marketing under the CRO,
Speaker:there's a bit of this, I hate to say a trend. Some companies
Speaker:are nestling marketing under the Chief Revenue Officer
Speaker:and separating marketing out into its different component
Speaker:parts. The product marketing goes under product. Others are
Speaker:keeping it as a function under the
Speaker:CEO. Thoughts on
Speaker:when and where this is working and whether you
Speaker:think this would be temporary? Any thoughts to
Speaker:share?
Speaker:>> Gary Service: I think first you need to ask
Speaker:the question, why is that
Speaker:happening? The reason that is happening
Speaker:is because marketing has lost the
Speaker:confidence of the organization. The
Speaker:leadership may or may not still be there and they
Speaker:are, uh, saying, okay, we want to change this
Speaker:because we weren't getting what we needed out
Speaker:of marketing. Where are we seeing
Speaker:when any of those combination of strategies
Speaker:done work for more than a year or
Speaker:two before they come back
Speaker:to a more true it creates a whole new set of
Speaker:problems. Going back to my
Speaker:original comment, I have a bias against solving for the
Speaker:problem that I had before and then I create a whole
Speaker:set of new problems by what I've done. This is a
Speaker:perfect example of that too.
Speaker:Now messaging, uh, becomes fragmented
Speaker:because product marketing is doing one thing
Speaker:that is under product management now, but
Speaker:that's not really helping your demand gen team. But sitting over
Speaker:in another place and you
Speaker:may have a CRO that is really only a
Speaker:sales leader but now has marketing reporting to them so
Speaker:they can't be the player coach. Every choice
Speaker:has repercussions and implications
Speaker:and if you are doing it, I would step
Speaker:back and say, why are you doing
Speaker:this and what are the issues there and
Speaker:how could we solve it? And uh,
Speaker:again, I know plenty of leaders have made
Speaker:the choice to do that, but I've not seen it
Speaker:work.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Okay, yeah, I know it's a controversial
Speaker:topic these days and I think the proof will be in the
Speaker:pudding. One, two, three years down the pike here.
Speaker:Awesome. I know that's a bit of a downer to end us
Speaker:on, but I did want to get your take on that.
Speaker:Thank you so much. We have covered so much ground. I feel like there's
Speaker:so much good insight here and people are going to love
Speaker:listening to this. So thank you. Thank you so much, Gary.
Speaker:>> Gary Service: Thank you for having me. This is fun. This is the easiest part of
Speaker:my day.
Speaker:>> Erica Seidel: Wonderful. Okay. And yeah, you could just point people
Speaker:to this podcast and say, oh, you don't have to meet with me, just listen
Speaker:to this.
Speaker:That was Gary, Service Marketing operating partner
Speaker:at Insight Partners.
Speaker:Stay tuned for the next episode of the get, coming in a
Speaker:couple of weeks. Thanks for listening to the get.
Speaker:I'm your host, Erica Seidel. The GET is here to
Speaker:drive smart decisions around recruiting and leadership in
Speaker:B2B SaaS marketing. We explore the trends,
Speaker:tribulations and triumphs of today's top marketing
Speaker:leaders in B2B SaaS. If you liked this
Speaker:episode, please share it. For more about the get, visit
Speaker:the Get Podcast.com to learn more
Speaker:about my executive search practice which focuses on
Speaker:recruiting the make money marketing leaders rather than
Speaker:the make it pretty ones. Follow me on LinkedIn
Speaker:or visit theconnectivegood.com the get is produced
Speaker:by Evo Terra and the team at Simpler Media Productions.
