Jim Lecinski, Clinical Associate Professor of Marketing, Northwestern University, Kellogg School of Management
Jim Lecinski is a marketing educator and advisor. His focus is Marketing Strategy and Digital Transformation. He has over 30 years of experience driving successful business results for major brands by developing and implementing integrated, omnichannel and digital marketing programs.
Following a notable twelve-year career at Google, where he was Vice President of Customer Solutions for the Americas. And counselled leading marketers on how to adapt their businesses and marketing to win in today's new digital world.
Jim is now a Clinical Associate Professor of Marketing at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management - the #1 MBA Marketing program in the US, where he teaches popular courses in Marketing Strategy and Omni-channel Strategy.
Jim is a recognized expert, in-demand consultant and keynote speaker on Marketing Strategy and Omnichannel Marketing. His seminal book about the new marketing model, "Winning the Zero Moment of Truth", known as "ZMOT", was published in 2011, has been read by over 300,000 marketers worldwide and was featured in the New York Times, Advertising Age and Forbes.
Jim's newest project, "The AI Marketing Canvas: A Five Stage Roadmap to Implementing Artificial Intelligence in Marketing", was published by Stanford University Press in May of 2021.
What is your favourite social media platform, and why?
LinkedIn because it allows me to learn about the latest developments and news in Marketing and stay connected with colleagues and students, past and present.
Tell us about you and your current role or area of interest.
I am a marketing professor at the Kellogg School, the #1 MBA program in Marketing in the US. I teach courses in Marketing Strategy and Omnichannel Marketing. Additionally, I am an author and marketing consultant.
What do you like about your career or area of focus?
I'm a lifelong learner and a student of why people make the choices to buy certain products, goods and services. So being a marketing professor puts me right at the intersection of this! It's energizing and invigorating to be with such talented students and help them on their journey to become tomorrow's marketing leaders!
What is the best advice you have ever received?
"Meet the universe halfway." Some folks try to bend and twist the universe to their wishes, and others let the universe take them wherever it may lead.
For me, the truth lies in between, you have to have a rough plan for your life, and at the same time, you have to be open to unexpected possibilities and opportunities that present themselves. And not be overly disappointed when life doesn't unfold exactly perfectly as you imagined.
What inspires you, motivates you, or helps you to move forward?
Two questions: "So what?" and "What's next?" Getting past the facts or observations ("people are spending more time watching video online.") to understand the implications of that, the "so what?" and then thinking about where does this go next?
What are you proud of in your life so far?
I am fortunate to have an amazing family, and I am proud of their wonderful accomplishments and the relationships we've formed.
What is your preferred way to meet new people/network?
I enjoy meeting and networking with folks in person, such as in the classroom or at a conference. And like most people, I've become accustomed to also doing so virtually over the past couple of years. So I guess you could say I am now an "omnichannel connector."
What skills or qualities do you feel have helped you?
Being organized and trying to be kind, though certainly, I've not always been able to be either of those fully. So, it's a constant process. But I do seem to have a knack for structure, process, organizing ideas, and that kind of thing.
As a professor, you have to be super-organized and be able to structure the topics, concepts and frameworks in a way that makes sense to students and try to act with kindness along the way.
What do you wish you had known when you started out?
That you don't always have to always have all the right perfect answers in business, academia or life, and it's actually ok to admit that. Saying "I don't know" isn't the bad thing we all think. It is saying that it actually can be freeing and become the start of new learning, new exploration and new ideas.
Who do you most admire in business, academic or creative circles and why?
I had the pleasure of interacting a bit with Eric Schmidt when I was at Google, and he was the Chairman. He's an amazing polyglot in the sense that he fluently knows the language of so many domains and disciplines, from technology to business to geopolitics to leadership.
And he's able to talk about these both at the 30,000-foot level and the "three-foot" level and communicate his ideas in a clear, memorable, and effective way.
Outside of your professional/work area, what hobbies or interests do you have or what other areas of your life are of real importance to you?
I am a jazz aficionado. I listen to jazz every day (and play it in my MBA classes); I collect vintage jazz reel-to-reel recordings; I write about jazz, and I play some saxophone and clarinet.
Has the pandemic had a positive or a negative effect on you and/or your business, and how have you managed it?
I'd say it's been both positive and negative. Certainly negative in that it's impacted the physical and mental health of so many of our students and colleagues.
At the same time, it's helped us all learn how to be more resilient, use new technologies, and improvise and adapt. And it's been great spending more time at home with my family, and our dogs really love the extra attention!
What advice would you have for someone looking to get into the same area of work or interests?
If you are interested in marketing, you'll need to be a "whole-brained" professional. You'll need to be comfortable and fluent in data, technology, modelling AND consumer behaviour, insights and creativity. And I'd add that it's a great profession-I love marketing--give it a try!
What do you feel is the most common reason for people failing or giving up?
Expecting immediate perfection. Most things in life require persistent effort to master. Sure a few natural geniuses like Mozart maybe were world-class proficient by age six. For the rest of us, we should seek "continuous improvement" more than instant perfection. That just tends to lead to disappointment and abandoning something that perhaps we actually could master over time. Stick with it!
What companies, brands, or institutions do you like or do you think are getting it right?
I've been spending a lot of time lately investigating how brands can use Artificial Intelligence (AI) and a branch of AI called Machine Learning (ML) to help them deliver a better customer experience and, at the same time, improve business results.
Often those two end goals are in opposition. Adding more features to my product might help raise customer satisfaction, but it might also cost me more to deliver that, potentially reducing my business outcomes. Starbucks is an interesting example in that they've heavily been on AI with an in-house platform called "Deep Brew" that helps them predict the right product to show at the right time with the right offer and the right message to the right customer. Truly personalized marketing via their app and your mobile device. Starbucks attributes this application of ML to its marketing as a significant driver of its business results.
How do you define success, and what lessons have you learned so far that you could share with our audience/readership?
Success is what makes you happy and allows you to sustain yourself. You could make a lot of income but be miserable; that, in my book, isn't a success. Or you could be super happy doing what you do but unable to pay your rent; that's a hobby, not a career.
So, you've got to find the intersection of both of those things. Know what you are good at, what you can uniquely do at a world-class level and then find a role and an organization that values this and will compensate you for it.