Are Marketers the Future for the Next Generation of CEOs?

Based on some of my posts related to Seth Godin, Somill Hwang of Bite Communications brought to my attention the results of a new study by the Institute of International Research, which polled 1,300 business leaders and discovered that 29 percent believed that marketing is the most important area of expertise among next-generation leaders.

Here’s the question the IIR posed and a snapshot of the results:

What will be the most important area of expertise for the next generation of leaders?
      Marketing: 29 percent
      Operations: 22 percent
      Finance: 14 percent
      Sales: 8 percent
      Engineering: 8 percent

Now it’s always a bit hard to interpret these kinds of survey results very deeply. That said, it’s an interesting question when one considers that many CEOs have come from second-in-command positions like CFO or COO positions. What do you think about these results?

Steve Shu

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