The changing role of the CMO—and what it means for growth

This is the McKinsey Podcast, where we help you make sense out of our world's toughest business challenges. Welcome to the show. I'm Lucia Rahili and I'm Roberta Fassaro. Only 50% of CMOs are involved in strategic planning alongside the CEO.

But that's a startling statistic in a world where I think of the CMO as being someone who really does understand the end-to-end customer journey. And so that lack of alignment really creates issues. That's McKinsey's senior partner Shelley Stewart III on the notable disconnect between CEOs and CMOs. He joins global editorial director Lucia Rahili and McKinsey senior partner Kelsey Robinson to talk about how to bridge this gap so companies can grow. This is adapted from our McKinsey live series and was recorded shortly after Can Lion earlier this year.

So let's get rolling. Obviously the current global business climate is rife with uncertainty in a range of ways, macroeconomically, geopolitically, technologically, given the advent of Gen AI and now agentic AI. And amid all this change and volatility, growth continues obviously to be imperative, but it also risks being elusive for some. organizations.

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