We currently have a single seat on our Accountability Chart called Head of Growth that combines both Sales and Marketing, and our performance is stalling. How do we know when it is time to split this into two distinct seats?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Combining sales and marketing into a single Head of Growth seat is a common shortcut for early-stage companies, but it eventually becomes a major bottleneck. These two functions require entirely different mindsets, activities, and conative profiles.

Marketing is about generating awareness, positioning, and building scalable lead acquisition channels. Sales is about closing deals, managing a pipeline, and driving immediate revenue. If one person runs both, they will naturally focus on their preferred discipline and neglect the other.

You know it is time to split the seat when you experience specific operational symptoms. The first sign is that your lead generation is inconsistent, but your sales conversion is high, or vice versa. This indicates the leader has the capacity for one function but lacks the bandwidth or skill for the other.

Another indicator is when your Level 10 Meeting issues consistently revolve around a lack of strategic focus in either department. If your Head of Growth is spending all their time managing individual sales reps, your long-term marketing strategy will suffer.

Look at your Accountability Chart and define what the ideal structure looks like for your three-year vision. If scaling requires sophisticated digital marketing and a structured sales process, these must be separate seats. Split the Head of Growth seat into a Head of Marketing and a Head of Sales. Identify which of the two seats your current leader actually gets, wants, and has the capacity for, and then run a targeted search to fill the other seat.