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Show All (51)
Blog (48)
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Preparing for the Next Normal
It's More Than Engagement: CX Leadership Is Earned--Part-4-of-How-Marketing-Creates-Great-Customer-Experience
The Shift to Social Selling
It's More Than The Deal: It's About Trust - Part 3 of How Marketing Creates Great Customer Experience
Is the Value of Your Marketing Both Transactional & Longitudinal? - Part 2 of How Marketing Creates Great Customer Experience
How Marketing Creates Great Customer Experience: Part 1 - It is More than Marketing As Usual
Using Sound to Rise Above the Noise: How Dell, Siemens, IBM, and ACVB are Using Sound and Music to Reinforce Brand Identity
Ditch the Newspaper Approach to Content Marketing, Try the Blockbuster Philosophy Instead
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Fundamentals of Data: What CMOs Need to Know to Succeed in a Digital Age
Applying Tech Innovations To Enhance Customer Satisfaction -- Part 3 of Personalizing Your Relationships With Your Customers
Meet Your New MOM (Marketing Operating Model)
Leveraging Content Marketing To Engage Customers - Part 2 of Personalizing Your Relationships With Your Customers
Six Ways Marketers Are Beating Disruptions With Technology
Personalizing Your Relationship With Your Customers, Part 1 - Leveraging Your Big Data Analytics
Marketing That Matters
Are You Considered A Progressive Leader Within Your Organization?
How Virtual Reality Will Change B2B Marketing
Who’s The Real Hero? You Or Your Customer?
Who's Ready To Lead Change In Marketing?
Millennials As B2B Buyers
Conducting A Marcom Audit: See Yourself As You Are - Part 2 of 2 Get Under the Hood and Tune Up Your Brand
What Will Determine Your Company's Ability To Execute Strategy In 2017?
Get Under the Hood and Tune Up Your Brand - Part 1 of 2
UX - What Makes A Great B2B Website? Part 4 of 4
Opportunities are Knocking: Key Tips to Ensure PPC Strategy Success - Finding Critical Gaps in Your Paid Search Part 2 of 2
How do you know your products are successful? Measure what matters.
Finding The Critical Gaps In Your Paid Search Advertising Strategy Part 1 of 2
Content: The Real SEO - What Makes A Great B2B Website? Part 3 of 4
News: SoCal BMA Unveils New Look and UX to Career Center
Brand: The Visual Story - What Makes A Great B2B Website? Part 2 of 4
The 3 Pitfalls of Production Positioning
What Makes A Great B2B Website? Part 1 of 4
5 Best Places to Research Marketing Automation Solutions for SMBs
Competitive Intelligence 3: It's not just about understanding your competitors, it’s about deriving actionable insights
RECAP: ''Refresh'' Summer Mixer Series
Competitive Intelligence 2: Your mission should you accept it Mr. Hunt is to...
Segmentation: An offline marketing concept emerging naturally in an online marketing world
Competitive Intelligence 1: Do you need James Bond?
BMA SmartBrief - Daily News for B2B Marketers - Subscribe
The role market dynamics play in developing your brand strategy
10 Reasons to Implement a Marketing Asset Management Solution
Creating Purpose-Drivent Brands
Relevance Is The New Black
Data Use in Branding
Developing a Conversation Marketing Strategy
Marketers Must Become Proactive Stewards of their Company Assets
5 Tips for Surviving and Thriving in this New Marketing Era
End-to-End Marketing Part 3: Creative examples, good and bad
End-to-End Marketing Part 2: Marrying creativity with technology
End-to-End Marketing Part 1: The death of creativity?

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CEOs  •  CMOs  •  VPs and Directors  •  Managers  •  Young Professionals    ANA_site_logo.png

Who's Ready To Lead Change In Marketing?

George Stenitzer, Founder - Crystal Clear Communications

SoCal BMA - Old Ways New Door


If you're not getting the marketing results you need, you may need to find a change agent. Or take on a role of one yourself. To find the hidden change agents among your team, look for these four behaviors:

1. Change agents question everything. Change agents exhibit relentless curiosity. They learn all they can about customers, products and services, the company, and competitors. Their reflex is to question assumptions, facts, and received knowledge. They ask out loud whether a team is using the best approach, content, or process. Change agents question authority and dare to ask the questions no one else will. Asking great questions help position them as experts who others turn to for answers. Change agents never say, "That's not how we do things around here," or "We tried that two years ago and it didn't work." That's because change agents value inquiry and learning more than conformity and obedience.

2. Change agents have a clear purpose. A pure customer focus can move mountains. By infusing a clear and consistent purpose into their work, change agents invite others to follow their path. Change agents discover their purpose by seeing the world through the eyes of customers and working to understand their pain points, needs, and buying journeys. That's how they deliver content and programs that fit customers like a glove.

3. Change agents seek forgiveness, not permission. Especially when they're new to an organization, change agents can use their "new guy" license to test the limits. Or they can receive a change license from an enlightened executive. That's what happened to me during my first six months at Ameritech, a Fortune 50 company.

I'll never forget meeting the CEO of Ameritech for the first time. It was on the morning I issued a news release about Ameritech winning a multimillion-dollar deal with EDS. Minutes after the release crossed the wire, my phone rang. It was the CEO, Dick Notebaert, whom I'd never met.

He got straight to the point: he hated a couple of phrases in the release. I replied, "Dick, I hated those too. But that's what the customer approved."

"Do you have the draft of the news release before the customer edited it?" he asked.

"Sure."

"Bring that draft and the one you issued up to my office right away."

I'd never seen his office. I rushed upstairs. Dick read both news releases quickly, then said, "I like the original one better. Why didn't you put this one out?"

"Dick, the customer wouldn't approve that draft. I put out the draft they approved."

"So, why didn't you call me?"

"Because my boss told me never to call you."

"You gotta break the rules. I'm counting on you." He made it clear that my job was to figure out the task and get it done, no matter what my boss said.

That's when it hit me: After many years in command-and-control companies, where I followed orders strictly, I transplanted into the entrepreneurial culture at Ameritech, but I hadn't changed the way I worked.

That was a pivotal moment in my career. Dick entrusted me with all the authority I needed to run my function, even offering a license to exceed the limits my boss set.

Luckily, for the next eight years, I got to work closely with Dick at Ameritech and Tellabs. Out of all the 52 bosses in my corporate career, I learned the most from him.

4. Change agents learn, learn, learn. Marketers face new challenges, new buyer behaviors, and new technologies every day. Change agents seek to learn at every opportunity by:

  • Reading the best books, blogs, and websites about marketing
  • Attending local professional association events
  • Participating in national marketing conferences

I welcome your comments, and invite you to share this information.

SoCal BMA - George Stenitzer - Crystal Clear Communications


George Stenitzer
Founder
Crystal Clear Communications

 

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