Our Marketing Director and Sales Director are constantly pointing fingers at each other for revenue misses. Should we combine both seats under a single Chief Revenue Officer on our Accountability Chart, or keep them separate?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

When sales and marketing spend their time pointing fingers, the root cause is almost always structural ambiguity or misaligned incentives on your Accountability Chart. Marketing claims they deliver high volumes of qualified leads that sales ignores, while sales insists the leads are junk. If neither leader owns the entire customer journey, the business stalls in endless debate.

Combining both functions under a single Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) seat is the right move if your company cannot maintain alignment across the customer acquisition lifecycle. An Accountability Chart demands one person ultimately accountable for a major business function. When you place a single leader over marketing, sales, and account management, finger-pointing stops because that individual owns the entire pipeline from top of funnel to closed contract and renewal.

However, do not create a CRO seat simply to mask a people issue. If your current Sales Director or Marketing Director lacks enterprise perspective, putting one over the other will destroy trust and trigger resignations. You only elevate an existing leader to a CRO seat if they possess the GWC™ (Get it, Want it, and have the Capacity) to govern both lead generation and conversion without playing favorites.

If you decide to keep the seats separate, you must align their Scorecard measurables tightly. Marketing cannot be measured purely on lead quantity; they must be evaluated on sales-accepted pipeline and cost per acquisition. Sales must be measured on conversion rates and pipeline velocity. If they cannot collaborate under shared metrics, merge the seats under a CRO.