Vodafone Australia will scrap its CMO position and merge marketing and sales into one team following the departure of CMO, Loo Fun Chee.

​A host of Australian marketing leaders have snatched the opportunity to change roles, companies and countries as we usher in the New Year.

​Virgin Mobile CEO and former marketing chief, David Scribner, is switching phones for classifieds and joining the True Local team as CEO.

​CMO’s ongoing series of marketing leadership profiles has been a key part of our editorial offering this year. Singularly, they present some great insights into different industry sectors and approaches; yet combined, these profiles highlight both the diversity of talent locally and globally, as well as the similar challenges faced by CMOs as marketing undergoes its biggest transformation ever. Here, we round-up our top 10 CMO profiles for 2016.

Two new executive-level CMOs have joined Australia’s marketing leadership ranks this week following appointments at Bupa and SocietyOne.

Virgin’s Frequent Flyer program division has appointed Former American Express VP of consumer acquisition and product development as its new chief marketing officer.

Bupa’s marketing director, John Moore, has been promoted to a newly created role in the health insurance group’s corporate HQ from 2017.

Mercer’s chief customer and marketing officer, Renee McGowan, has been promoted to a global business operations role within the group and will relocate to New York later this month.

Moves to curb the types of jobs eligible for 457 work visas by the Australian Government should sound a warning bell to the marketing industry to do more to foster local talent, leading industry association chiefs say.

Guzman y Gomez CMO, Anna Jones, has parted company with the fast food chain after just 15 months in the role.

Marketers must tackle the power, trust and skills gaps in their organisation by harnessing true leadership qualities if they hope to attain their rightful place as influential business executives.

Former Telstra consumer marketing chief, Inese Kingsmill, has resurfaced as the new head of marketing and customer engagement for Virgin Australia.

Mars former global chief marketing officer, Bruce McColl, has joined the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute at the University of South Australia Business School.

​The Marketing Academy has opened nominations for the third year of its marketing learning and mentoring program aimed at creating the next generation of CMOs.

Carlton & United Breweries marketing director, Richard Oppy, says the biggest change to marketing strategy he’s seen over his 15-year career is the client-agency relationship.

Pandora has snatched up Presto’s former marketing director to head up marketing in A/NZ as part of growing investment into its local marketing capabilities.

Former Best and Less CEO and current non-executive director at Woolworths, AMP, Australia Post and Nine Entertainment, Holly Kramer, has been awarded for her career-long contribution to marketing at the annual Australian Marketing Institute (AMI) Awards this week.

The Commonwealth Bank has built itself a reputation as Australia’s most innovative banking group, launching a host of pioneering digital offerings and technology advancements that have earned it the title of Australia’s first real-time financial institution. But when it comes to marketing, Vittoria Shortt is looking to reorient perceptions of innovation away from initiatives and to cultural shift.

There are plenty of shiny new digital and technology breakthroughs on offer to brands today looking for an edge, and Domino’s is using lots of them. In just the last 12 months, the company has launched dozens of new technology fuelled offerings, stretching from a geo-location based customer tracking service, called On Time Cooking, to zero-click and SMS ordering and the world’s first commercial autonomous delivery vehicle, named DRU.

When most people talk about innovation, they tend to focus on technology or digital improvement. But for Carolyn Bendall, the biggest innovation that’s occurred since she took over ANZ’s local marketing function four years ago has been the shift to customer centricity.

Australia’s education sector has been given a mighty shake-up thanks to the hefty combination of digital disruption and deregulation. So it’s not surprising Deakin University’s marketing chief, Trisca Scott-Branagan, sees the ability to harness ambiguity as a vital attribute for the modern CMO.