The Gist
- CMOs under fire. Gartner says nearly 60% of CEOs have fired CMOs for failing to adapt — and most don’t see them as growth contributors.
- Strategic dysfunction is rampant. 84% of marketing leaders report high levels of strategic dysfunction in their organizations, hindering performance and collaboration.
- Marketers are adapting — with grit and honesty. Marketing leaders say the pressure is real, the change is hard, but they’re evolving through partnership, long-term bets and customer-first strategies.
AURORA, Colo. — Welcome to Aurora, Colorado. Or, the City of Marketing Doom and Gloom.
Gartner kicked off its Gartner Marketing Symposium/Xpo conference Monday morning, June 2, with a keynote here at the Gaylord Rockies Resort & Convention Center.
It wasn’t a feel-good, we are the brand champions, the unconditional customer advocates and everyone C-Suite member loves us kinda keynote.
More like: we stink, we lack in the self-aware department, and we’re on our way out kinda vibe.
Gartner analysts Alex De Fursac Gash and Kristina LaRocca-Cerrone with Gartner for Marketing Leaders definitely had a narrative — CMOs must adapt or die — and had the data from the CMO’s peer executives to prove it.
Table of Contents
Hey, CMOs: You’re Not Ready, Gartner Says
Notably: Almost 60% of CEOs said they fired their chief marketing officers because they didn’t adapt.
You’re not ready, they told the packed crowd of marketing leaders — five times in the opening few minutes of the keynote:
CMOs Fail at Commercial Targets
CEOs and CFOs say that their CMO has fallen short of at least one commercial target. Most CEOs and CFOs don’t believe their CMO has made a “major positive contribution to growth,” De Fursac Gash said. “In other words,” he added, “from the CEO’s perspective, you’re not ready.”
Marketing Has Inflated View of Initiatives
Over half of non-marketing leaders say marketing has an inflated view of initiatives and is an inhibitor to the success of those initiatives.
“So from this C-Suite perspective, you’re not ready,” LaRocca-Cerrone said.
Your Customers Don’t Feel You Get Them
“Consumers continue to feel that most companies simply don’t understand their needs, their preferences, today,” De Fursac Gash said. “And so from the customer’s point of view, you’re not ready.”
Marketers Are Burnt Out Because of High Expectations
Marketers are feeling the pressure of extraordinary expectations, particularly in today’s disrupted environment, according to LaRocca-Cerrone. “Marketers who report high levels of change are nearly twice as likely to experience burnout,” she said. “So marketing teams aren’t ready either.”
CMOs Are ‘Stumbling’
“CMOs themselves are stumbling with two-thirds reporting that they fail to exceed the expectations of their roles,” De Fursac Gash said. “Bottom line, most marketing teams today are not ready for the epic journey.”
We get it. The pressure it real. According to CMSWire’s 2025 State of the CMO report, 69% of marketing leaders now face pressure to deliver quantifiable ROI, up from 59% just two years ago. And 95% say their team is under more pressure than ever to prove marketing impact.
Related Article: Marketing’s Tallest Mountain? CEO and CFO Approval
Marketing’s Risky Status Quo: Adapt or Get Replaced
Enough doom and gloom from the marketing leadership corner for you? No? OK. Let’s continue.
How about a little job insecurity as some frosting on this Doom Cake?
The business environment is anything but normal, and sticking to the same old marketing strategies and planning approaches significantly lowers your chances of success. In fact, failing to adapt to today’s elevated expectations could cost you your job — it’s one of the most common reasons CEOs part ways with their CMOs.
And this is troubling: Marketers are finding it hard to adapt and get it done collaboratively: 84% of marketing leaders report “high strategic dysfunction” in their organization, according to Gartner research.
And if marketing leaders do adapt and prepare what they feel is the best execution plan ever, the average CMO only has up to an 11% chance of exceeding CEO and CFO expectations.
But you gotta do something. Right?
“Doing nothing today will only leave you further behind when disruption eventually extends,” De Fursac Gash said.
It wasn’t all doom and gloom.
Gartner researchers shared some optimism and advice for CMOs to raise their importance in the enterprise and contribute more to brand health, including:
You’re on an Epic Journey — and You Can Lead It
Your function, your team, your reputation, even your legacy — it’s all on the line. But you can also become extraordinary in this moment of great disruption. Despite the bleak diagnosis, the keynote framed marketing’s situation as an epic journey — one full of real, achievable opportunities if leaders prepare well, adapt and adopt the right mindset.
Market Shapers Can Win Big
Being seen as a “market-shaper” CMO makes you eight times more likely to succeed in your role. Gartner introduced two types of CMOs: the enterprise operator and the market shaper. While most CMOs fall into the former group, those who actively shape market preferences, product strategy and enterprise direction stand out — and succeed.
Planning Ahead Drives Real Results
CMOs who plan at least 18 months ahead are 1.5 times more likely to report high performance.
Strategic foresight isn’t just nice to have — it’s measurable. Longer-term planning helps marketers shape enterprise growth strategy and support AI adoption with confidence.
Scenario Planning Can Reduce Chaos
Good scenario planning makes you 70% less likely to face strategic disruption. Gartner gave the example of State Farm’s ‘issues watch’ program — a quarterly prioritization tool used not just by marketing but by HR and legal. This process elevated marketing’s role to that of a strategic consultant — proof that foresight earns a seat at the table.
Data-Driven Customer Understanding Pays Off
Companies that invest more in customer understanding get stronger growth.
Brands that prioritize data science and other customer data and behavioral platforms — dubbed genius brands — consistently outperform peers. Gartner urged CMOs to reinvest in customer understanding as a path to resilience and revenue.
AI Can Help You Navigate
Good customer insights find that north star — and use it to guide the way. Rather than viewing AI as yet another disruption, Gartner presented it as an enabler for deepening customer insight and enhancing agility — essential skills for navigating turbulent times.
Marketing Leaders: Yes, We Have Pressure, But We ARE Adapting
OK, enough of the lawyers and judges. Let’s move on to the person on the witness stand: the marketing leader.
We worked the floor at the conference here in Aurora to catch up with marketing leaders about this whole “prove your worth or file for unemployment” thing, getting the scoop on marketing’s mountain of pressure — straight from the edge of the Rockies.
Shifting from Lead Generation to Long-Term Brand Investment
Despite the winds of change, the only thing that truly matters in marketing is the heart and mind of the customer, according to Lindsay Boyajian Hagan, VP of marketing at Conductor.
“You could say everything’s changed but at the same time, almost nothing’s changed,” Boyajian Hagan told CMSWire. “The marketer’s job is to know the customer and connect the brand’s wisdom with that customer, and how they do that may change over time.”
And change her marketing team has done. To Gartner’s missive: they are adapting.
This year, Boyajian Hagan’s marketing teams underwent a major strategic change. They moved away from traditional lead generation tactics and significantly increased their investment in content, even though that approach posed risks to conventional performance metrics like MQLs and leads. The decision was driven by a focus on long-term growth and brand value, and it required strong alignment across the executive team and marketing leadership. Once that alignment was secured, the results in the first half of the year were strong, validating the direction.
“We had to have really hard conversations as marketers,” she said. “It was anxiety-inducing.”
As part of the shift, Conductor is hiring for new roles like AI content architects and exploring emerging technologies. Boyajian Hagan emphasized that the strategies that worked over the past five years won’t be enough in an environment shaped by tools like ChatGPT.
“We need to invest in this long term asset as a business, because as a business, we’re building for the long term,” Boyajian Hagan said.
Related Article: CMOs: Be the Voice of the Market — Not Just Marketing
Building True Partnerships And Proving Long-Term Marketing Value
Rachel Meranus, CMO of Stensul and a 25-year marketer, sees CMO as a change-enabler, not inhibitor. She said that CMOs today play a leading role in driving change across organizations. Her own role has evolved significantly in recent years — it’s no longer just about having a seat at the table, but about forming true partnerships, especially with peers like the CRO.
She described a fully collaborative approach to a go-to-market strategy, where both marketing and sales are aligned and share accountability. Rather than being measured by traditional metrics like MQLs, marketing is now evaluated based on pipeline and revenue impact.
“We look at things as a joint go-to-market,” Meranus said. “I bring things to the table. (The CRO) brings things to the table. But there’s no division, if you will. I am held accountable to revenue. He’s held accountable to pipeline. It’s a joint goal. We aren’t measuring marketing by MQLs anymore. We’re measuring it by actual pipeline generated and then revenue generated. So, to me, the change has been more of an opportunity than anything else.”
Meranus acknowledged that one of the biggest ongoing challenges in marketing is the need to evangelize internally. To gain support, marketers often have to show quick wins — even though that runs counter to long-term strategy. Still, she strongly advocates for sustained investment in brand, thought leadership and content.
She uses frameworks like the Bowtie Model from Winning by Design to guide budget allocation across the full customer journey, emphasizing that the right mix depends on where the company is in its growth.
“There are ways to look back on things, to be able to make your case to say, this pipeline actually started from this initiative that we did nine months ago, 10 months ago,” she said. “That’s how you sort of start to defend the investment for longer-term.”
Adapting to Change While Navigating Silos and Marketing Strategy
Toi Walker, a marketing leader in the healthcare industry, told CMSWire Gartner’s opening message of adaptation for marketing resonated greatly. She is acutely aware of the rising pressure to demonstrate ROI in an environment where expectations are changing rapidly — both inside and outside her organization.
“They tried to really connect with the audience around expectations these days, being able to show that ROI, but also acknowledging the fact that we are in a state of change,” Walker said. “Technology is just making that change even more heightened.”
Like many attendees, Walker found Gartner’s discussion around “strategic dysfunction” during the keynote to be uncomfortably familiar.
“Everybody probably does [have dysfunction], whether they want to admit it or not,” she said. “I think it’s acknowledging where the problems are and where the silos are. That’s where a lot of that originates — because we have our own little goals and objectives. We think we might have communicated them and maybe haven’t to the best of our abilities and therefore you get that strategic dysfunction.”
Walker described her team’s setup as subject-matter-expert-driven — with clear divisions across digital marketing, communications, creative services and product marketing for service lines and regional hospital networks.
Channel choice, she added, is driven less by preference and more by customer behavior and campaign goals.
“It would probably be a disservice for us to have a channel of choice,” she said. “We want to be as omnipresent as we can and just be able to speak to consumers based on what their preferences are.”
