« November 2005 | Main | January 2006 »
Brand Autopsy, part of the Corante network carries a nice synopsis of the well-publicised Spencer Stuart research into CMO tenure...
With CMOs lasting just 22 months on average...their analysis strongly advocates an extended period of assessment - of 60-90 days -for CMOs who wish to stick in the role for the long haul.
The only downside, of ignoring the quick wins itch for this long...is that only leaves 10-40 days to actually make an impact...
A quick search reveals lots of available reading on the topic of First 100 Days. Books to consider reading include:
The First 90 Days by M Watkins; Your First 90 Days in a new job by W Robinson; Right from the Start by D Ciampa and M Watkins again; and You're in Charge - Now What by TJ Naff (Apologies for any inaccuracies in the titles or names; my writing is appalling!).
Also a couple of useful reports on the same subject. One comes off the Harvard Business School site and is a summary of a recent presentation by the aforementioned Michael Watkins. The other is a report conducted by Egon Zehnder. It relates specifically to the first 100 days of Biotech CEO's but is of general interest and applicability. Available on www.nature.com
Of more interest, though, is the stuff that gets written about high profile leaders taking the first steps in their new roles. Lots of George W of course, but also some good insights about Pope Benedict. In particular a radio newscast from npr (in the USA) reviewing the Pope's first actions:
Not everyone will necessarily take the same view of what the new Pope has been doing, but it is clearly possible to trace the elements of a First 100 Days strategy...
Hat-tip to Seth Godin, for a really neat illustration of just what it means to transfer FMCG 'scarcity' thinking...to the B2B arena.
Here is the office of Creative Artists, the Hollywood talent agency which charges millions of dollars to make phone calls, negotiate contracts and have lunch with Studio directors. As Seth puts it: "They could just as easily do their jobs in some trailer park..."
He continues: "if you don't think tone of voice and storytelling matters when selling to business, take a second to check out their entire website (it won't take long)": Creative Artists Agency.
Story-telling and emotional selling is just as big a deal in b2b!
It's an old statistic.but a good indicator, that just 18 per cent of CEOs have a background that's marketing-biased.
According to this piece from the AMA, financial skills, strategic insight, and internal visibility, are critical to reaching the CEO's office.
Marketers everywhere, prepare to sit back and admire.
If politicians know anything, they know how to orchestrate perceived consensus around a vision - especially with Good Business's Steve Hilton in close attendance.
Just watch the 'Cameroons' building a groundswell of belief and public acceptance around the new conservative leader...
Setting out core values. Listening to critical stakeholders. Building a new front-bench of young accolytes. And trying his damndest to overcome public scepticism around the political psyche.
Consensual PMQs? Ditching the legacy of Thatcher? Whatever next?
Knowing my focus on supporting marketing directors through their First 100Days, a friend sent me this piece of career advice - from Don Kendall - the co-founding CEO of Pepsico, no less.
Set your own performance standards. Make sure they comfortably exceed the corporate norms. Then make sure you exert the extra effort needed to match your own higher standards. It's superior performance that pays off, not good intentions.Especially in your building years, put your emphasis on job fulfilment and a positive working environment, not on making money. Respect for the people you work with, and what they stand for, are much more important than most people realise. If the business is growing - the right way - and you are contributing your share, the money always follows. And in my experience, 'staying the course' is usually a better way to learn and grow than rushing off in search of greener pastures at the first sign of trouble - or to chase a better offer.
Make the most of opportunities, but don't 'press' when you get one. And don't try to preselect every opportunity. Often you'll be wrong.
Being sensitive to others is critical. People do it in varying degrees, but there is a minimum level required to succeed. Be sure you're conscious of what is in your environment. People at either extrenme usually fail. Either by offending others, or by needing approval so badly they are indecisive.
Try to develop a special competence early on, preferably one that is reasonably broad (i.e. sales, marketing, finance etc). A specialty helps build confidence and acts as a grounding in reality as you move upward. There is usually plenty of time to become a generalist if you're good.
Take a genuine interest in helping others. It builds the organization. It builds you. And it builds your value far beyond your individual contributions
.
Don goes on to advise tactful self-promotion, constantly seeking to take the initiative, and self-knowledge.
He also advocates the frequently-suggested, but seldom-practised virtue of hiring people superior to yourself.
Finally, he says:
" there is no requirement - on my list at least - to ruin your marriage in order to succeed."
His last words that will ring most true for the private lives of Oxford Strategic Marketing consultants and our clients:
"Long hours and intense commitment do not have to last 24 hours (save in spurts). Plan your (personal) time together, but also grab it opportunistically as you go along."
With the percieved fast pace of change, and the marketer's psyche that lusts after fresh information...marketers too often ignore the body of past knowledge...
'Back data' and past research can give the new marketing hire all they need to hit the ground running in F100D!
In most cases, any piece of research has a limited life within an organisation, and is often focussed on a key task, issue or deadline. Once this is passed or resolved, somehow the research dies, and in many organisations uncomfortable findings are glossed over and forgotten.
In a pre-hire phase, past research reports reveal more than their specific objective, especially when read with other reports, so patterns, repeated concerns and issues are highlighted.
As soon as you arrive at your new desk, time for reading and reflection is scarce, so use pre-hire time well, by immersing yourself in a selection of past research reports. You will certainly hit the ground running, you may well avoid re-commissioning research, and you will certainly save yourself time.
Furthermore, you will establish your intention in F100D to be driven by facts; not speculation. The new team will then know you will expect evidence to back up any assertions or points of view, and your first discussion can be more focussed on consumer and brand issues that really matter.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, you will have a background and frame of reference that allows you to see through the myriad of powerpoint presentations, and persuasive points of view to which you will be subjected in your induction programme!
I have some strongly held views about what executives should do in the early days of any role, based partly on personal exprience as an HR professional and coach and partly on general observation of leaders moving into challenging roles in other walks of life.
There is a lot of "stuff" out there that can be read, and I will try to make some links to this later. I will also pull together a few stories of folks whom I have helped in their early days. However as a start (and as my first ever "Blog") I wanted to lay out the elements of what I have found to be most important to executives as they enter into a new role. This stands true for individuals moving into an organisation from outside as well as for internal appointments, although in the former case more care needs to be given to understanding the organisation and more of that later. And incidentally I acknowledge that I take an idealistic view of how to make this happen, and have struggled with organisations for years to implement that idealistic view - but it is worth the fight!
Make sure that you get a proper ending, from both a professional and personal perspective, and then try and take a break in order to establish mental and emotional freshness--only then start your appointment.
Be clear about what you bring to the new role that you are proud of - skills, leadership capabilities, experience and hold on tightly to your self-esteem. It will be tested!
Furthermore, reflect upon who you are as a leader; know how you are seen by colleagues, bosses and reports; understand what shadow and light you cast on those around you. If you have not done so already, consider doing a personality inventory such as the MBTI in order to build this self-awareness.
Of course you will invest time in researching the business - that is table stakes. But also think of building a map of the organisation that shows formal structures, decision-making processes, informal power structures and relationships (the dreaded "p" word), culture, climate and the impact of the external environment. This is a very conscious exercise, and takes some time - but it is worth it.
Ask yourself what the key objectives are that you have in the role, and work out whom it is that you will have to influence. Get to know them, what they are like, how they like to work, how best to influence them. And make a conscious plan for how you are going to do this.
Be clear about who you are as a leader, and right from the start express your leadership with complete authenticity. Be clear also about how you want your leadership to be seen by other parts of the organisation, such as peers and the next level up. Be authentic!
Then, and in my view only then, get on with being clear about the nature of the business task that faces you; the content of the role, the objectives and the context in which your own role contributes to the business (desperately important in matrixed organisations and more on this later perhaps); the metrics that apply to the role. Define success with your boss and make it tangible. And so on.
And with regard to all of the above - look for help and support.
More at another time.
Yours aye
David Thomas
James MacAonghus offers a robust and justified defense of WPP CEO Sir Martin Sorrell's recent IAB speech, here.
Some weblogs had taken a rather naive interpretation, of the 'old media is dead; long live new media' variety.
James's 'Aqute Research' commentary a more considered view. The major agency groups have their finger firmly on the pulse of the telecomm's/media convergence and mass media atomisation issues.
But the pace of this change is difficult to predict...
Experience is good, right? In F100D, your CV is your record of achievement. You are what you have learned. Most experience is transferrable. The CEO's first recruitment question is often "Where have you done this before?".
But marketing does not always follow this logic..
As a society, we may be getting (dramatically) older, but the marketing profession continues to revere and reward the young and energetic. It values freshness over faithfulness.
This knee-jerk reverence for youth is not just an issue for marketers themselves, but can affect their judgement and treatment of customers too.
As David Wolfe says: "With US adults 40 and older now outnumbering younger adults by 128 to 85 million, ageism has become a serious challenge in consumer marketing because the antipathy of young creatives toward aging can unconsciously find its way into marketing messages. Even the venerable AARP unwittingly projects ageism in its new tagline, “60 is the new 30�.
Is he overstating things? Surely we marketers are above such stereotyping? Well, maybe. If you fancy a bit of fun, try this little test on social attitudes
An early priority in the marketing director's First 100 days (F100D) is to identity the action team who are going to provide reliable, fact-based support for those early decisions in a highly pressurised time period.
But accessing these hard marketing skills internally is a real challenge in an age which values Tips above focused education.
Fewer and fewer businesses now invest automatically in broad-based, grass roots marketing training, preferring to source specialist expertise from outside, when circumstances dictate.
In the kingdom of the specialists, perhaps a well-trained generalist can be king....or queen.
Achieving consensus around marketing intentions first requires mutual understanding between marketers and their peers. And understanding requires a common langauge. NOT a private language.
All industries have them of course, their own private languages. With good reason.
An agreed lexicon can be very helpful to insiders - to rapidly convey meaning and share common experiences.
However, private languages are also used to obscure and confuse, to maintain secrecy; to distinguish group members from outsiders; or simply to have fun.
The language of marketing - brand essence, segmentation, value propositions, lifetime values, suffers from the worst of every form. In the private langauge of IT, there is at least consensus over what' html' actually means.
Marketing's fuzzy language both excludes others, and confuses itself. There are as many definitions of branding as there are marketeers. Savvy smart marketing director talks the language of customers and the language of the balance sheet.
Save the marketing-ese for the team meetings, or conference platforms.
A critical issue in the first 100 days for a marketing director, is whether on not to seek external help, and what to do with the existing help you have on hand.
Much debate and substantive research is needed on about the balance of different media; weight of media spend and return on investment.
But according to Allan Gorman's article
He advises:
'Remember that the tools you use to tell your story are only as effective as the story you have to tell.'
Understand your customer. Distinguish the proposition. Define the brand story. THEN determine the media and supplier mix.
Makes sense...if you can create the time and space to do it.
All materials ©2005-2008 Oxford Strategic Marketing. Bespoke MovableType hosting by 
Editor