In a recent podcast I referred to "Forgetting the ivory tower CMO".

I meant it.

Long gone are the days when a marketing leader could be "hands off" - both day-to-day operationally and, more importantly, practically when it comes to the tools of the trade.

Early on in my career I saw marketing leaders becoming dinosaurs, disconnected from the “frontline”. Ever since I committed to staying ahead of the game, even setting up an (IRL) industry networking group.

In 2008, I was in the Marketo beta program. Not my team. Me. Personally testing every workflow, breaking things, learning what worked.

At Adobe, while managing a team 40+, I was still diving into campaign analytics. Not because I had to. Because I wanted to understand.

At VMware, I was hands-on with AI. Not just sponsoring my team to up-skill. Actually participating. Getting my hands on the tools. Failing fast. Learning faster.

The best CMOs I know can still:

Edit marketing content from the customer’s viewpoint
Spot a broken funnel in seconds
Jump on a customer call without prep
Prompt AI better than their team
Engage on social

If you think you’re too senior to get your hands dirty, you’re missing the point.

Leadership isn’t about distance - it’s about presence.

When teams are shrinking (I regularly hear of 6 marketers running $100M ARR), you can't lead from a spreadsheet. You need to know how the tools work. How the customer thinks. How the message lands.

In an era where AI handles the grunt work, being hands-on isn't about doing everything. It's about understanding everything.

𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘁𝗲𝗮𝗺 𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗱𝘀 𝗮 𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝗴𝗲𝘁𝘀 𝗶𝘁. 𝗡𝗼𝘁 𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝗶𝘁.