What it takes to be a CMO today: resilience, agility, and adaptability
- When it comes to taking on a marketing leadership role, resilience, agility and adaptability are among the qualities needed to tackle the marketing challenges brands face in a constantly changing business landscape.
- Whether it’s the geopolitical environment or rapid technological developments, marketers must exercise flexibility and adapt to their situations while putting the customer front and centre.
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Kevin Huang, chief operating officer, SCMP and Hanane Sabri, head of racing marketing at the Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC)
[Morning Studio Feature]
When it comes to taking on a marketing leadership role, resilience, agility and adaptability are among the qualities needed to tackle the marketing challenges brands face in a constantly changing business landscape.
Whether it’s the geopolitical environment or rapid technological developments, marketers must exercise flexibility and adapt to their situations while putting the customer front and centre. This will always be the winning formula, said a group of influential marketers featured in the 2024 Marketing Predictions Series produced by the South China Morning Post.
Resilience, Agility, and Adaptability
“If I had to sum up 2023 for me, I would use the word: roller coaster. It’s always breath-taking and exciting during the ride, but sometimes you may have a heart attack as well, and I sure had many of those,” Jacqueline Choi, head of marketing at Prudential Hong Kong Limited shared. She shared a sentiment many marketers felt when looking back on their marketing journey over the course of the year as Hong Kong embarked on its path to a post-Covid recovery.
Marketers had to learn and adapt quickly, drawing on their own career and life experiences to navigate a new changing world. Hanane Sabri, head of racing marketing for the Hong Kong Jockey Club, drew inspiration from her career as an elite athlete.
“Elite Sport has taught me work ethics, discipline, resilience and goal setting, I learned to have ambitious goals while also having realistic ones,” Sabri said. But above all, she learned the importance of teamwork, and believes that a good marketer is able to define a clear vision and purpose and then cascade that into a mission and objectives.
“It’s really important to define, a unique value proposition,” she said.
Customer-Centricity
She also believes that marketers must have the ability to humanise and create meaningful connections with a focus on consumers.
It is crucial to adopt a consumer-centric approach, you must understand your consumer’s specific needs and priorities in order to have the best offer to answer these needs. Align the marketing strategies with the business organisation strategies.
Sabri is not alone on this. Looking back on his career, Cheuk Shum, head of marketing, Wealth and Personal Banking, HSBC Hong Kong, said passion, excitement and continuous learning were essential to delivering customer-centricity. He advocates that marketers should adopt a humble approach and engage in experience sharing to allow them to learn the unique perspectives of publishers, industry players and even consumers.
“Keeping an open mind is quite key, always be learning, always be hungry for knowledge, and I think that’s the spirit we have with our teams,” he said. Cheuk has also always been one to live the brand sporting a haircut featuring the PayMe Meow shaved into the back of his head.
The ability to humanise and create meaningful connections is for more than just B2C environments. Colliers Hong Kong, head of marketing and communications, Cecilia Chan, “I do believe B2B and B2C marketing is pretty much the same. The strategies we deploy, the marketing knowledge we deploy, knowing your customer, and the creativity. The only difference is the clients, what they want and need and the KPIs,” said Chan.
Watch the 2024 Marketing Predictions Series.
- Cecilia Chan, head of marketing and communications, Colliers Hong Kong
- Jacqueline Choi, head of marketing, Prudential Hong Kong
- Dr Winfried Daun, group head of advertising, brand strategy and media, UBS
- Hanane Sabri, head of racing marketing, Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC)
- Cheuk Shum, head of marketing, Wealth and Personal Banking, HSBC Hong Kong
