Setbacks are inevitable, marketers need resilience to face them

It’s resilience that you need (sung to the theme tune of the BBC’s Record Breakers, for those old enough to remember). In our challenging yet rewarding profession, it’s inevitable that resilience will be required from time to time. But what truly is it?

Resilience is our ability to bounce back quickly from setbacks – not to be confused with endurance, which is the stamina to keep going.

Our resilience levels are individual to each of us: our personal lived experience of setbacks may mean we have already discovered perspective, coping strategies and techniques to deal with the initial stress that comes with news of a setback. But how we handle a setback isn’t just our immediate response, where frustration, anger and upset occur, which is only natural, and often needed to process a situation. It’s also how quickly we come back with a can-do attitude and the drive to carry on working through it, as well as being able to develop ideas for an alternative approach.

Marketers in particular need resilience, more than many other roles in an organisation, because marketing has shifted recently from being a support function to the one leading the long-term commercial agenda. While this is 100% the right move, it has resulted in an increased level of responsibility.

 We need to have the resilience to pivot quickly in any given situation, whether it’s an expected or unexpected change.

The day job takes so much emotional and mental energy – with constant requests for urgent one-pagers, more meetings reflecting the change in commercial accountability, the drain of ‘socialising’, the effort to gain buy-in for marketing plans and much more. We also know as marketers that we have to respond to changes in our markets, customers and internal structures.

When setbacks arise, the demands of the role may mean we are already depleted or lower on energy and therefore find it harder to deal with them. But we need to have the resilience to pivot quickly in any given situation, whether it’s an expected or unexpected change. The organisation will be looking to us and asking ‘What now?’, seeking a quick, clear plan to turn things around.

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Adversity is inevitable

Some might say it’s a shame that we need to build resilience to survive, let alone thrive, in the marketing profession, and I agree more needs to be done to address the issues that cause the setbacks. We can start by defining our strategy and plans clearly, and gaining alignment at all levels before proceeding. We can educate colleagues about marketing science, insight-based decisions and feedback, which will ease the decision-making processes.

Yet setbacks are still inevitable – and plentiful. They might include:

• Changes in brand performance and strength due to increased competition, or market and economic conditions;
• Resource or investment reductions (often maintaining the same growth expectations) to meet short-term profit targets or offset other declining brands;
• Lack of buy-in from the C-suite, as they are focused on short-term gains and not long-term brand building;
• A well-tested comms idea not coming to fruition due to the reality of production budgets, budget cuts and/or a multitude of internal opinions diluting the idea.
• Well-scoring innovation concepts being pushed back due to internal profit margin expectations, or production and capex limitations, resulting in a lack of relevance and competitiveness when finally launched;
• Changes to strategy and plans that have taken months of developing with data and insight, in order to accommodate a last-minute customer demand or ‘wildcard’ idea from someone in senior management;
• Alignment or buy-in that suddenly needs to be gained from yet another stakeholder, late in the process.

There are also the setbacks that are more personal to us or our careers, for example:

• The promotion you have been waiting for being postponed due to changes in ownership or management, meaning you have to prove yourself all over again;
• Unexpected changes in organisational structure or your role;
• The impact of the climate crisis or conflicts happening in the world;
• A significant personal loss;
• A relationship breaking down;
• Illness;
• Care challenges for loved ones.

All these, and more, will impact our ability to focus and our levels of resilience to deal with the task at hand. So what can we do about it?

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Practical ways to build resilience

You could argue that we should be creating plans, processes, cultures and environments that reduce and/or prevent setbacks. Where decision-making on communication ideas and activation is left to the marketers to bring to life. Where brand strategies are built, growth targets are agreed, budget is secured and locked in with both long- and short-term KPIs understood. Where opinions never supersede true customer insight.

Bit by bit, we can look to address all of the above, but we also need to ensure we have the resilience to overcome difficulty. Marketers should be empowered to build and maintain their own resilience levels, and to advocate for those in their care to do the same. And we can only do this by prioritising the things that give us the strength to face adversity and bounce back.

1. Take personal action

The first step is taking the time to define what you need to maintain this strength and energy, and then setting and communicating boundaries to protect them. This also gives permission to those around us to do the same.

Wellbeing obviously includes eating well, sleeping enough and exercising. However, these things are often the first to go during busy times. Don’t forget that wellbeing also includes mental health and capacity to process, ensuring we take time to reflect, gain perspective and prioritise the activities that top us up.

2. Define your values and purpose

Ensure you have your own internal motivations, to give you the inner drive to keep going, and make conscious choices to do activities or tasks that play into these. Select roles and organisations that align with them. Put your hand up for workstreams and prioritise activities outside of work that fit your values. As Friedrich Nietzsche said: “Who has a ‘why’ to live can bear almost any ‘how’.”

3. Build a support network

Identify the people internally and externally who you can talk to when you need to vent, gain perspective or ask advice.

4. Adopt a can-do attitude

After the initial frustration and disappointment of a setback, which is only natural part of the process, adopting an open, positive and optimistic mindset is essential. It allows us to be flexible in our thinking and creativity, to come up with the ideas to answer the ‘what now?’ and the ‘what’s next?’, to define alternative next steps and move forward.

Setbacks will always happen, and while I hope one day marketers can find ways to reduce the professional ones, building our resilience is key. As passionate marketers wanting to lead from the front, we need to get back on the horse and keep moving forward.

Abigail Dixon is the founder, author and podcast host of The Whole Marketer. An award-winning marketer with more than 20 years experience, she is passionate about ensuring marketers have successful and fulfilling careers.