Nearly two-thirds of chief marketing officers expect artificial intelligence to reshape their role in the coming years dramatically, but far fewer believe their own skills will need significant change, according to a survey by research and advisory firm Gartner.
Sixty-five percent of CMOs said advances in AI will dramatically change the role within the next two years, yet only 32 percent said significant changes are needed to the CMO profile and skill set, the survey found.
The survey was conducted between August and October 2025 among 402 senior marketing leaders in North America and Europe.
As AI becomes more central to enterprise growth and competitive advantage, many marketing leaders are not updating their own skills at the same pace as the role evolves, Gartner said.
The firm predicts that by 2027, a lack of AI literacy will rank among the top three reasons CMOs are replaced at large enterprises, making AI knowledge an expectation at the board level.
“CMOs are not ignoring AI; most are expecting the role to change,” said Lizzy Foo Kune, distinguished vice president analyst in the Gartner Marketing practice. “But the data points to a disconnect between anticipating disruption and recognizing the personal transformation required to lead it.”
Foo Kune said CMOs must develop the literacy needed to prioritize high-impact use cases, validate outputs and manage risk.
“Otherwise, AI becomes something happening around them, not something they lead,” she said.
Many marketing leaders first encounter AI through operational uses such as content generation, analytics and workflow automation, according to Gartner. This can reinforce a view of AI primarily as an efficiency tool and lead organizations to push responsibility for it to internal teams, agencies or IT departments.
Gartner said this approach can prevent AI from being elevated into a leadership capability tied to growth strategy, decision-making and experimentation.
“CMOs can’t treat AI as something the team ‘uses’ while leadership stays on the sidelines,” Foo Kune said.
She said marketing leaders who succeed in the transition will focus on a limited number of high-impact use cases linked to measurable outcomes, while building understanding of model limitations and establishing processes to validate AI outputs.
Foo Kune added that CMOs should also hold agencies accountable for governance and demonstrated value, while building a C-suite community of practice to accelerate experimentation and align AI initiatives with enterprise priorities.
