Stop Hiring the Silent Type: Why Your Team Needs a Strategic Voice at the Table

If you’ve ever walked out of a brainstorming session wondering why the marketing hire you were excited about never actually spoke up, you’re not alone. Too often, companies hire marketers who look great on paper and check all those boxes, but don’t bring much to the table—literally. They sit quietly in meetings, nod along in Slack threads, and rarely challenge an idea or add to the strategy. Nice? Maybe. But effective? Not so much.

Let’s be honest: your organization doesn’t need more passive tactical players. It needs strategic thinkers who lead, not just do. People who get fired up about solving problems, inspire the team to care about customer experience, and turn insight into action.

Here’s what happens when you hire an experienced marketing leader, not just a resume that’s full of the latest tech buzzwords:

            • Your team gains someone who can connect dots across departments (yes, they talk to others and build relationships), understand customers, and improve the actual relevance of your message.

            • Your junior marketers stop “guessing” and start growing—because they’re learning how to think, not just how to do.

            • Your content starts working smarter. Because it’s rooted in strategy and customer understanding, not just output. And, then your marketing spend is not a gamble—it’s an investment with a return.

Great marketers don’t need to be the smartest person in the room, but they need to be smart enough to build the right room. That means hiring and mentoring people who may know more than you do in their specific area. An experienced marketer doesn’t feel threatened by talent; they attract it. They cultivate a team that’s diverse in perspective and strong in skills—because that’s how you build marketing that matters.

I love building and mentoring teams, and I even have a strategic thinking training for my teams. I’m really proud that many of the people who worked for me years ago are still more than smart colleagues that I admire, they are great friends.

Smart strategy shows up in the details: knowing which customer to prioritize, what they care about, how to position your value at each stage of the sales funnel, and when to say no to something that clearly won’t move the business forward. That kind of thinking doesn’t come from sitting silently in a team meeting. It comes from experience. You can hire someone who’s just there in the room, or someone who knows how to read the room …and lead it.