69% of Marketers See No Career Progression — Spearman Says Fix Starts With You

Nearly seven in 10 marketers — 69% — reported a lack of career progression in the last year, according to Marketing Week's 2026 Career & Salary Survey. The figure frames the latest episode of The Marketing Week Podcast, in which careers advocate Lauren Spearman argues the industry faces a genuine careers crisis — and that marketers themselves hold part of the answer.

Spearman is the co-founder of Careering, a careers platform built, in her words, "for people who feel like their careers have gone a little bit adrift." Marketing Week named her a Changemaker in 2024. She built her career inside the industry, holding senior marketing roles at Made.com, Benefit Cosmetics and Many Pets.

Her turn toward careers advocacy began in 2023, when she started posting online about her own experience of navigating the jobs market. Since then she has become a prominent voice for better hiring practices across marketing.

In conversation with host Molly Innes, work and careers editor and podcast lead at Marketing Week, Spearman addresses a question many in the profession are now asking: is marketing in a careers crisis? The survey data suggests the answer leans yes. Marketers report feeling stagnated, stuck and searching for something new, and the episode sets out what both individuals and employers can do about it.

For Spearman, the starting point is ownership. "We should always look at what we can do ourselves to support our own progression. Absolutely, your employer has a role within your own career development, but they can't be the custodian of your career," she says.

Her practical advice for marketers who feel stalled is to change how they approach progression itself. She urges professionals to be "a bit more experimental" in the routes they take, rather than waiting for a linear climb that may no longer exist. The point is not that employers are off the hook — she is explicit that companies retain a role in development — but that individual marketers who outsource their entire career trajectory to their employer leave themselves exposed when that progression stalls.

The episode lands at a moment when the survey numbers give the argument weight. A 69% progression gap is not a fringe complaint; it is a majority experience across the profession, and it carries implications for retention, skills development and how marketing teams plan for talent over the next cycle.

Marketers who want to hear more from Spearman can catch her at Marketing Week's Festival of Marketing 2026 on 14 October, where she will be speaking. The Marketing Week Podcast is available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Acast.

For employers, the takeaway from Spearman's argument is direct: with most marketers seeing no path forward, the brands that actively demonstrate a role in career development — without being asked to own it outright — are the ones best placed to keep their talent from drifting.