Beyond the Founding Team | A Leadership Playbook for Growth: Marketing

Explore More Leadership Roles

More than 75% of companies established a Chief Marketing Officer within two years of major funding to focus on customer acquisition and brand recognition.

^{Source: 2022 RRA Growth Co Analysis, n = 31 Chief Marketing Officers}

CMOs at time of IPO 

The profile of leaders who scale all aspects of marketing across the organization and continue to build brand awareness with customers, investors and underwriters leading up to an IPO

^{Source: 2022 RRA Growth Co Analysis, n = 26 Chief Marketing Officers}

Discover more Marketing leadership insights

Meet our Growth Marketing Experts

Authors

• Robert Alexander is a member of Russell Reynolds Associates’ Technology Knowledge team. He is based in New York City.
• Agnes Greaves co-leads the firm’s Core & Growth Technology practice globally and the Consumer Digital & Media practice in Europe. She is based in London.
• Tuck Rickards heads the firm’s San Francisco office and co-leads the Core & Growth Technology practice. He is based in San Francisco.

Methodology and Notes

• Analysis of 40 tech/tech-enabled companies that were founded since 2005 and IPO’d 2017-2021, were largest by region according to valuation at time of deal, and achieved ≥20% revenue growth rate over the three-year period prior to IPO
• Industry verticals included: fintech, healthtech, automotive/transportation, eCommerce/marketplace, software/cloud
• Analysis includes only the appointment of non-founder executives
• Major funding rounds: approximate point in time at which each company reached series C/later stage funding
• APAC excluded from study due to data accessibility
• Sources: Pitchbook, Board Ex