Should You Run Marketing Like a Product Team?

#355 | Dave sits down with Maria Scheifler to talk about why your marketing team might be getting less done as it grows — and what to do about it. Maria makes the case for running marketing like a product team: two-week sprints, a prioritized backlog, and a lightweight intake process that kills approval bottlenecks without losing control. She walks through the context-switching exercise that proves multitasking is destroying your output, how to push back on random requests from across the company without saying no, and why getting team buy-in before rolling out any operational changes is the step most marketing leaders skip.Timestamps(00:00) - - Intro: the problem isn't your strategy, it's your operating system (04:38) - - Maria's background (07:38) - - Why teams get bigger and somehow get less done (10:07) - - The multitasking exercise that proves context switching kills output (17:36) - - Running marketing like a product team: the mindset shift (20:24) - - Building a working agreement with your team (22:56) - - The experimentation guardrail template: killing approval bottlenecks without losing control (28:26) - - Building a prioritized backlog (32:47) - - How the backlog helps you push back without saying no (39:36) - - Two-week sprints: how to plan, commit, and ship (41:48) - - Daily standups: how to keep them short and useful (42:39) - - Sprint reviews: showing the rest of the company what marketing does (44:20) - - Retrospectives (46:19) - - Where to start on Monday Join 50,0000 people who get Dave's Newsletter here: https://www.exitfive.com/newsletterLearn more about Exit Five's private marketing community: https://www.exitfive.com/***Brought to you by:Knak - A no-code, campaign creation platform that lets you go from idea to on-brand email and landing pages in minutes, using AI where it actually matters. Learn more at knak.com/exitfive, or check out the MCP server by clicking this link. Vector - A contact-level ads platform that lets you build audiences from actual people on your site, clicking your ads, and checking out your competitors. Learn more at vector.co, and get on the waitlist for their new MCP server by clicking here. Compound Growth Marketing - A full-funnel demand generation agency that helps high-growth cybersecurity, DevOps, and enterprise software companies drive more pipeline through AI SEO, paid media, and go-to-market engineering. Visit compoundgrowthmarketing.com and tell them Dave sent you.***Thanks to my friends at hatch.fm for producing this episode and handling all of the Exit Five podcast production.They give you unlimited podcast editing and strategy for your B2B podcast.Get unlimited podcast editing and on-demand strategy for one low monthly cost. Just upload your episode, and they take care of the rest.Visit hatch.fm to learn more