If there’s one word that defines what I’ve seen in the marketing industry in my career, it’s ‘acceleration.’

When I started, I was writing print ads in The Wall Street Journal for clients all over the country. So the deadline was when FedEx came to our building…or if we were really pushing it, FedEx’s deadline at the airport. This created a natural ebb and flow.

Then PDFs came along, and well, that deadline got pushed much farther back. But because it still ultimately had to go to print, there was still an ebb and flow.

Fast forward to today. Everything is always on, real time, with endless data streams. It feels like there is no more ebb, only flow.

Which is why this lesson really caught my eye in a podcast guest application – It’s important to ‘take a beat.’

To hear that lesson, along with many more lesson-filled stories, I talked to Cindy Van Horne, global head of marketing & communications, McKinsey & Company [https://www.mckinsey.com/].

Lessons from the things she made

• It’s important to ‘take a beat’   
• Be fearless with your ambition  
• Reinvention is not optional   
• When goals are not hit, leadership is about finesse 
• The pathway to innovative campaigns is about breaking down barriers
• Real change comes when others are inspired to break their own ceiling 

Discussed in this episode

AI Guild [https://join.meclabsai.com/]

Strategic Marketing Collaboration: Find your partner in crime (podcast episode #68) [https://marketingsherpa.com/article/interview/strategic]

Branding Lessons from TV Production: Don't focus on failure, keep moving towards success (podcast episode #92) [https://www.marketingsherpa.com/article/interview/brand-lessons]

Leadership Development: Network every day (podcast episode #72) [https://marketingsherpa.com/article/interview/leadership-development]

B2B Marketing Leadership: The higher you get in the organization, the more details you need to know (podcast episode #115) [https://marketingsherpa.com/article/interview/B2B-marketing-leadership]

Customer-First Marketing: Every click is a wish (podcast episode #85) [https://marketingsherpa.com/article/interview/customer-first]

Get more episodes

Subscribe to the MarketingSherpa email newsletter [https://marketingsherpa.com/article/interview/customer-first] to get more insights from your fellow marketers. Sign up for free if you’d like to get more episodes like this one.

For more insights, check out…

This podcast is not about marketing – it is about the marketer. It draws its inspiration from the Flint McGlaughlin quote, “The key to transformative marketing is a transformed marketer” from the Become a Marketer-Philosopher: Create and optimize high-converting webpages [https://meclabs.com/course/] free digital marketing course.

Apply to be a guest
If you would like to apply to be a guest on How I Made It In Marketing, here is the podcast guest application – https://www.marketingsherpa.com/page/podcast-guest-application

Most Recent Episodes

May 22, 2025 Mature Content

Influencer Marketing: Focus on one thing (episode #139)

As an entrepreneur, as a marketer, the world is conspiring to grab your attention and distract you.For example, when I started in this career, there were really only a few channels you could go to....

Listen · 50:04

May 15, 2025

Creative Marketing Leadership: Strike a balance between management and production (podcast episode #138)

Career Growth is a funny thing.That is the goal after all right? Junior copywriter, Senior copywriter, creative director, etc.? We all want a career path.But that journey towards something – often...

Listen · 43:15

May 8, 2025

Authentic Brand Transformation: To build a brand that lasts, consider rebranding a team sport (episode #137)

I’ll tell you what happened in my career before. Maybe you’ve been there, too.There’s a sponsorship, sometimes a fairly high-profile sponsorship, and I have gotten asked to write it about it in...

Listen · 51:43

Load More Episodes

Daniel Burstein Podcaster

Daniel Burstein is the Senior Director of Content and Marketing at MarketingSherpa and the host of the ‘How I Made It In Marketing’ podcast, where he talks to marketing leaders about the lessons learned through their careers.

He also reports on successful marketing campaigns and industry data in MarketingSherpa articles, and helps facilitate the AI Guild from MarketingSherpa's parent organization, MECLABS Institute.

Daniel has 23 years of experience in copywriting, content writing, interviewing, speaking, business journalism, content marketing, sales enablement, and field marketing communications.