The marketing department is such that it requires both creativity and strategic discipline. Today’s marketers are required to both understand analytics and be able to handle the creative components of the job. From the C-suite, empowerment plays an important role in their success.
Setting Your Team Up for Success
From the outside looking in, people have this notion that executives are kicking back and relaxing in the C-suite – cashing fat paychecks and dining out on the company dime. However, as you know, life as a CMO is far more stressful and demanding than most realize.The tricky part about being a CMO is that your future is dependent on how successful your team performs – and you can’t physically force them to do anything. Having said that, you can influence how they act by empowering them to make good decisions that are a positive reflection of who you are and the value you bring to the organization.If you’re looking for simple, tangible ways to empower your marketing team and foster a culture of success, start by doing the following:
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Establish a Clear Chain of Command
One of the biggest mitigating factors in both creativity and productivity is a lack of communication. And in many cases, a lack of communication can be directly traced back to a muddled chain of command.
Every team member should know exactly who they report to, who they’re in charge of, and how ideas are communicated from top to bottom. Having a chain of command that’s too loose will result in chaos and distractions. Having a chain of command that’s too rigid will limit efficiency and slow down your ability to make timely decisions. Keep things simple and clear.
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Be Open to New Ideas
Employees want to be heard, understood, and taken seriously. Sadly, they rarely feel valued for their thoughts and ideas.
“Often when employees come forward with new ideas the thing that people often hear from their manager is either, ‘If I wanted your opinion, I would have asked for it,’ or ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah, I will take that under consideration,’” mentions Joseph Folkman, founder of two leadership development firms. “The first response is simply expressing, ‘we don’t want or value your opinion.’ The second is when managers that pretend to care and listen but never do anything with your idea.”
Both of the aforementioned behaviors discourage empowerment. Not every idea an employee has is worth listening to, but you risk demotivating your team by consistently shutting them down. Be open to new ideas and run with the ones that are promising.
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Give Access to the Right Resources
A team member who is resourced well will be much more efficient and productive than one who never has the tools he needs to accomplish the tasks he’s assigned.
Empower your marketing team to take charge. The use of customer-centric tools is highly recommended. Here are three to consider:
- Drag’n Survey for quickly and effectively developing customer surveys and gathering real-time data for future projects.
- Mention for monitoring your brand, and gathering real-time data on your competitors’ online behavior.
- IFTTT for creating chains of conditional statements that allow your team to streamline and automate steps that otherwise require manual input.
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Eliminate Unnecessary Meetings
Stop wasting your team’s time by scheduling unnecessary meetings that could be replaced by a simple morning digest email or 90-second huddle at the end of the day. Open up schedules to allow for more opportunities to be productive.
- Afford Greater Freedoms
On a related note, don’t be afraid to give your team members greater freedoms. Freedom breeds creativity and – assuming you’ve hired disciplined people – comes with very few downsides. Just make sure you’re occasionally checking in and enacting swift consequences for violations of trust.
Catalyze Marketing Success
You can hire the most talented marketing professionals in the industry to compromise your team, but they’ll only be as effective as they are empowered. In other words, you have to give them the space, opportunities, and resources to execute. The tips and strategies mentioned in this article are just a start. Now’s the time to dig in and get to work.
