Snickers is running two simultaneous marketing pushes around its peanut butter products — one built on a longstanding creative platform about hunger-induced bad decisions, the other timed to the NFL Draft and anchored by a college football star expected to go in the first round.

The first, a campaign called “Stuck,” extends the brand’s existing creative territory around hunger as the source of human irrationality. In the lead spot, a rock climber in distress spends his crisis composing the perfect text message for help, until his companion hands him a Snickers and delivers the line: “You’re indecisive when you’re hungry.” Separate spots use self-aware humor to poke fun at the campaign’s own voice-overs. The ads are running across television and social platforms, including YouTube, Meta, Snapchat and TikTok.

Mars says the campaign is designed to highlight the textural qualities of the peanut butter variant — citing survey data from ingredient company Puratos indicating that 71% of consumers globally identify texture as a meaningful part of their eating experience.

“With ‘Stuck,’ we’re adding a new, hilarious chapter by exploring the world of hunger-fuelled indecisiveness,” said Ashley Gill, vice president of brands and content at Mars Snacking. “It’s a creative platform that allows us to playfully show how the satisfying, creamy and crunchy texture of Snickers Peanut Butter is the perfect solution to that all-too-familiar feeling of being caught in between.”

Also Read: Your CX Partner Is a Revenue Engine. Treat It Like One.

The second activation centers on the brand’s ice cream line and former Ohio State wide receiver Carnell Tate, who is widely projected to be selected in the first round of the NFL Draft, which begins April 23. Through a dedicated microsite, Snickers is distributing limited-edition ice cream bars with packaging bearing the word “Chill” — a message aimed at fans and commentators caught up in the speculation-heavy draft season. Tate will also wear a custom jewel-encrusted Snickers Ice Cream Chill Chain at the draft event, which fans can enter a sweepstakes to win.

“The passion surrounding the NFL Draft is what makes it so exciting, but the non-stop speculation can turn up the heat quickly,” said Chanel Gant, marketing director at Mars Ice Cream. “We wanted to give fans a fun and delicious way to chill the hot takes.”

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Most enterprises have no problem handing off customer service to an outside partner. Billing disputes, tech support, and returns are all fair game when it comes to outsourcing. Yet, the moment the conversation shifts to revenue-generating functions like sales, leaders become more cautious. Sales is often perceived to be too close to the brand, too strategic, and too important to trust to anyone outside the building.

That logic is costing companies growth.

A recent IDC InfoBrief, “From Efficiency to Excellence: Driving Enterprise Value Through Customer Experience Partnerships,” sponsored by TELUS Digital, draws on survey data from 287 enterprise decision-makers on their business priorities and CX partnership strategies. The results show a striking imbalance in modern outsourcing. 

The Trust Gap Is the Real Bottleneck

Organizations are comfortable delegating customer friction, but they remain tethered to an outdated belief that revenue-generating functions must stay strictly in-house to maintain control. That mindset is holding enterprises back. 

According to IDC’s InfoBrief, customer analytics is now the most outsourced function to CX partners, cited by 27% of respondents. Inbound B2B sales trail at 17%, inbound B2C sales at 9%, and outbound sales functions rank even lower.

The disparity is telling. Enterprises are willing to hand over the data and insight layer of the customer relationship, but they still hesitate at the transactional moment. Modern CX outsourcing has evolved from transactional labor to high-fidelity brand extension. The barrier isn’t a lack of partner capability. It’s a legacy mindset that treats sales as ‘core identity’ and service as a ‘utility.’ When enterprises mistake proximity to the office for quality of the outcome, they inadvertently limit their own scale.

Same Tools, Different Silos

Consider this: the same AI and predictive analytics that enterprises deploy to resolve support tickets are perfectly suited for identifying upsell triggers, forecasting churn, and surfacing expansion opportunities.

The IDC data shows that 34% of enterprises rank improving operational efficiency as their top priority over the next 12 to 24 months, with 31% prioritizing improved customer experience and 21% focused on revenue growth. Most companies chase these with separate budgets and separate teams. But think about what actually happens in a single customer interaction: an AI tool resolves an issue faster, and that’s efficiency. The customer walks away satisfied, and that’s experience. And because the system flagged a cross-sell opportunity during that same conversation, the agent closes an expansion, and that’s revenue. One interaction, one platform, three outcomes. The only reason companies don’t see it that way is that they’ve organized themselves not to.

Technology and talent are commercially agnostic. Only internal silos prevent a service tool from becoming a revenue engine. CX partners, by nature, sit outside organizational walls. The best among them have spent years perfecting the science of hiring, training, and scaling the specific skill sets required for consultative, high-conversion interactions.

When Procurement Undermines Growth Strategy

The most significant insight from the IDC InfoBrief concerns how enterprises buy CX partnerships. Contract pricing and flexibility are the top vendor selection factors at 28%, and 72% of enterprises expect 10% to 19% cost savings from their CX partner. Cost discipline matters, of course. But when pricing is commoditized, partners are forced into a defensive posture, focusing on baseline service level agreements (SLAs) rather than proactive growth.

In a revenue partnership, the conversation must shift from cost per head to return on investment. In a service-only model, success is often measured by how quickly you can get off the phone. In a revenue partnership, success is measured by conversion rates, pipeline contribution, and account expansion. 

Enterprise leaders need to think beyond the cost of a partner, considering how effectively they can accelerate outcomes and shorten the sales cycle. IDC’s data shows that 22% of enterprises already view revenue growth as a quantifiable outcome of their CX partnerships. That number should be much higher. You cannot expect a vendor to drive strategic growth if the contract is designed only to manage tactical costs. A true revenue partnership transforms the CX provider from a defensive cost center into an offensive growth engine that pays for itself.

Agentic AI Changes the Math

The emergence of agentic AI accelerates all of this. According to IDC, 32% of enterprises have already deployed agentic AI use cases in their outsourcing operations, and only 6% report no interest in the technology. This is no longer about chatbots deflecting routine inquiries. Agentic AI analyzes behavior in real time to trigger next-best-action recommendations, ensuring expansion opportunities aren’t missed during a service interaction. It moves CX from manual task execution to autonomous revenue orchestration.

For CX partners already managing both the data layer and the customer interaction, agentic AI can be the connective tissue that turns a support conversation into a qualified pipeline event.

The Full-Lifecycle Imperative

The enterprises that will pull ahead are the ones that stop treating acquisition, retention, and expansion as separate workstreams managed by separate vendors. Deploying a single partner across the full customer lifecycle ensures data continuity, with the sales team informed by support data and the support team staying aligned with the original value proposition. IDC’s data reinforces this: 25% of enterprises say the highest satisfaction driver is alignment of service delivery with their business. A fragmented customer journey is a silent revenue killer. A unified lifecycle is a force multiplier

Time to Rethink the CX Partner Relationship

The CX outsourcing market has matured well beyond transactional staffing models. The partners, the technology, and the talent models exist today to drive measurable revenue impact. What hasn’t caught up is the enterprise mindset. The risk isn’t in outsourcing sales, but in the cost of not scaling it.

For leaders still treating their CX partner as a cost center, the IDC InfoBrief sponsored by TELUS Digital offers a clear direction: the same partnership you’re using to manage friction could be the engine that drives your next phase of growth.

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Nearly eight in ten Gen Z and Millennial Americans are using what researchers call “survival spending” to get by — relying on short-term financial strategies like Buy Now, Pay Later for essential purchases, turning to AI for budgeting guidance, and increasingly abandoning long-term financial planning altogether.

That is the central finding of new research released Monday by Beyond Finance, in partnership with financial literacy nonprofit Operation HOPE, based on a survey of 2,000 Millennial and Gen Z adults conducted in March.

Almost half — 45% — say they would put a tax refund toward bills or debt. Just under 4% would spend it on travel or leisure. More than 70% say supplemental income from side hustles is now necessary simply to keep up, and 59% say spending on meaningful experiences today feels more practical than saving for long-term goals that feel increasingly out of reach. Nearly two-thirds say they are uncertain whether traditional retirement planning will deliver real security.

Also Read: Protecting Loyal Customers From Your Own Return Policies

The findings also reveal a generational shift in where young people turn for financial guidance. Gen Z is now more likely to consult social media influencers (24%) than their own parents (21%) when refining money strategies. And financial transparency is increasingly entering the dating conversation: 73% of respondents say they want to know someone’s exact financial situation before the third date.

AI is playing a growing role as well. Some 39% say they are already using AI tools to budget or inform financial decisions, often running hypothetical scenarios before taking action. A smaller share — 16% — use apps that gamify saving and spending to reinforce financial habits.

“Gen Z and Millennials aren’t failing at money. The system they inherited has changed, and they’re responding in real time,” said Dr. Erika Rasure, chief financial wellness advisor at Beyond Finance. “What we’re seeing is a generation shifting from long-term financial ideals to daily financial practices — using windfalls to stabilize, leaning on AI to make decisions, and prioritizing what’s immediately within their control. That adaptability isn’t a weakness. It’s a new form of financial resilience.”

Also Read: The Invisible Infrastructure Behind Every Great App

John Hope Bryant, founder, chairman and CEO of Operation HOPE, framed the findings in broader terms. “Gen Z and Millennials are not walking away from success,” he said. “They are searching for a model that speaks to their lived reality, their struggle, and their hope. At Operation HOPE, we believe financial literacy is the new civil rights issue of our time — and our calling is to help this generation move from uncertainty to confidence, from surviving to thriving, and from financial stress to lasting wealth.”

The survey was conducted by QuestionPro on behalf of Beyond Finance and Operation HOPE between March 16 and 18, 2026. Respondents included 2,000 American Millennials, defined as those born between 1981 and 1996, and Gen Z adults, born between 1997 and 2008.

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U.S. Bank has struck a multiyear deal to become the official bank and wealth management sponsor of the NFL, filling a sponsorship gap in the league’s retail banking rights that had gone unfilled for more than 30 years.

The agreement, announced Tuesday, makes U.S. Bank the presenting sponsor of the Super Bowl MVP Award and a top-tier sponsor of the NFL Flag Championships. The bank will also integrate NFL intellectual property and player talent into its existing “Power of Us” brand campaign — the first fruits of which arrived Monday, when two 30-second spots featuring Minnesota Vikings wide receiver Justin Jefferson and U.S. Women’s National Flag Football team quarterback Izzy Geraci began airing across television, digital video, and connected TV. The ads were produced by agency Supergood.

The NFL’s retail banking rights had most recently been held by Truist since 2021, as part of a pass-through arrangement tied to Visa’s broader financial services sponsorship, which expired after last season. U.S. Bank, the largest American bank outside the Big Four, has banked the Minnesota Vikings since the franchise’s inaugural 1961 season and has maintained a relationship with the league itself for more than two decades.

Also Read: Merchandisers Are Drowning in Data and Still Flying Blind

“It’s a generational opportunity to become an NFL sponsor,” said Michael Lacorazza, executive vice president and chief marketing officer at U.S. Bank. “We were at a place where our brand was ready to take on a bigger stage in its evolution.”

At the center of the deal is a new financial education initiative called U.S. Bank Financial Edge, a customized guidance program for NFL players covering cash flow, charitable giving, long-term wealth, and entrepreneurship — topics the bank describes as critical both during and after a professional football career. The program is part of the NFL’s broader effort to modernize how it supports players financially.

The face of the program is Fernando Mendoza, the Heisman Trophy-winning Indiana University quarterback widely projected to be the first overall pick in the NFL Draft on April 23. Mendoza, who graduated from the University of California’s Haas School of Business and is pursuing an MBA at Indiana, was described by Lacorazza as an unusually strong fit.

“He probably has more knowledge and acumen, relative to his age, than most others coming out of college,” Lacorazza said. “For him to play a central role in helping to launch our Financial Edge program made a ton of sense — especially given his visibility as the number one player in the draft.”

Also Read: Push Notifications Are Broken. Here Is What Comes After Them

The NFL deal is the latest in a series of high-profile cultural integrations pursued by U.S. Bank under Lacorazza, who joined the company in 2023. Last year, the bank served as a top sponsor of the fictional Tour Championship in Netflix’s sports comedy “Happy Gilmore 2.”

“This is the next step in our evolution of leaning into culture, and it’s a big one for us,” Lacorazza said of the NFL partnership.

The post U.S. Bank Signs NFL Deal After 30-Year Rights Gap appeared first on MartechView.

Axe is joining a growing roster of brands angling for visibility around the FIFA World Cup 2026, launching a TikTok sweepstakes that offers match tickets to fans willing to ask someone out on camera while dressed in an over-the-top soccer outfit.

The promotion, which began April 15 and runs through the end of May, asks entrants to post a video of themselves making their boldest move while wearing conspicuous fan gear, tagging Axe’s account and adding designated hashtags. The stunt is designed to reinforce the brand’s longstanding confidence messaging — the idea being that if Axe can carry someone through that level of public awkwardness, it can carry them through anything.

In total, the brand is giving away 82 tickets across seven matches, including two seats in a private suite at the Miami Quarterfinal. Sweepstakes winners will also receive $2,000 toward travel and accommodation. This year’s tournament, co-hosted by the United States, Mexico, and Canada, spans 104 matches over five weeks, with opening matches beginning in mid-June.

“The social energy of the tournament creates moments that bring people together,” said Dolores Assalini, head of Axe U.S. “Through this sweepstakes, Axe is helping fans put themselves out there and show up with confidence, a sense of humor, and the boldness to make a connection.”

To amplify the campaign, Axe has partnered with The Pointer Brothers, a content duo who will explain the sweepstakes mechanics across their channels. The effort also launches alongside a limited-edition World Cup product collection, available exclusively at Walmart with themed packaging.

Also Read: Push Notifications Are Broken. Here Is What Comes After Them

The activation is part of a broader repositioning Axe has undertaken to connect with Gen Z consumers. The brand introduced a Fine Fragrance Collection in 2023 and, earlier this year, launched a campaign called “The History of Overdoing It” that gently mocked the body spray’s reputation for heavy-handed application. Last April, the brand enlisted comedian Pete Davidson to help young men, in the brand’s parlance, improve their “rizz” — a slang term for romantic appeal.

Axe is not alone in chasing World Cup momentum. Mondelēz, Modelo, and Coca-Cola are among the other marketers running campaigns timed to the tournament.

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As enterprises scramble to move generative artificial intelligence from experimental pilots to the balance sheet, TELUS Digital is arriving at Adobe Summit 2026 with a potential solution for the “activation gap.”

The company, an Adobe Gold Solution Partner, plans to demonstrate a new “agentic” AI workflow at the Venetian Convention and Expo Center in Las Vegas next week. The technology is designed to solve a persistent bottleneck: the inability of large organizations to use customer insights captured in contact centers before the window of opportunity closes.

“Enterprises don’t struggle with data scarcity; they struggle with activation speed,” said Samantha Thibault, Senior Director of Digital Marketing at TELUS Digital.

The “activation gap,” as the company defines it, is the lag between a customer signal—such as a complaint or an expressed interest during a phone call—and a brand’s ability to respond with a personalized offer or solution. Currently, most of that intelligence remains “trapped” in transcripts and legacy databases.

Also Read: The Organizations That Survive Disruption Never Had to Recover From It

Closing the Loop in Real Time

At the heart of the TELUS Digital demonstration is a shift from passive data processing to active orchestration. Using a combination of custom GenAI and the Adobe Experience Platform, the workflow follows a three-step cycle:

• Extraction: AI identifies intent and emotional sentiment from live contact center audio.
• Unification: That data is instantly synced into a centralized Real-Time Customer Data Platform (CDP).
• Activation: Web experiences and loyalty programs are updated automatically via Adobe Journey Optimizer while the customer is still engaged.

By moving away from “batch processing”—where data is analyzed in large chunks days after it is collected—the company claims it can compress response latency from days to mere minutes.

Also Read: SEO Is Not Dead. But It No Longer Works Alone.

A Blueprint for Retention

The stakes for this technology extend beyond simple personalization. During a featured session on April 22, TELUS Digital will present a case study of its implementation within its parent company, TELUS.

The communications giant reportedly used the agentic ecosystem to automate customer retention workflows, employing “action loops” and continuous learning to predict and prevent customer churn.

For the modern Chief Marketing Officer, the value proposition is clear: in an era of declining brand loyalty, the winner is often the one who can reason and react the fastest.

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Revolut has launched an AI-powered financial assistant for its more than 13 million customers in the United Kingdom, as the $75 billion challenger bank joins a growing wave of fintechs embedding conversational AI into everyday banking.

The tool, called AIR, is available free within the Revolut app and is designed to replace multi-step navigation with simple conversational prompts. Users can ask it for spending insights, track investments, freeze a lost card, manage subscriptions, or plan travel budgets. Revolut says personal data is never stored by third-party AI partners or used to train external AI models.

“We believe the era of navigating through endless tabs and menus is over. With AIR, we’re delivering a new level of money intelligence that’s both powerful and effortless. It’s not just an assistant; it’s a co-pilot that elevates everyday life, making financial management as easy and natural as sending a text. Crucially, Revolut customers also remain firmly in the driver’s seat, ensuring that money intelligence never comes at the cost of privacy,” said Julia Ponomareva, director and general manager of CX and AI product at Revolut.

Also Read: The Organizations That Survive Disruption Never Had to Recover From It

The launch places Revolut alongside a clutch of European fintechs racing to integrate generative AI into their products. Klarna uses the technology for customer service, while Bunq launched its own AI assistant in 2024. Danish challenger bank Lunar has said its AI-powered voice assistant will eventually handle around 75 percent of customer calls.

In the United Kingdom specifically, rival Starling Bank launched what it described as the country’s first agentic AI financial assistant last month, signaling that AI is fast becoming a competitive battleground among challenger banks.

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Klarna and the Douglas Group have expanded their European payments partnership to Italy and Spain, bringing flexible installment payment options to beauty shoppers across Southern Europe for the first time.

The expansion builds on a collaboration already established in other European markets. Shoppers in Italy and Spain will now have access to Klarna at checkout, including the option to split purchases into interest-free installments.

“Italy is a thriving and fast-growing market for beauty, and we are thrilled to bring Klarna’s payment solutions to Douglas shoppers here,” said Luigi Traldi, head of Klarna in Southern Europe. “Our partnership reflects a shared vision of putting the customer experience first: offering flexible, frictionless payment options that make every checkout as enjoyable as the products in the basket.”

Also Read: The Invisible Infrastructure Behind Every Great App

Klarna, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, serves more than 118 million active users globally and processes 3.4 million transactions per day. Douglas is Europe’s leading premium beauty retailer, operating across multiple markets on the continent.

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Birch Coffee, one of New York City’s most beloved independent coffee brands, has opened its twelfth location, powered by Square’s unified commerce platform. Built on a hospitality-first ethos and a commitment to neighborhood connection, the brand is steadily scaling by using Square to simplify operations, support frontline teams, and deliver a consistent customer experience across every location.

Birch Coffee’s origin story is one of humility and hustle. Founded in 2009 by two bartenders new to the industry, the brand has grown from a neighborhood newcomer into a name recognized city-wide for its warmth, craft, and community. Believing that every cup of coffee has its own story and soul, the founders early on established relationships with South American farmers behind their beans, with a commitment to discovering the best processing methods and flavor profiles. As they embarked on ambitious expansion, the team needed technology that would evolve alongside them, upholding their high product standards without adding operational complexity.

“We really immersed ourselves in the industry, learning as much as we could and becoming more confident in our point of view,” said Jeremy Lyman, co-founder of Birch Coffee. “What started as a small, uncertain venture has grown into a more established and intentional brand. We’ve become much clearer about who we are and how we operate, and we need systems that support that as we grow.”

That intentionality has paid off. In 2025, Birch Coffee posted 16 percent year-over-year growth — a testament to the brand’s local reputation and the commerce infrastructure supporting it. Before Square, Birch Coffee ran on a legacy point-of-sale system that was struggling to keep pace with rapidly advancing customer expectations. When word spread that other local coffee operators were making the switch to Square, the founders took notice.

Also Read: The Organizations That Survive Disruption Never Had to Recover From It

“It’s easy to use, easy to train on, and easy to scale with,” said Lyman. “Being able to run so much of the business through one ecosystem while still integrating with best-in-class partners is a big advantage. The overall simplicity and flexibility would be hard to replace.”

Birch Coffee’s portfolio runs entirely on Square, combining hardware, software, and integrations that support both frontline operations and back-office management. The business uses Square Register and Square for Restaurants to power its service operations, while Square’s email marketing tools and gift cards help drive community connection and repeat visits from loyal regulars. Square also powers the brand’s coffee subscription service. Birch Coffee additionally uses a custom-built API alongside an integration with workforce scheduling platform 7shifts — an example of how Square’s open platform can be tailored to a brand’s specific needs.

Running a coffee brand in New York City poses distinct challenges. The pace is fast, real estate is tight, and with local competition fierce, customers expect standout experiences every time they walk through the door. Square is designed to meet those demands, offering the reliability to handle dense urban footprints, tools to manage large and rotating teams, and the mobility to take commerce anywhere.

“Cafés have some of the most demanding commerce needs, with high transaction volumes, complex shift work, tip income, and customers who expect excellence with every visit,” said Nick Molnar, global head of sales and marketing at Block. “Square is purpose-built to meet those demands, and what Birch Coffee has achieved across its locations in New York City is a testament to what’s possible when capability scales. The same platform that powers a single neighborhood café can run a multi-location enterprise without adding complexity. That’s the promise we deliver for operators like Birch Coffee.”

Also Read: Protecting Loyal Customers From Your Own Return Policies

With its twelfth location now open and further expansion on the horizon, Birch Coffee shows no signs of slowing down. The company remains focused on deepening its presence in New York City’s coffee community, and with Square as its unified commerce provider, it is positioned to keep growing without losing the hospitality-driven character that defined it from the start.

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Every industry has a word it reaches for when it does not know what else to say. In boardrooms today, that word is transformation. It gets invoked at strategy off-sites, written into annual reports, and handed to consultants as a mandate — often before anyone has agreed on what exactly needs to change, or why.

The results are predictable. Brands that once stood for something begin to feel like everything. Customer experiences that were once a competitive advantage become inconsistent and interchangeable. Revenue targets get hit in the short term. Brand equity quietly erodes over the long term.

The problem, more often than not, is not a lack of ambition. It is a lack of an anchor. Transformation without a clear sense of what must be preserved is not strategy — it is change for its own sake.

Giovanna B. Questioni has spent her career in that gap. A transformation expert with experience across luxury fashion, food, furniture, and the digital industries, she has led mergers and acquisitions, crisis interventions, and large-scale omnichannel overhauls across global markets. Her argument is not against change. It is for coherence.

The brands that survive disruption, Questioni argues, are the ones that understand the difference between what is negotiable and what is not. Design, quality, emotional resonance — these are not variables to be optimized in a transformation roadmap. They are the reason the brand exists. Everything else is in service of them.

That distinction shapes how she thinks about omnichannel strategy — an area where many brands have spent heavily and delivered inconsistently. The instinct is to treat every new channel as an opportunity. The discipline is to treat every channel as a responsibility to serve customers without breaking what they already trust.

“Every touchpoint — whether in retail, franchising, wholesale, e-commerce, or social commerce — must deliver a distinct yet cohesive experience. Physical stores thrive on human connection and sensory engagement, while digital platforms excel through simplicity, speed, and personalization.” 

A customer who buys online and returns in-store should not feel the friction of two separate systems. The seams should never show. And the sales assistant at that moment is not a workaround — they are an opportunity for the kind of personalization no digital platform has yet replicated.

What Questioni warns against is the version of transformation that becomes its own end. “Disruption is powerful, but it must always align with customer expectations and ROI,” she says. “Without this balance, transformation risks becoming an academic exercise — one that could dilute the brand’s reputation and desirability.” Bold innovation is not the enemy of brand integrity. Undisciplined innovation is.

The second argument she makes — and the one that challenges the most deeply held assumptions in corporate strategy — is about resilience. The dominant understanding is reactive: how fast can an organization absorb a shock and return to normal?

That framing, Questioni argues, is entirely the wrong one. By the time a company is managing recovery, it has already lost the most valuable thing: time. The organizations that emerge from disruption stronger are not the ones that responded fastest. They are the ones that had already built for it.

“Resilience isn’t just about bouncing back — it’s about building the future before it arrives. It’s the difference between surviving the unexpected and shaping it into opportunity.” 

A future-ready organization, in her view, has designed agility into its operating model before crisis arrives — and has given its teams the tools, authority, and mindset to move without waiting for direction from above. The question she puts to every leadership team is not how they responded last time. It is what they have already built for next time.

Which brings the conversation to the question that defeats most large-scale transformations before they ever reach the customer: execution. The strategy is rarely the problem. The problem is that a vision designed at the top must be delivered by teams moving at different speeds, across different functions and geographies.

Most organizations respond with governance frameworks. Questioni’s response cuts closer to what the problem actually is.

“Large-scale transformation operates like a symphony — an intricate performance where each element must harmonize under the guidance of a skilled conductor.” 

The conductor she has in mind is not ceremonial. It is a deeply operational C-level leader who holds the granular and the panoramic simultaneously — who understands how individual performance feeds collective outcomes, and who can align diverse functions without erasing what makes each of them effective.

The failure mode she sees most often is not a shortage of talent or resources. It is teams executing brilliantly within their own lanes while the overall composition falls apart. “True transformation isn’t about managing chaos,” she says. “It’s about precision, collaboration, and leadership that turns vision into reality.”

The conductor is not optional. Neither is the score. And the brands that understand the difference between noise and music — between change and transformation — are the ones that will still mean something when the disruption settles.

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