Does Marketing Lead Business Today? From Influence to Strategic Leadership

Abstract Book of the 19th International Conference on Modern Research in Management, Economics and Accounting

Year: 2026

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Does Marketing Lead Business Today? From Influence to Strategic Leadership

Prof. Rui Murta, Marta Bicho

ABSTRACT:

This study investigates the tension between marketing’s increasing accountability for organizational results and its frequent lack of formal authority within executive leadership. Using a PRISMA-based systematic literature review covering 1990–2025, the research analyzes how emerging roles, such as the Chief Revenue Officer, are redefining sectoral authority. A three-level conceptual model—comprising the Executor, Influencer, and Business Leader stages—is developed to assess marketing’s strategic maturity and its subsequent impact on performance.
The results indicate that while marketing’s presence in Top Management Teams is growing, full business leadership remains achieved by only a minority of organizations. This transition is heavily contingent upon “leadership architecture” rather than mere presence. Notably, recent research reveals that 54% of CMO roles exhibit structural misalignment between their assigned responsibilities and their actual decision rights, which significantly compromises organizational outcomes. The findings further demonstrate that progression to high-level leadership is driven by advanced analytical capabilities and the integration of Artificial Intelligence, providing the technical legitimacy required to navigate the modern erosion of traditional authority. Ultimately, the study concludes that strategic marketing leadership requires a deliberate organizational design that empowers the function as a cross-functional silo-breaker with formal authority over growth engines and integrated customer-experience governance.

Keywords: Analytical Capabilities; Chief Marketing Officer; Marketing Capabilities; Organizational Performance; Structural Misalignment