New year, new you. You’ve recently been promoted or appointed at C-level. Congratulations! It’s an exciting step in your career. Here's what to expect, starting TODAY!
I am a CMO and I also coach C-level executives. Some of them are new at C-level, in which case I help them “fill big shoes” with behavioural coaching and tangible advice.
This post lists the top 7 things that in my view drastically change once you become a C-Level Executive.
I summarised what to expect and how I handle it: These are things that I learned - sometimes the hard way - working as a C-Level Executive for the past few years.
1 - You have a new team
When you’re a Director or VP, reporting into a C-level, your immediate team is composed of the person you report to and the people who report to you. Your team is therefore a group of people who know all the intricacies of the function you belong to. In my case, it would be marketers: People who know when it is time to create brand awareness or to focus on conversion rate, what CPA is acceptable and how to lower it, how to improve customer lifetime value and how to develop or refresh a brand.
However, once you become a C-level Executive, your team changes. Your immediate team is no longer people who are in your function, it become the Management Team also called Operating Management Team. Yes, your immediate team becomes all the other C-level Executives of the company including the CEO.
You make a big commitment and big decisions with them, first and foremost. You’re collaboratively driving the growth of the company and this is the ultimate metric that you all keep an eye on.
So, what does this shift exactly means for you?
Focusing on the healthy growth of the company, beyond your function, means that if you’re now a CMO, you have to shift your focus from “getting more marketing budget” (for instance) to permanently asking yourself : “Will this budget yield optimally if invested in marketing? Or would the company get a better return on investment if this budget was invested in the product / talent retention / tech innovation?”.
Because your immediate colleagues are C-level leaders of other functions, you’re expected to have a good understanding of their role and how they work, as well as their goals and challenges, and to be ready to share your views on their proposals, and help them put changes in motion. You have to look at this team and promptly understand its dynamic (leaders, followers, collaborators… map their profiles) and how your strengths can complement each other.
You no longer focus only on how well your department in delivering, you focus on how well your functions collaborate and contribute to the most strategic projects of the company. This is a different way of thinking, which adds a dimension to your previous landscape. You become responsible for all the deliverables of all the company's functions.
Having as immediate team the Operating Management Team also means that you need to endorse whatever’s been decided and then relay the message to your own function - whether you fully agree with what’s been decided, or not. It is not possible, at C-level, to criticise the strategy or to question decisions made by the Operation Management Team in front of employees without confusing people about your ability to lead. You can argue as much as you want with your C-level colleagues behind closed doors, but once something’s decided, it becomes YOUR decision too, you have to communicate it and live it.
2 - You no longer DO your job
This is a reality that often takes newly appointed C-level executives by surprise. I often hear comments such as: “I have not had bandwidth to work on a single campaign over the past month!”, coming from new CMOs.
The reality of being a CMO - if this is a real C-level position and not a role called “CMO” where you manage 20 people and you still have to get your hands dirty in startup-mode - is that you no longer work on campaigns. You mostly approve them and assess their results, but that's it. If you’re a CTO, you will no longer code. If you’re a CFO, you’ve lost sight of payroll details. If you’re a CCO, you probably won’t attend sales meetings with prospective clients any more. This reality can come as a shock, especially to people who are so passionate about their area of expertise they hoped to still do the actual work. It’s best to think about it before deciding that you want to be a C-Level Executive. If your priority is to DO marketing, or to code, or you love the direct contact with customers or clients, you may be better off not going all the way to C-level, and that’s OK! C-level is not “the goal” of everyone’s career, it’s a job like any other. And no, being a CMO does not mean you earn the highest salary in the marketing department, by the way!
3 - You become the company
As a C-level Executive, you become “one of the top guys” and as such, you represent the entire company, be it on social media, at conferences, when you speak to journalists, in front of the entire workforce, when your family asks you about work… Actually, count yourself lucky if you don’t end up representing your entire industry in the eyes of the external world! Whatever you say will be taken as coming from the top and the overarching truth about the entire company. You’re perceived as the person who makes “it” happen, whether “it” is good or bad! At C-Level, there’s no room for “Hey! It was not my decision, OK?!”.
This has repercussion on the way you address not only employees but also external audiences. Your role in your company’s employer branding is multiplied 100 folds once you become C-level. You are seen as the company. If you say something really clever in an interview, the article will be understood as “this company sounds great” and if you make a mistake on Social Media, what people will think is “This company’s terrible!”. How I handled this: Partner with the Corporate Communications department ASAP. Let them guide you, and do as much prep work as possible before your public engagements or interviews. At Betsson, I appointed a social media company (https://www.qnary.com/) to help me with my presence on Social Media as I felt the need to tweet and blog regularly on topics relating to best marketing practices, career progression and diversity (my 3 favourites) but no longer had the bandwidth to do it all from scratch by myself.
As a leader, you’re also expected to know your industry inside out, to have an opinion about it, and to spot trends and opportunities within it. Gone are the days when your job was to focus on your specific tasks and do your work as well as possible, in silo. I have always thought that being a marketer was industry-agnostic. You’re good at attracting, retaining and growing your user base or you’re not, regardless of the product or service you promote and company you work for. At C-level, it’s no longer possible to remain inward focused and oblivious to your industry. You have to know what’s happening in your direct AND indirect competitive landscape and its repercussions on your company: Who’s merging with whom, why such competitor pulled out of Brazil, and whether this new law is likely to have an impact on the user experience and your P&L.
4 - People no longer talk to you
The reality of having a C-level role, especially if you’ve been brought in from outside (maybe less so if you’ve been promoted) is that not only you manage a big team (close to 200 marketers at Betsson) but you’ll soon enough realise that - apart from about 20 brave people - no one in your function dares to talk to you, let alone tell you what they really think! Weird, regrettable, I know, but this is how it goes. Once someone wears the “C” label, automatically, a vast majority of his or her team won’t dare to have a chat with this person about a project, a concern or an idea. People are not going to come and tell you face to face that they think communication is bad within the marketing function or that your monthly Marketing All Hands meeting is boring, but you still need to know this! I found the best way around this: You need to partner tightly with HR, because HR has the finger on the pulse of what’s going on in your function: Who’s happy, who’s not, who’s vocal about it, who may leave, who’s asking for a promotion or a pay rise, who hates whom… ;) . Additionally to a yearly survey to monitor employee satisfaction, HR can help you monitor how you’re doing as a leader: What's expected, what’s working and what's not.
A tip: Book 30 minutes per week to get up from your seat and out of your office or work station area and wander around amongst your function. Stop at desks, ask what people are working on, sit down and help, put people in contact with colleagues who could help them with their project… basically, give everyone an opportunity to speak with you. Whether they grab it or not is their choice.
5 - You need more thinking time
So not only you need to lead the best function possible, you also have to think about the company overall and get involved in several strategic cross-functional projects. You may also get involved in meetings with financial analysts or investors (because you’re working for a publicly trading company, or because you’ll be involved in fundraising)... Your brain is solicited like never before and you keep jumping from an important meeting to another even more important meeting, in between you need to read and remember the top findings of a report, while also looking daily at the company results and trouble-shooting… In short: You need a lot of thinking time because there are very few of your new tasks that you can do on autopilot. Well, actually, if you find yourself functioning on autopilot, it’s probably a task you can delegate.
The best solution I have found to enable me to find thinking time - without extending my daily work beyond 12 hours - is to appoint a kick-ass Operations Manager. I think that anyone who’s managing a team of 100 people or more needs one. An Operation Manager is your function's Chief of Staff. It's someone who should
understand your function well enough to not act like a dog in a china shop when they attend your meetings (experience as a marketer was a key requirement for my Ops person).
be more OCD than the most OCD person you know.
be highly collaborative, great at analysing and summarising data.
blend in and be friendly and can tell you what is going on on the shop floor. This person becomes your eyes and ears on the ground.
be able to impose structure and put in place processes and who has the authority to make sure people comply and respect deadlines.
This is an ideal role for an experienced marketer who wants to become a CMO, or for a super bright PA who wants to make a move to Marketing.
6 - You need the right partners
Aligned with the company strategy and the decisions made collectively by the Operating Management Team, you have to permanently ask yourself about the partners you need to create a tight working relationship with, and the terms of this relationship:
Should we outsource this work because it’s not core to our company’s mission? Or should we integrate it into our workforce because it’s a key skill and we’ll get a better ROI if we do this internally?
Do we have the best possible partners in place and are our agreements with these partners aligned with the company’s policies and objectives? Namely in marketing: Should I continue working with Advertising Agency X or is it time for us to go fishing and look for options, with the goal to lower our costs and improve our reach and CPA? Have we re negotiated our existing deals in the last 12 months, since we added 2 countries?
Am I sufficiently prepared for succession planning at my level and below? Do I know which skills and profile I will need to attract in the next 6 months? Do I have access to the best pool of candidates? Which Headhunter firm is likely to bring me the best advice and support today, while also being the one who will find me a new role, in a few years?
A new technology: Do we need it now? Will we need it in 6 months time? What do we need to know, in order to be sure? If we’re likely to need it in the future, what needs to be put in place right now so it’s affordable and actionable (AKA: Budget ask, compatibility study with our Tech platform etc.) in 6 months time, when I revisit this question?
How can I be sure that a marketing sub-function is delivering the best possible results? How can it be impartially audited? Should we do this externally with a consulting firm? Does this firm need to know our industry or our function, or both?
It is easy to feel like you are carrying the responsibilities and the weight of a small country on your shoulders when you become a C-Level Executive. It is therefore imperative to know what you can do (in terms of bandwidth, know-how and impartiality) and what you can’t do yourself. What you need help with, from partners, as well as how to strategically choose these partners, not only looking at what you need today but also what you’re likely to need in 6 to 12 months time. You need to be aware of how partnerships could impact competitors or be perceived by journalists or financial analysts. For the sake of the company, you need to ensure that you put in place the best possible deals that balance your need to get the best value for money while ensuring you remain a lucrative and therefore priority client for your partners.
7 - You no longer have a manager
You’re the guru now:
When you’re a C-Level Executive, your boss is the CEO. She or he is probably not a specialist of your function. Above you, there is no longer a Marketing Guru (in my case), you are the Guru! This means that your manager won’t be guiding your specific work or tell you “how to do it”. The CEO will expect you to clearly and succinctly report on the “What”, spot what needs fixing, and know how to move forward.
Update your CEO
Update your CEO with your most important decisions including a bullet pointed list of the main reasons behind your decision. Don’t expect him or her to make these decisions.
Be ready to self-manage:
You report to the CEO, a person who has a stretched work-life balance and who you will have very little time for one on ones, chats, feedback sessions, discussions about your career aspirations. He or she may not even have the bandwidth to do a perfectly executed 360 degrees appraisal yearly. It is imperative that you gather feedback yourself, from the Operating Management Team and from other teams and make your own plan for improvement. You have to be the worst critic of your own work, while also being able to pat yourself on the back because your manager will probably won’t have the time to do that.
You must act as a filter:
Your boss is the CEO. Now that you’re at C-Level, you’re getting more clarity on how challenging the role of CEO can be. Your CEO is bombarded all day long with information that has to be analysed and turned into decisions. Fast. A ton of them. He or she not only has to memorise a phenomenal amount of data while permanently prioritising what has to be done and what can wait.
What does this mean to you? The CEO needs to be shielded from the nitty gritty details of your job. Problems that happen in your function have to be solved by you and stop with you. You should not add to the burden of a CEO by not being able to lead, decide, and own independently. This rule also applies regarding your relationships with other C-Level Executives. Should you struggle to come to an agreement with one of them, you have to solve this on your own because your manager’s no longer available to iron out your collaboration issues. There are a lot of topics you could breach with your manager when he or she was a Director, a VP or even a C-level Executive. You can no longer bring such topics to the table when you spend time with your new boss the CEO because all s/he needs to solely focus on macro decisions that directly impact the company’s growth and strategy.
So there you have them, my 7 C-Level tips:
You have a new team
You no longer do your job
You become the company
People don’t talk to you
You need thinking time
You need the right partners
You no longer have a manager
I hope that these tips will help you, newly appointed C-Level Executive, know what to expect and how to handle it.
Did you find this post helpful? I’d be delighted to hear your feedback, email me. And if you are a C-Level Executive who needs coaching, you may contact me. marion.gamel@gmail.com
Published on LinkedIn