Why CMOs burn out faster

Her eyes were so sunken in with deep black circles around them.

She seemed to be so tired, completely drained of energy, so I had to ask her: “Say, are you alright?”. “Oh yes, I’m perfect and this is the best time of my life” she replied.

But as both of us were CMOs in different stages of our career path, we both knew that wasn't the reality of the situation.

This is usually what happens when I meet marketing leaders. I'll typically meet with 5-7 CMOs on a weekly basis in 30-minute intervals to provide them with guidance. I myself get as much out of it as they do, allowing me to stay in the know as to what's going on in the industry.

In some situations, I also meet with the CEOs of these companies. In most cases the CEO says that their CMO needs either a ‘professional boost’ or an ‘energy boost’ and that they think that they can do much better. In many cases, these CEOs are thinking “how can I improve my CMO? I think it’s time to transition them out of their role”. Unfortunately, this happens far too often.

As a long-time marketing leader, I love MarketingCharts.com and am subscribed to their blog. I get an instant dose of statistics, surveys, and an overarching view of what’s going on in the marketing sphere.

In one of their recent newsletters, I got the below table based on this research:

From what I’ve seen since I first became a CMO 15 years ago, and even more recently in the past six months since I’ve started consulting growth-stage startups, and experiencing my own burn out a few years back (when I strained my back and developed shingles - a horrible disease common among 65+ year old's) is that, CMOs are indeed lasting less time in their companies; mainly because, we are burning out faster.

I agree that there are many more reasons why we CMOs last the shortest time in a company: here are a few opinions from the Wall Street Journal article- Average Tenure of CMOs Falls Again

• “It’s a noisy laboratory in which a marketing leader is going to try to make the connection between an action and an outcome,” Ms. Moorman said, adding that other executives might not fully appreciate that complexity.
• Some companies assign CMOs to handle relatively narrow tactical questions around communications and advertising, not recognizing their ability to perform a broader strategic role driving growth. “Nobody’s going to win—the CMO is going to get frustrated, the CEO is going to get frustrated—if they’re dealt a more tactical hand,” she said.
• Marketing chiefs have an opportunity to lead if companies let them, he said. “I’m seeing more and more jobs that have been expanded,” he said. “The best CMOs I know happen to be talented managers and leaders who just happen to be skilled around all things in marketing.”

So I asked on my social platforms about this phenomenon, as it related to the MarketingCharts.com data, and here are the responses I received.

*Note: This was a collaborative project made up of the brightest marketing leaders and digital thinkers in the industry. After compiling dozens of comments from my posts, I divided them into core categories based on the roadmap that a CMO typically undergoes when joining a company - what they need to do prior, and during their time at a company/organization:

1. Face the complex reality
2. Research before joining
3. Manage expectations
4. Enhance internal communication
5. Build a resilient team
6. Mindfulness, Mutual Support, and Professional Growth
7. Manage yourself better

Face The Complex Reality 

Coming to terms with the environment in which you are already entrenched. Any marketing leader should know that the marketing leadership sphere is tough and no one is going to take it easy on you.

It's a combination of a lack of understanding and expectations of the actual position and the fact that most startups are run by technology or salespeople, who usually see the CMO function as secondary, which can be replaced frequently. (Yehuda Kogan, Growth Advisor)

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The role itself has many definitions, and with confusion and unrealistic expectations, it seems that for some reason, the marketing department is one that receives input from all other team members, despite their knowledge and actual comprehension of what the marketing department's purpose actually is. (Yan Kotliarsky, AccessiBe, Head of Growth)

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A lot of executives do not know what marketing is and do not understand what to look for in a CMO. The main confusion is between Performance Marketing, Product Marketing and Brand Building. (Neta Weinryb, Marketing Consultant)

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It is a lack of understanding and often fear. Marketing is an area that everyone has a position on from the board to the last employee. (Eran Shlingbaum, EXP-Editions, Marketing Manager)

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The field of marketing is very broad and includes many sub-fields, some with the ability to be measured in the short term, and some with indirect effect and/or measurability in the long term. (Yossi Aviv, HackerU, Chief Marketing Officer)

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It comes down to knowing If you are strong enough to analyze the image of the organization and your ability to promote it. At the end of the day anyone can claim to be an expert in marketing, but what counts is your ability to bring significant results to the organization.  (Yossi Aviv, HackerU, Chief Marketing Officer)

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It is interesting to hear how Sangram Vajre from Terminus analyzes the fact that only in the world of marketing can people who have not grown in the same field reach senior positions. Unlike Sales, Product, R&D, Finance, etc. Maybe the success of guys like Steve Jobs who are considered marketing gurus has made many executives think that these are abilities that are born with and not necessarily acquired? For the full section: https://terminus.com/blog/how-to-be-an-effective-cmo/ (Roy Brockman, SecuriThings, Director of Marketing)

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It's the complex nature of the job and is something that you need to be aware of going in. We are responsible for web, design, and demand generation, to events, comms, and customer/sales. It's either you spread yourself out too thin and burn out, or focus on only a few of these and then aren't able to produce on the others. (Scott Fingerhut, Grafana Labs, VP of Global Marketing)

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It starts with a marketer who wants a job but is forced to enter a place where the leader doesn't understand anything related to marketing, but on the other hand, has unrealistic expectations. From there everything will inevitably deteriorate. (Einav Laviv, G2mTeam, Co-Founder & Co-CEO)

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An important aspect of the CMO’s role is to ensure that the CEO of the company doesn't do any harm to his own company, due to his lack of knowledge related to marketing, (Eliav Alaluf, Marketing Expert)

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The issue is many CMO’s lack managerial experience and a broad enough understanding of marketing, so they often are fired quickly. Furthermore, unlike most positions, CMOs hold marketing budgets and these are often the largest budgets in the organization and are often perceived as a waste rather than an investment. This results in a decreased tenure expectancy when compared to other C-level execs in my opinion. Regarding methods for reducing stress, I recommend setting realistic goals and making sure they match with your company, as well as taking personal development courses in any field in which you feel a professional weakness. (Ehud Basis, Outbrain, Head of Growth Marketing)

Research Before Joining 

Executing due diligence is an essential stage, prior to accepting a CMO position at a new company/organization. You owe it to yourself to research as deep as possible by speaking with future team members and by defining a clear checklist of information you want to know, prior to jumping on board.

The most important thing is the internal environment in which you want to join. Lack of synchronization and chemistry with the CEO is the main reason why so many CMOs leave or get fired. The problem tends to be that everyone seems to think they know best, and if there is no connection with the CEO and your fellow C-level colleagues, there is no real future. (Omer Shai, Wix, CMO)

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Questionnaire for marketing managers:

1. Do you work for an organization that is trying to solve product problems by investing in advertising?

2. Are you trying to solve customer trust issues by recruiting more leads?

3. Is the CEO's strategy to fund the working in the long run from the money that will be received from the leads that come in the short run?

4. Are the members of the senior management in your organization sure that they understand marketing and that you are only a promoter?

If you answered "yes" to 2 or more questions, congratulations! You have gained mental erosion! Good luck in the next role. (Eliav Alaluf, Marketing Expert)

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A big hurdle is lack of buy-in and a true understanding of the role by other execs; sometimes it feels that the hire is a must-have for the sake of it, but isn't empowered/understood in a productive way. I think it's critical we ask sharp and specific questions about what resources were put into marketing in the past - including energy, time, etc. What experiences/relationships have other execs had with other marketing execs, even in (especially in?) previous companies. I'd want to get a sense of whether there is skepticism lingering, whether this is a token post, and who in the exec team has the real empowerment to make choices that will impact the marketing exec. (Liz Cohen, Hetz Ventures, Director of Content)

It comes down to choosing the right person and 90% of the work is making sure you've picked the right individual. If you have chosen the right person then you’ve significantly reduced the risk of burnout. (Yehuda Kogan, Growth Advisor)

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Unreasonable expectations that do not take into account market maturity, budgets, product maturity, or the need to adjust the penetration strategy for a new market with a new product. In the end, the most important thing is to join an organization where the CEO understands (really) what marketing is and coordinates expectations (Neta Weinryb, Marketing Consultant)

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Understanding the needs of the CEO/Founder and ensuring you aren't tied to a plan drawn up prior to you joining the company. A startup during a recruitment period behaves differently from a startup that is in the growth stage. (Eran Shlingbaum, EXP-Editions, Marketing Manager)

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The challenge is to analyze the situation prior to jumping in and creating a mutually agreed-upon plan with the Founder/CEO that addresses the goals, competitors, market, and current situation of the company. (Yossi Aviv, HackerU, Chief Marketing Officer)

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One of the problems is the lack of flexibility and 'runway' that a new CMO has come into an organization that may already be considered tense. Investors are pressured to see results, and management needs to deliver. Everyone is stressed to show results and stress causes two things:

1. The creation of the marketing plan and the priorities needed to get it up and running.

2. Creates s level of urgency, and when things are done out of urgency they often are lacking in quality.

The best way to manage this is to coordinate expectations prior to entering a new organization. Make sure they know that it takes time to adjust to the relevant product/customers/content, and do not let the stress from the organization put unneeded pressure on the marketing plan. (Talia Schmidt, AllCloud, Head of Marketing - EMEA)

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When joining a new company it’s important to understand where you’d like to go; what resources do they provide; what are the challenges facing the organization; what is the status of their product; and who are their partners when it comes to decision making. All these things are important to take into account before joining a new organization. Of course, this is not to say there won't be surprises along the way, but you should do everything you can to reduce that possibility. 

Additionally, it's also important to understand the job requirements as published, the salary of the CMO, and the budget of the marketing department. (Neta Weinryb, Marketing Consultant)

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The basis for success (and "survival") is trust, open communication, and coordination of expectations with management. So before joining any company - you need to create a basis for these values and make sure they really exist. This can be done by interviewing clients, future colleagues, by joining a management conversation, and in some cases even reaching out to former employees. (Ariel Navon, Affogata, Head of Marketing)

Manage Expectations

Making sure you and your current or incoming CEO and the team have a clear, concise, and drawn out understanding of what's expected for you, from you, as well as them.

I think the expectations are unrealistic. When results don't come quickly, companies change CMOs much like professional sports teams swap out coaches. The best companies create an environment where CMOs, CEOs, and CFOs are aligned, the rules of engagement are established, and the results are realistic (but still ambitious!) (Mark Evans, B2B & SaaS, Fractional CMO)

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First and foremost, the chemistry and trust between the CEO and the CMO is crucial. The greater support the CEO gives while delegating responsibilities, the greater the organizational value is delivered by the CMO. (Betty Kulbak-Aharon, Cyber Education Center, VP Marketing and Partnerships)

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Coordinating expectations and defining the CMO’s responsibilities is priority #1. For example, in many cases, there is someone in charge of the product, if so then there must be defined expectations between coordinating between departments and who exactly is in charge of the research and who is in charge of the product marketing.

Also a clear definition of metrics. A CMO should be measured on revenue, not CTR for Facebook ads. (Yan Kotliarsky, AccessiBe, VP of Marketing)

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The KPI any marketing leader should be accountable for is revenues because at the end of the day it's what you really measure, reflects overall performance, and does not take things like image, PR, cool/viral factors into account, or any other variables that founders/CEOs typically don't care about. (Noa Gottfried, Marketing Consultant)

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The best advice I can give is to do your research before accepting the job. Look the CEO in the eyes and have him describe the state of the company with full transparency. Only then will you be able to make a decision. (Einav Laviv, G2mteam, Co-Founder & Co-CEO)

Enhance Internal Communication

Communication is the lifeblood of any well-run organization. Proper communication, and the way you communicate can have an immense impact on reducing burnout. Think of it like executing internal marketing as a method to expose and educate the rest of your employees and leadership team as to why marketing is needed and what you do in your department.

Schedule a weekly conversation or lunch with the CEO to keep him up to date, and to try and maintain a level of friendship. Through this, you'll be able to create mutual respect and bond, that will allow the CEO to always be in the know. (Yossi Elchanan, Adcore, CMO)

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Being connected to all your customers and employees within the company and understanding their difficulties, desires, problems, and successes (Yossi Elchanan, Adcore, CMO)

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1. Creating meaningful relationships within the organization to understand the emotional needs it has.

2. Connect and collaborate with other departments to create campaigns that help to address and get a sense of the big picture.

Coordinating expectations about what marketing is, is what's important. In the end everyone does more or less the same thing - but what differentiates those special individuals is their ability to create a relationship with their target audience.

Real marketing, at least to me, is building connections, including meaningful relationships. Only then is it clear why you are doing what you are doing. What it is that is getting you up in the morning. (Eliav Ser, Digital Marketing Consultant)

Build A Resilient Team 

A CMO is only as good as the team he/she is leading. Don’t delay, and be sure you build yours based on the proper characteristics, skills, and traits. Try to move away from being hands, otherwise, the weight will be too heavy to bear. 

Build a very strong, and self-reliant team. Those that come from a variety of backgrounds and specialties who are experts in their field and who know how to advise as well as manage others. (Dror Pic, SodaStream, Online Marketing Team Leader)

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I am in favor of small teams versus large ones, composed of team members who are experts in their craft. It's also important to empower your managers and employees and help to support a team dynamic, and a collaborative environment. (Noa Gottfried, Marketing Consultant)

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You need to build a strong team around you. A team that buys into the vision and is there for the right reasons. A team that knows what needs to get done and then gets it done well. A team you love working with day in and day out. A team you trust and care for and never hesitate to challenge directly. A team that calls you on your bullshit. That's something we're always striving for and it makes this journey worth it. (Srdjan (Serge) Popovic, Crossrope, CMO)

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Following through is important. The act of not completing a task through to completion will only hinder your ability to complete tasks/projects in the future. When faced with an issue such as this, take a break, complete a different task, or challenge, and come back to it. (Eran Shlingbaum, EXP-Editions, Marketing Manager)

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Delegate smaller/easier tasks to employees and allow them to be a part of the greater, long term strategic plan. Quick wins build confidence for both sides but are not a substitute for strategic planning and execution. Proper delegation helps with workflow and overall project execution and helps the overall team to complete projects on time.

In this way, you help to emphasize to your team that marketing is not only about quick wins and that proper planning is what helps to bring about change. (Eran Shlingbaum, EXP-Editions, Marketing Manager)

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One of the techniques I use comes from the development world of a daily standup. A quarter of an hour in the morning that tells everyone what happened yesterday and what’s planned for today. This produces clarity and a sense of accomplishment for the team. Nowadays with the tools available, this is much simpler to perform and maintain (I use Airtable - the free version is rich in ingredients) and produces a view by date, with sharp and clear performance metrics of the team and company as a whole. (Eran Shlingbaum, EXP-Editions, Marketing Manager)

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At first, I used to do everything myself, I was hands-on way too much. But after I gave birth there was no chance I could continue doing what I did and that was my turning point- I understood that I must build a team, otherwise, I'll collapse. I hired A-Players and created a bi-weekly schedule in which we would touch base about our project's statuses. (Inna Shteyn, Herbalife, Sr. Marketing & Sales)

Mindfulness, Mutual Support, and Professional Growth

There is no end date when it comes to personal or professional growth, not to mention the effects that learning has on your brain's ability to absorb dopamine and reduce stress. Moreover, allowing yourself to rest is key to creating a balance between your personal life and work life.

I am so glad to have found a group where we can share information and collaborate on different levels, meetup on a monthly basis (when possible), have webinars, commercial collaborations, a job board that I centralize for community members, and create lots of other friendships. (Yotam Gutman, SentinelOne, Direct of Marketing)

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We have all experienced high-stress situations where we had to produce a solution that would result in profitability and growth, and sometimes, for one reason or another, it simply doesn't work.

What helps me? I build a panel for consultations and feedback. A supportive and preferably a professional circle of individuals. I am not diminishing the power of venting but it is also important to do this with people who know how to make sure it doesn’t become something that pulls down.

I also met someone amazing who does mindfulness workshops for senior executives as a tool to make sure that instances such as these don't reoccur. The ability to get out of a specific perspective and enter a state of mindfulness is a good tool for regulating stress. (Noa Gottfried, Marketing Consultant)

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Vacations - Learn what your own boundaries are and take your vacations on time. Not when you already feel worn out, regardless of if it's a busy time, it's important to re-energize yourself. (Noa Gottfried, Marketing Consultant)

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Know how to separate work and personal life. Just as religious people use candle lighting/distinction between sacred and profane. Find ‘your’ thing that helps you to separate work from private life. And only allow major crises to flow into your private life, if necessary.

It could be an office/home, family time/hobby, or just a day/hour that you reserve in the schedule that is slated just for you. This is one of the most important battery chargers for me (Noa Gottfried, Marketing Consultant)

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Restart every day anew. Go to bed in the evening (wholeheartedly if possible) and get up in the morning like a blank sheet, no regrets, and no hesitations, do not take anything personally (Erez Nativ, Kimberly Clark, Digital Producer)

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I believe balance helps to keep our spirit going. Even when we are tired our spirit continues onward. And to answer what we can do to prevents professional burnout: I think we need to replenish ourselves. (Deepak Chander, Proactive Group, Entrepreneur)

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Zoom out and listen to podcasts that inspire, at least once a week. I listen to interviews with people in my field and learn a lot (learning is not tiring but rather helps to produce dopamine), it's inspiring, and actually helps the brain produce new connections. One I recommend in particular is: https://www.chasejarvis.com/blog/self-care-reboot/ (Noa Eshed, Bold Digital Architects, Co-Founder, CEO)

Manage Yourself Better

Managing yourself is as important as managing others. Make sure you demand from yourself what you demand from others as there must be a fit between these two “manageable assets”.

There is a tendency for a lot of marketing executives to try to do everything and be involved in everything, but with limited resources. It’s very important to choose the areas where marketing will have the greatest impact and expand upon them. You can then drill down and grow those areas to grow ROI (Saar Rozenberg, Amazon Web Services, Head of Marketing Israel)

Make sure to also focus on the minor actions that are producing results, not just the major, complex, expensive actions that take a long time to reap rewards. (Eran Shlingbaum, EXP-Editions, Marketing Manager)

A startup always needs to convey a perception of growth. In the very initial stages, these are not sales and users but often a sequence of actions that build the infrastructure for creating growth. In the case of a startup in a growth phase, this would be tactical actions that produce a change in one of the parameters in the panel, such as increasing users, improving conversion rates, or entering a new channel.

We often invest a lot of resources in planning, but it's important to understand how to transition from planning to execution, which is a completely different stage, especially when working within a small team. (Eran Shlingbaum, EXP-Editions, Marketing Manager)

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Focus on a few projects, On average choose 1-2 and promote them well, and ensure they generate real value. (Yossi Elchanan, Adcore, CMO)

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I think the main issue is that CMO's haven't been hands-on for a long time, and what happens when you aren't hands-on is you lose touch and therefore can't stay on top of the game. Marketing is so agile that you need to stay focused and being more of a macro leader doesn't help you. (Stefanie Amini, Gossip Media, Co-Founder)

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Setting challenging, realistic, and job description appropriate goals. Each organization defines the CMO's role differently. Aligning expectations with other business units is vital, and it's up to the CMO to set clear boundaries as to which responsibilities do and do not fall under their jurisdiction. (Betty Kulbak-Aharon, Cyber Education Center, VP Marketing and Partnerships)

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Ensure there is a budget for employees and their development. And be sure to go to bed relaxed and wake up every morning with a blank slate. Lastly, make sure to celebrate small victories along your long term strategic roadmap. (Inna Shteyn, Herbalife, Sr. Marketing & Sales)

CMOs tenure time will continue to decrease, but we never ever should let ourselves and others burn out. Never.

I was astonished by the number of comments I received from my initial social media posts.

This issue clearly hit a nerve and most of us can agree that the cause for burn out is due to:

1. Founders and CEOs thinking they know marketing better than their CMOs. Hence the expectations from the CMO are not always realistic to start with. This friction creates a self deteriorating situation, destined for failure.
2. A CMO's role is so wide - Brand marketing, Demand Gen, Product marketing, etc.. Some can be more quantified, some are more creative and this imbalance can drive professional nuts.
3. Marketing is a business unit, not a department that needs to blow the bells and whistles. We speak numbers, which means that we too experience the entrepreneurial roller coaster as well. Other execs, sometimes, are not under the same pressure
4. We must conduct deep due diligence within the founding team, CEO, and the rest of the C-suite before joining the company. We tend not to do so, however, this is paramount, especially prior to negotiating our salary and terms. We need to ask to meet the other execs and their VPs before making a decision. This is a must!
5. Build a marketing team fast as possible! Any exec’s main work is to build a team of A-Players. The more A-players you hire the sooner you’ll stop worrying about the overall strategy, tactics, and execution. You will be able to rest easy, embrace a forward-thinking mindset and scale your operations.
6. Empathy - People demand to be treated as human beings, so make sure you treat all people under you as humans. It all starts there. 
7. Don’t take on projects or plans that may be too heavy to bear, or that may not show results fast enough. I encourage you to create a series of micro-success situations for you and your team. Success doesn't necessarily mean hitting a KPI. I’m talking about mini tasks. For example, if my Head of Content’s KPI is to have 100 bloggers to write about us, his department’s micro-success might be to reach out to 100 bloggers each week, easy, right? Success increases our self-confidence and you want your team to feel comfortable and confident.

One of the pieces of advice that I truly enjoyed from this article came from Ram Stein which takes a real full-cycle approach:

Stage One - Coordinate expectations with the relevant levels regarding business goals and your way of working.

Stage Two - Map the solutions for fast and short growth, as opposed to the long, continuous, and strategic ones.

Stage Three- Start with something relatively short that creates a big impact (improvement in an existing panel, updating a creative / creating a higher converting message, etc.).

After having proved my abilities. I gained an appreciation from my colleagues as well as their patience to handle the more strategic and ongoing tasks (which are not always valued enough). Patience and appreciation create peace of mind which allows for continued growth and relationships with colleagues to blossom.

Another tip - in difficult moments of declining self-confidence, I like to hold on to my anchors that keep me from getting carried away. I remind myself of all sorts of accomplishments that I myself, or others have appreciated during my career. This reminds me that perhaps I'm not as bad as I think I am. (Ram Stein, X+, CMO)

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I want to thank everyone who contributed to this project. It's important that as a community of marketing professionals, regardless of where you are in your career stage, that we discuss the issues that face us all. 

I want to encourage everyone to continue to share their input and advice in the comments below. Feel free to share your experiences and thoughts on ways to combat CMO burnout.

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Also thank you, Daniel Friedman (DX2 Global, Founder) for helping me compose and structure this article, bringing my thoughts to life, and supporting me along this process in a precisely written manner ;-)