From manager to multiplier: How marketing leaders create impact through others
Marketing leaders are under intense pressure to deliver more impact with the same, if not smaller, teams than before. The instinctive response is understandable: get closer to the work, make faster decisions, tighten control, and personally step in to keep momentum moving.
But while this approach can feel effective in the short term, it rarely delivers sustained impact. The real step change comes when leaders shift from being the engine of the function to amplifying the system around them.
Manager mindset vs multiplier mindset
Most leaders don’t set out to limit their teams. Yet under pressure, many default to a traditional ‘manager’ mindset.
A manager mindset values efficiency, control and predictability. Problems are solved personally, progress is measured by activity and speed, and teams often wait for direction before moving forward. Output increases – but only as fast as the leader can personally drive it.
A multiplier mindset looks fundamentally different. Multipliers value clarity, ownership and judgement. They deliberately push decisions outward, measure impact by outcomes and growth, and create teams that think, challenge and lead rather than wait.
Put simply: managers get results through people. Multipliers get results because of people.
Why this matters in modern marketing
This distinction between manager and multiplier matters more than ever in today’s context of a marketing leader.
Marketing is no longer just a delivery function. It is commercial, reputational and strategic. Leaders are expected to balance brand and demand, creativity and data, experimentation and governance – all while influencing senior stakeholders and navigating constant change.
No single leader can personally be best-in-class across brand, digital, data, content, martech and stakeholder management. Trying to be creates bottlenecks, slows decision-making and limits growth – both for the team and the function.
Multipliers recognise this reality. They create the space for better thinking, faster learning and stronger ownership. They share responsibility and accountability rather than hoarding it. And as a result, they build teams that are more resilient, adaptable and capable of delivering sustained impact.
Five behaviours that turn managers into multipliers
The shift from manager to multiplier isn’t about stepping back or caring less. It’s about leading differently. And there are five behaviours that make the difference.
1. Clarity over control
Multipliers are uncompromising on clarity. They set the ‘why’ from the outset, including success criteria, boundaries and any real constraints that could hinder delivery. But they leave the ‘how’ deliberately open.
This creates space for team members to develop their own solutions, build confidence in their judgement and generate new insights. Approval systems are replaced with alignment. Control is traded for trust and without losing accountability.
2. Push decisions to the edge
Instead of defaulting to ‘bring it to me’, multipliers ask a different question: who is the closest to this decision?
Multipliers coach team members to think through trade-offs, risks and implications rather than providing immediate answers. Importantly, they accept that not every decision will be perfect – or that every decision will be identical to how they would have approached it themselves. The goal isn’t perfection; it’s progress and capability building within the team.
3. Coach capability, not just delivery
In multiplier-led teams, 1:1 meetings move beyond status updates. They become spaces for problem-solving, reflection and development.
Leaders ask better questions. They challenge assumptions. They help team members sharpen judgement rather than creating dependency. Over time, this builds leaders within the team – not just doers.
4. Create psychological safety
Multipliers actively create environments where people feel safe to think out loud, challenge ideas and admit uncertainty.
This doesn’t mean lowering standards or avoiding difficult conversations. In fact, multiplier leaders are often very demanding. But they are demanding about thinking, not compliance. They separate ideas from identity, invite dissent early, and model curiosity rather than defensiveness when challenged.
In marketing teams, this matters deeply. Innovation, experimentation and judgement all depend on people being able to test creative ideas or say ‘I’m not sure’ or ‘I think there’s a better option.’ Where psychological safety is low, teams default to safe ideas, recycled approaches and consensus thinking. Where it is high, they learn faster and make better decisions.
Multipliers understand that the fastest route to progress isn’t uncertainty, its learning. And learning only happens when people feel safe enough so speak up.
5. Measure impact, not activity
Manager-led teams often measure progress by visible activity: outputs delivered, tasks completed, campaigns launched. These metrics feel reassuring because they are tangible and controllable.
Multiplier-led teams focus on something harder but more meaningful: impact.
They ask different questions. Not ‘what did we produce?’ but ‘what has changed as a result?’ Not 'how busy are we?’ but ‘what did we learn?’ They link work more clearly to outcomes, whether commercial, behavioural or reputational, and they encourage teams to reflect on what worked, what didn’t and why.
This shifts behaviour. When teams are measured on impact rather than activity, they make better trade-offs, prioritise more effectively and take greater ownership of results. They stop waiting for validation and start exercising judgement.
For marketing leaders under pressure, this is one of the most powerful multipliers shifts available.
From being the answer to building the system
The move from manager to multiplier is not about doing less, it’s about doing the work that only a leader can do.
In a world where marketing complexity continues to grow, leadership scale no longer comes from personal excellence alone. It comes from creating clarity where there is ambiguity, trust where there is risk, and capability where there was one dependency.
By shifting from control to clarity, from answers to questions, and from activity to impact, leaders build teams that can deliver better results – now and in the future.
By Annabel Elliott-Browning, Vice Chair Communications, Greater London Regional Group