It took scientists many years to discover a new system in the body that connects all of our organs and allows them to communicate in a way that Western science didn’t realize before, the interstitium. For decades, they were so focused on the parts they knew that they missed seeing something critical interconnecting the whole.

My college roommate, an expert in systems leadership, just wrote a fascinating article on this topic that reminded me how much systems dynamics are a blocker, and an unlock for business.

My friend's philosophy was shaped from her social entrepreneurship work in Cambodia, a country whose educational foundations were nearly annihilated by the Khmer Rouge. Teachers and intellectuals were executed, schools demolished, and even years after the regime fell, Cambodia’s education system struggled. Daniela started a social-impact company that brought global tourists on adventure trips to Cambodia and used the profits to build schools. But soon after investing in school buildings, she realized teacher training was a problem. Just after investing in teacher training, she realized kids couldn’t make it to school because of long commutes on foot, so she invested in a bike program. Soon after that, she realized many girls couldn’t use their bikes for school because they had to hand-fetch water each day for their families… so she began a water filtration business to unlock school attendance… Her initial assessment of the parts (buildings) didn’t take into consideration the deeply interconnected aspects of the system blocking educational success. After transitioning her organization to local leadership, she went on to Oxford to learn and later to teach systems thinking and leadership.

Back to B2B tech…

As an advisor to CEOs, I’m often told, “We have a marketing problem.”

And more often than not, I’ll observe: “There are aspects of your marketing we can improve, but you really have a COMPANY STRATEGY problem.”

My advisory practice was initially focused only on CMOs and making them more successful. But I quickly realized I couldn’t make a CMO successful without also working with CEOs, president, or COOs above them and connecting to their CRO and CPO peers.

Many problems that CMOs and CROs face are not issues of their own competence (as their CEOs or peers might think). Many of the problems in the CMO and CRO’s domain are deeply cross-functional, but show up in marketing and sales since they are the tip of the spear to the market. For instance, a CMO might be under the gun for “not creating enough pipeline” or a CRO for not closing it - but the issue could be that the company’s product isn’t differentiated, that their MARKET isn’t growing, or that the financial market is in trouble and no one is buying, or that the company is spread across too many customer semgments and not valuable enough to any one segment, or that the product or customer service is an issue that was killing customer satisfaction… and on and on.

Often CMO who is not hitting their numbers on pipeline is not taken seriously when he or she says the product isn’t good enough to win in the market or that the financial plan has some incorrect assumptions causing a plan-achievement gap. “Excuses…” they may be accused.

A CMO who is not hitting numbers is often not taken seriously when they say, “We might have hired too many salespeople too fast - we don’t have enough budget and organic growth to fill their pipeline.” "Do more with less,” they might be told, or they might just be fired and replaced.

But in many of these cases, there might be an issue with the financial plan and assumptions, or prioritization of product releases, or prioritization of audiences, or any number of core strategy elements that extend ACROSS AND BETWEEN each team. In these cases, the CMO or CRO may look like THEY are the problem, but they are the tip of the SYSTEM PROBLEM. Just like the interconnected system in the body might play a bigger role in the spread of cancer, for instance, than any one organ might!

Systems Solutions

As an outside advisor with an air of neutrality, I can often be the person who brings words to the system problem and helps convince the CEO to address and align around it. Since I don’t play a specific departmental role, naming other departments’ roles in a challenge isn’t seen as defensive or personally motivated. I can say what might be unsafe for people inside the business to say.

There are several things that make system problems really challenging to solve:

• Accountability: Company strategy is everyone’s problem and no one’s problem - especially at smaller companies, there generally aren’t owners of cross-functional issues outside of the CEO. And the process for working on company strategy is ill-defined, perhaps included in annual budget planning, or in elements of “off-site” planning meetings.

• Lack of Clear Urgency: System strategy problems are really hard to solve because they are often important but not urgent.

• Unclear Answers: They are often diffuse and hard to solve, and involve decisions with no right answer.

• Too Busy: They are easier to solve if someone can really dive in and do analysis (but often the most relevant people are up to their eyeballs in day-to-day work, trying to outrun the strategy problem through brute force).

But system work is critical to solving the problems of the parts. A detailed how-to article is warranted on corporate strategy, but for now, there are several critical things to keep in mind:

1. Consider that there might be a systems issue - As you explore part of the business that’s struggling, look for the interconnected parts that might be contributing rather than treating issues in silos.

2. Create space for constructive truth-telling - As a leadership team, you need to foster the trust and structure that allows systemic issues to be named and addressed, even when they implicate other functions or expose uncomfortable realities. It’s rarely safe for individuals to point out problems in other areas without support, so the team must intentionally come together to look behind the symptoms and examine what’s really going on, collectively and without defensiveness.

3. Be specific about the HOW, not just the numbers - Many companies use their financial plan and KPIs as their strategy. Their annual plans and quarterly goals describe the numbers more than HOW to get there and what trade-offs are necessary. Make sure your annual and quarterly plans include how you expect the market and competitors to evolve, how you define and allocate investments to different audiences, regions, and verticals, and how you plan to differentiate in the short and long term.

4. Make hard decisions, don’t kick the can down the road - Systems problems rarely resolve on their own. And because they are diffuse, generally not time-bound, and have no right answer, it’s hard to make quick progress on them. But choosing to act, even imperfectly, is better than pretending the issue doesn’t exist.

5. Keep asking: what are we missing? - Periodically step back and ask what might be hiding in plain sight - is there an overlooked “connective tissue” that could unlock progress?

As an executive team, it’s easy to get deep in execution and run out of time for strategy. But if there’s illness in a part — it’s really important to consider the health of the system.

Carilu Dietrich is a former CMO, most notably the head of marketing who took Atlassian public. She currently advises CEOs and CMOs of high-growth tech companies. Carilu helps leaders operationalize the chaos of scale, see around corners, and improve marketing and company performance.