Morning Advantage: All I'm Askin' Is for a Little Respect

Marketers get no respect, writes Ivey Business School professor Niraj Dawar on INSEAD's blog. "The CEO wonders how you spend your time, the CFO wonders how you spend the company’s money, the sales folks think you’re too conceptual, too abstract, and not sufficiently focused on the immediate business, and the production and supply chain guys just think you’re full of hot air." Yes, marketing faces a steep uphill battle its quest for a seat at the table of valued corporate functions. For one, it’s a cost center. While the sales team is out driving real revenue, what are marketers doing but conceptualizing, positioning, and spending huge wads of dough on market research? And the ROI for this spend is anything but clear. Even when data is available on every customer transaction, marketers struggle to convince the rest of the organization that their spend is a legitimate investment. So what can marketing do to regain respect? Simple, says Dawar: contribute to sustainable competitive advantage; demonstrate ROI; and connect the dots from spend to revenue. He promises concrete to-do's soon on his blog soon. We’ll be watching for them.

MAYBE THERE'S A KODAK EXEC WE COULD NAB

What’s that Old Definition of Insanity? (eWeek)

This item just in from HBR's Andrea Ovans: HP’s experience with outsider CEOs has been nothing if not consistent. After Lucent’s Carly Fiorina saddled HP with Compaq, NCR’s Mark Hurd took a blowtorch to the R&D budget, and SAP’s Leo Apotheker abandoned PCs for some $10 billion British software acquisition. Current outsider CEO Meg Whitman has managed to reduce HP’s market cap by $60 billion. Maybe it’s time to go for someone who has faith in the power of the HP name, history, products, and its 349,600 employees. Chances are awfully good, suggests eWeek, there’s somebody already working there who can do this job.

DON'T GO TRYING SOME NEW FASHION

Despite the Gloom, Few Europeans Want Radical Change (Oxford Analytica)

Although many Europeans remain gloomy about the economy, have little confidence in their leaders or their policies, and possess just tepid enthusiasm for the single currency, only a minority want to return to national currencies, according to a new Pew Research survey. And most people still back a free-market economy. Not surprisingly, support is lowest in recession-hit Greece and Spain.

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Double-Edged Swords

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