The CMO-to-CEO pipeline was more prominent at CPG brands like Procter & Gamble (P&G), where CMOs were often groomed for the CEO role. CMO tenure at these companies was the shortest of all the industries Spencer Stuart analyzed, at 3.5 years.
“Low CMO tenure is not a sign of failure. In fact, quite the opposite. It’s actually a sign of success, because so many of them are being promoted into other roles,” said Sanderson.
2. Brands are marketing without a CMO
In line with 2024’s findings, roughly a third (31%) of SP&P 500 companies do not have a CMO.
However, that doesn’t mean they don’t have a marketing boss; the responsibility simply sits elsewhere on the org chart.
Sanderson said companies are increasingly hiring for alternative or complementary positions, including chief growth officer (CGO), filled by Walmart in January, and chief revenue officer (CRO), adopted by Morningstar in late 2025.
These roles might not be CMO positions, but they typically include some responsibility for marketing and have brand and data specialists reporting into them, Sanderson observed.
“It’s not that marketing has gone away, but rather the set go-to-market capabilities have been restructured in a new way, for example, around a CRO,” he explained.
The CMO role isn’t dead, though. While some organizations, such as Unilever, are decentralizing marketing, others, like Disney, are doing the opposite and appointing their first formal CMO.
“It’s always fluid. Where one role is broken up, another is created,” observed Sanderson.
3. Hiring practices vary vastly
