You’ve done the work. You’ve put in the time. But still feeling like there’s no hope?

We get it. Marketing operations can be a tough career path to take because many get stuck at IC/manager level (especially at start-ups).

Often marketing operations folks are viewed as tech admins and not strategic partners that have to be in the leadership conversations. But it’s time to rise up and earn your seat at the table. It is not impossible to break-through.

Here are six essential steps to help progress your career that we should all do, regardless of level:

1. Work cross-functionally with other leaders in sales, customer success, IT, and more. Find out what they care about and figure out how to support them.
2. Prioritize internal comms and "market" the marketing ops team internally. Don't just show an endless list of tasks but show the results.
3. Example: change "we did xyz" to "we did xyz and it resulted in conversion rates improving 25% and pipeline increase of 10% in Q1".
4. Create, own, and communicate the marketing ops vision and roadmap.
5. Stop complaining the team is “too busy” and work on a business case to get more headcount.
6. Don't just react to inbound requests, use a prioritization framework (e.g. RICE) and align your work and goals to the business.
7. Delegate to your team or agencies and do not micromanage so you have time to focus on the above.

You think you’re ready to advance in your marketing operations career? Taking a bigger role comes with greater responsibility and challenges. That’s just how it goes. But as you can see, there are many ways to grow. Find the ways that work best for you and put them into practice early and often. Move forward in your career and earn that right for a promotion.