It’s no secret that I strongly believe in principle stated originally by Thomas Edison’s that “vision without execution is hallucination.” It’s on my website and business card and I even spent a fair amount of time on it in a previous blog back in August 2012. So, it’s nice to see others now jumping on the bandwagon when it comes to marketing leaders as “strategists” or “doers.”
In his recent Salesforce Effectiveness blog entitled “Do CEOs Need ‘Doers’ Or ‘Strategists’ Leading Marketing?”, Ryan Tognazzini takes a stand very near and dear to my heart when he states
“You hired a ‘strategist.’ You went for “been there, done that” experience. Rather than focus on working with sales to drive revenue, they got caught up chasing shiny objects. They focused on things like branding exercises and awareness campaigns with PR firms. Revenue got missed. The sales team lost confidence in their ability to fill the funnel.”
Yep! Vision without execution is not only hallucination; it is a recipe for disaster. This is why I strongly agree with Mr. Tognazzini when he further clarifies why ‘doers” can do:
“‘Doers’ are people who can take your strategic plan and convert it into tactical steps that drive revenue. They are willing and able to work cohesively with sales to drive revenue. The ‘doer’ is concerned about sales results. They work to deliver this through focusing on:
- Pipeline creation
- New customer revenue
- Training sales to sell new products
- Creating buyer personas that teach sales what to say on calls
They prioritize sales results over all else. The ‘doer’ is willing to walk into the sales leader’s office and have authentic conversations about results at any time. They look at the sales VP as their customer. They help create sales enablement tools, sales value prop messing, demos and presentation decks to ensure the success of your sales team.”
Of course the ideal candidate will be a strategist with experience who also can put that vision into reality with good old-fashioned execution.
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