The CMO Accelerator course fast tracks you to the skills and knowledge you need to navigate the C-Suite as a marketer.
We caught up with recent alumnus, Maureen West of Uberflip, to find out her biggest takeaways from the course.
What were your motivations for signing up for the CMO Accelerator course?
I was already taking a CRO class, and I thought it would be interesting to understand more about the C-suite and get a different perspective.
I was getting that little bit of the sales and the revenue side, but I wanted to understand what the marketing side of the C-suite was really looking at, and really should be looking at, in relation to the CRO.
So taking those two courses concurrently was phenomenally informative. It gave me a more nuanced understanding of the definition of what a CMO is, versus the definition of a CRO, and how these two roles should align to be effective.
What was your biggest highlight from the course?
For me, it was the live discussions, and it was the understanding that, just like a product marketer, there are different types of CMOs. And depending on the type of company that you join, you really need to match the type of skill set you have with the company growth stage and business goals.
It also led me to conclude that, when thinking about growth stages and skill sets, growth stage is a temporary thing, hopefully, as you eventually make it to the next stage. But skill set development requires you to make a decision: do you want to play in one growth stage, or do you continue to add to your skill set to be able to work in others?
I think that’s something that a lot of people- even in the C-suite - aren't necessarily realizing, but it's becoming clear to me you need to make a decision kind of quickly. It’s interesting to think about the opportunity, even at the highest levels of an organization, to continue learning and developing your skills, simply based on something as obvious as the trajectory of your company.
How do you plan to put your findings from the course into practice in the future?
I’m putting them into practice now! I'm very interested in understanding things like our marketing mix, how effective it is, and how much budget we're spending on things that aren't proving to be effective, and why.
It's really about understanding how all of these things are working together. It feeds my curiosity: the course has given me more to be curious about and more questions to ask, which then in turn brings more information for me to consider and then ask additional questions.
What’s the next step for your professional development, and how do you think the CMO Accelerator course is going to assist with this?
It's going to help me interact differently with a CMO, I'll have different kinds of questions to ask, and then I'll have an understanding of what the answer should be. Are we really on the same plane in terms of information exchange and how can I support the CMO?
I intend on having a seat at the table as a product marketer on the C-suite. So I might not necessarily want to become a CMO, but I want to be in a strategic position as part of the C-suite.
Who would you recommend the course to?
I would actually recommend the course to director-level product marketers. They have an amazing opportunity to show value to the CMO, but they need to understand their perspective, the challenges they’re facing.
If you can help your CMO succeed, then you show how you're indispensable as a product marketer. You're bringing in research, you're bringing in data, you're bringing in all sorts of insights that the board is looking for: enabling the CMO with business data.
I really think the course helps to bolster the skill set of product marketers to, one day, become a CMO, but also to become a more valuable product marketer to the CMO. It’s a constant theme among product marketers: it's very difficult for people to understand what we actually do, when we actually provide a tonne of insight, pathways forward, and ways to be successful in a company. This course can really help you overcome these misunderstandings.
Thanks, Maureen!
Do you want to take your marketing leadership skills to the next level? Enroll in our CMO Accelerator Course today.
