“Can you let go enough to trust me to do this job now that I’m in that seat? But also, can I trust that I can bring you ideas and thoughts and have you engage with me?” she said.

As a former CMO, that aspect was harder for Loeschen, who said he had to make a “conscientious decision,” once he became a CEO, to walk away from a lot of marketing responsibilities. “Being an ex-CMO, the biggest pitfall is that I still want to be a marketer,” he said, adding: “But you need to take a step back.”  

Padula also needed to let go. As a younger marketer, she focused mostly on social and digital media, but now that she was working with the Nespresso brass, she had to realize that multiple people at the corporation have a say in how the brand is represented. 

“If a marketer thinks of themselves as the only person who’s in charge of the brand, that’s going to be an issue from day one,” she said. 

She understood that she would not be in every discussion where the Nespresso brand was represented, and had to trust that Loeschen would also make sure the brand would always be “thoughtfully considered.”

As marketers grow in their career, it’s important to have the counsel of the top executives beyond their main discipline. 

“It’s kind of lonely at the top,” Padula said. “And you don’t have a lot of marketers to share ideas with. Your team is relying on you to set that vision for the marketing strategy. And yet, I can go to my CEO, as long as you build that working relationship.”