The Get: Finding And Keeping The Best Marketing Leaders in B2B SaaS

Hiring great marketing leaders is not easy. Especially these days! The Get is designed to inspire smart decisions around recruiting and leadership in B2B SaaS marketing. 

I'm Erica Seidel, host of The Get. I run an executive search practice focused entirely on placing what I call the ‘make money’ marketing leaders -- not the ‘make it pretty’ ones. 

I spend most of my time talking with today’s most talented marketing leaders, and with The Get, I bottle up some of those conversations for you. 

This is the 4th season of The Get. The theme for this season is ‘Solving for the Scale Journey.’ 

The Get is still all about helping you explore the trends, tribulations, and triumphs of today’s top marketing leaders in B2B SaaS. 

If you've listened to the first three seasons, welcome back. And if this is your first time tuning in to The Get, welcome! Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode.

Again, I'm Erica Seidel, and I'm glad you’re here. 

This episode wraps up our ‘diversity-in-B2B SaaS marketing’ themed third season of The Get, with not one but two special guests on either end of the age/experience spectrum, discussing their take on age-related diversity in the business world in general and in B2B tech in particular. Our goal with this episode is to raise awareness of age biases and address them in our B2B marketing world. This episode is controversial but compelling. Don’t miss it!

Dwight Griesman is the CEO for Eye4Growth, as well as the former CMO of Forrester and of other companies, with decades of experience and experiences behind him. Sarah Assous is a first-time CMO at Zoovu, the conversational AI experiences company, and previously held marketing roles at B2B companies Selligent and SmartFocus.

They talk with Erica about what age means to them in the hiring and team-building context- and indeed, whether it matters at all. They share which workplace traits of people on either end of the age spectrum they find valuable, and which ones are less-than useful, as well as the crux of the debate: what is more valuable to the business- experience or experiences?

Highlights include

• A 25-year old doesn't know what it's like to be 50+, but a 50+-year-old has been 25. How relevant is that knowledge in our dynamic business environment where reference points change and evolve so rapidly?
• What does it mean to have more experience? Is it only the number of years or the quality and diversity of experience - the ‘experiences’ you have been exposed to?
• Is age a factor in hiring and getting a job in B2B marketing today? Do we have an unconscious bias about applicants based on their age? Do young people want a high degree of convenience with a very high pay? Do older people want stability and compensation but not too much challenge?
• What role does the hiring leader’s gut feel play in picking the right candidate, when they are at extreme ends of the age spectrum?
• How a growth mindset trumps everything else, regardless of age. The ability to adapt, relate, and execute will always be in style.

Jeff Winter is the Chief Marketing Officer of Rocket Software, a B2B tech company that helps companies innovate using the data and tech they already have. Rocket serves customers across the Fortune 50 and has a global presence. Jeff has had a prolific career including senior marketing roles at SAP and IBM before joining Rocket.

Episode synopsis

In this episode, Jeff and Erica talk about company values, how they can be lived by the marketing team and how there is still room to bring in function-specific values without colliding with corporate values.  Jeff also shares the various initiatives at Rocket to improve diversity of all kinds, including the RIDE initiative and their journey to operationalize and measure the impact of diversity as a part of everyday culture.

Highlights include:

• When Empathy, Humanity, Trust, and Love are your corporate values
• How Marketing leaders can take the larger corporate values and create their own functional values to complement them
• Working with all kinds of diversity – be it regional, gender, experience, or ethnic diversity – it’s always a work in progress but there are ways to structure it and measure its impact. Jeff shares details of how Rocket is working towards operationalizing diversity and measuring its impact – including the creation of a new initiative called RIDE (Rocket Inclusion, Diversity, and Equity)
• Ageism in tech and why it needs more conversation
• Experience diversity: when we should look outside the obvious areas to hire B2B marketing talent (and when we should not)
• Jeff’s insights on the 3 things you can do to build a more high quality, diverse team

Pantheon is building the world’s best web ops (website operations) platform to empower marketing and development teams to take control of their websites. Christy Marble, the Chief Marketing Officer of Pantheon, is a global SaaS growth marketing expert with over 20 years of experience leading all facets of marketing. Prior to Pantheon, she served as CMO of SAP Concur, and CMO of Visier.

Episode synopsis

Christy and Erica discuss building a marketing leadership team that does not compromise on diversity. They also discuss whether prior SaaS experience is necessary in a marketing leadership role at a SaaS company. They ponder why female candidates can feel the need to explain themselves more, and what needs to happen to break through unconscious bias in the workplace.

Highlights include: 

- Personal lessons on managing gender diversity from the home environment

- How diversity, equity, and inclusion are 3 different things

- How the hiring practice of doing a ‘listening interview’ and then a ‘questioning interview’ can be critical to hiring success

- How Christy builds and structures her organization and marketing leadership

- How to effectively transition from a bigger to a smaller company, by presenting yourself as a ‘sherpa’

Openpath offers cutting-edge workplace safety and security solutions though touchless access control. It is a hardware and SaaS company with about 80 people. Kieran leads marketing for Openpath and has previously led marketing at Belkin and Radioshack. He has been recognized by Forbes as one of “The World’s Most Influential CMOs 2020”.

Episode synopsis

In this episode, Kieran and Erica delve into the big trends in B2B that will impact B2B SaaS marketers and the work they do, in 2021 and beyond. Kieran shares valuable real-life experiences from his career, stressing that an agile mindset is the key competency of a CMO in today’s environment. We also delve into what a CEO needs to think about when hiring a CMO, considering there is no one fixed template of what a CMO should do.

Highlights include: 

• The key trends impacting B2B CMOs today
• Why there is no one universal CMO role… and the core competency of a good CMO
• The pros and cons of marketing leaders reporting to CROs
• The most important emerging role in marketing
• Whether diversity needs to be approached in a systemic way, or whether  individual leaders should establish their own initiatives
• Why empathy for customers will rule in 2021… and why building ongoing relations with the end-user is critical for B2B Marketing

Concur is a global SaaS leader in travel and expense management. David Hsu is the Global VP of Marketing Data and Technology and has worked in senior marketing roles at IBM and CA in the past.

At Concur, he leads a global 30-member team with the mandate to support marketing with analytics, automation, martech, and project management solutions and services. His team balances both transactional, problem-solving work and more strategic innovation projects.

Episode synopsis

In this episode, David and Erica talk about different kinds of diversity that are critical in a global team - regional and location-specific diversity, role and skill diversity within the team, and the more human aspects of diversity such as gender, race, and personal preferences.

David shares his experiences on the process he follows to set a common vision and strategy for the global team, as well as his take on addressing the diversity of all types in his agenda.

Highlights include: 

• How to cross-pollinate ideas and best practices across global teams
• The process of developing an annual strategy and how to get the team to own and lead it
• The conscious shift of moving from being a transaction-driven team to a strategic advisory function
• How to bring the diversity aspect into hiring without falling into the trap of familiarity bias
• The role of the leader in owning diversity – should they avoid it, proactively lead the discussion, or wait til the company is forced to surface the issues?
• How some companies are stretching the hiring brief to make room for diverse voices. For example, companies seeking out qualified candidates without college degrees, or not advertising the role on LinkedIn
• The rise of future roles in marketing - for instance, David recently created a Data Strategy role on his team to bridge the data gap between tech and business
• What leaders should do to ensure diversity on their global teams

Eric brings nearly two decades of experience as a senior go-to-market leader in high-growth technology businesses, including as CMO for Sovos, and as CEO of mobile startup Zerista, which he successfully exited. Quick Base is an app development platform that helps problem solvers of any technical background to work together to create an ecosystem of applications safely, securely, and sustainably.

Episode synopsis

What does a diverse team really mean to the organization? How can you make ‘culture’ more data and process driven? Should employers prefer experience over diversity? Great insights for SaaS companies as Erik and Erica deep dive into the meaning of culture and how it can become a competitive differentiator when done right.

Highlights include:

• Why diverse teams outperform homogeneous teams, even though the alignment is harder
• Why diverse teams need to be like a soccer team and not a relay team
• The 3 things you need for a diverse team to work:
• Making a team goal that’s bigger than the individual goal
• A transparent strategy that brings the team together, and a process that helps interlock the team
• A common way of behaving and holding each other accountable
• Why culture needs to be treated as a first-class citizen, right alongside goals related to financial performance
• Making culture data-driven and process-driven for real outcomes
• How to reconcile hiring for experience versus hiring for diversity
• Roles that are changing the shape of B2B SaaS marketing teams

With 25 years in B2B Marketing, including start-ups and companies such as Akamai and Silicon Graphics, Jenny features on the Top 50 Women in Revenue That You Should Know and the Top 60 Most Influential Marketing Thought Leaders list. She’s been a part of not one or two but 11 successful exits! ActiveCampaign is a Customer Experience automation company which has grown from 60 to 600 people over the last two years.

Episode synopsis

In this episode, Jenny and Erica talk about bringing diversity into every facet of B2B tech, from the interview and hiring process to the way the team builds and retains its unique culture and vibe. Jenny tells us why a ‘culture add’ versus ‘culture fit’ approach helps bring net new perspective to the team and adds value and space for growth. They also talk about ageism, experience diversity, and gender in the B2B SaaS world.

Highlights include: 

• What a marketing leader can bring to diversity initiatives
• Hiring in a way that’s inclusive, starting with ensuring equal access to the opportunity
• How to organize your team to ensure it’s as diverse as possible
• How a leader can be vulnerable and authentic and create a safe place for working together and building relationships respectfully
• How roles and new titles are evolving in B2B companies to reflect growing industry hyperfocus on people and engagement
• Whether age diversity in B2B tech is seen as a liability or a plus. Is the number of years worked really as important as mastery and innovation?

Lori Cohen, a veteran CMO and a veteran fractional CMO, has worked with several different growth-stage B2B SaaS companies. In this episode, Lori and Erica talk about how to drive optimal value from a fractional CMO engagement.

Highlights:

-The differences among a full-time CMO, a fractional CMO, and a consultant

While alignment with the CEO and building trust with the team remain the same, the key differentiator is that fractional CMO roles have an exit plan baked in. This lets them avoid the political aspects and do the best job for the company knowing that there is an exit plan/date. This is also why they can challenge the CEO more than a full-time CMO – something especially critical for early stage companies.

-How fractional CMOs succeed as uber-consultants, even as they manage multiple engagements with CEO clients who expect access at all times

-The real reasons early-stage companies should hire fractional CMOs

Todd is a fractional CMO in the Bay Area and also the co-author of the book ‘Beyond Product.' He's on the board of directors of MOCCA (Marketing Operations Cross-company Alliance) and has previously served Verisign, Neustar, SAP, and IBM in a variety of senior marketing roles.

Highlights from Todd and Erica’s conversation include:

- Who needs a fractional CMO and when (hint: It’s not just for early-stage companies)

- Advantages of fractional CMOs:

--Upscale your marketing strategy without the expenses of a full-time CMO

--Get rich perspectives and cross-pollinate ideas

-When not to hire a fractional CMO (hint: when what you actually need is a lead gen manager!)

-Measures of success with fractional CMOs: Is it the number of hours served or the nature of the value and seasoned expertise that they bring?

-The secret value of a Fractional CMO (It’s more than the marketing expertise but you won’t hear it in the pitch!)

-How to pick the right fractional CMO: Advice for CEOs