Zero CMOs on FTSE 100 Main Boards, Study Finds
No FTSE 100 company has a CMO on its main board, down from 14% in 2007, yet 70% retain meaningful marketing expertise as titles shift, research finds.
Updated
The brief
- Zero FTSE 100 companies have a CMO or marketing director on the main board, down from 14% in 2007.
- 70% of FTSE 100 boards have 'meaningful' marketing, customer and brand expertise; 45% have marketing expertise beyond the CEO.
- 86% of businesses run an executive committee below the main board, where marketing influence now typically sits.
Not a single FTSE 100 company has a marketing director or CMO on its main board, according to new research from agency The Marketing Directors.
The figure marks a sharp decline from 2007, when 14% of the UK's top 100 listed companies had marketing representation at the top table. The study compares today's position against a 2007 piece of research from Professor Malcolm McDonald and Cranfield School of Management, which found 14 board-level marketing officers operating across the FTSE 100.
But the disappearance of the CMO title from the boardroom does not mean marketing expertise has vanished. The majority of companies — 70% — retain what the study calls "meaningful" marketing, customer and brand expertise within their boards.
Marketing leadership in a different shape
Around 10% of FTSE 100 chief executives have a background in marketing or customer leadership. Tesco's CEO Ken Murphy, for example, was previously chief commercial officer at Walgreen Boots Alliance. Reckitt's CEO Kris Licht held the chief customer officer role at the company before taking the top job.
Beyond the CEO, 45% of main PLC boards include non-executive or executive marketing expertise. Below main board level, 30% of companies have a senior marketing or customer leader in senior leadership, and 38% have "other substantial" marketing, brand or customer expertise.
The research suggests marketing is not necessarily losing influence. Instead, the shape and understanding of marketing leadership is changing. Recent years have seen marketing subsumed into different job titles, with the rise of roles such as chief growth officer and chief customer officer. The CMO is no longer the default marketing job title.
Marketing Week's 2026 Career & Salary Survey data supports this picture of structural churn: new roles have been added to teams following a company restructure (40.7% of cases), a change in business strategy (31.6%) or the departure of a marketing leader or change in personnel (24.9%).
Consumer brands lead the way
Consumer brands show the strongest marketing influence. Of the 16 consumer companies on the FTSE 100, all have senior management-level marketing and customer leaders, and 15 have board-level expertise.
Travel, hospitality, technology, media, information and digital companies show a "similarly high" index of senior management marketing expertise. Energy and financial services businesses lag behind, the study finds, with marketing experience lacking at that level.
Where influence now sits
The role of the main board itself has shifted. The UK corporate governance code now positions the main board as more of a watchdog, covering governance and long-term oversight rather than daily operations.
The majority of businesses (86%) run an executive committee or operating board below the main board, typically composed of the CEO and functional leaders. This, the research notes, is where marketing now holds influence.
"A CMO, chief customer officer or chief growth officer can therefore have significant responsibility for strategy, investment, customer experience, brand and commercial performance without being a statutory director of the PLC," the study explains.
Guy Tomlinson, chief marketer at The Marketing Directors, points to the changing role of marketing over the last 30 years, from a creative function to a growth lever. "As markets and products become more commoditised, the ability to understand customer intent, use data and technology intelligently, build distinctive customer experiences and drive growth has made marketing capability increasingly important at executive level," he says.
Based on Marketing Week
Filed under cmo, ftse-100, marketing-leadership, boardroom, uk
Amara Osei
Show full bio
News editor covering industry trends and analytics at Marketing Herald.