First — the decision. Then the structure and roles.

Over the past six months, several colleagues and clients have come to me with the same question: how do you build a marketing team that actually works? What roles should it include? Who is responsible for what — and where is the boundary between marketing, product, and content? Recently, we were discussing whether SMM could sit outside of marketing and be part of product — if its primary goal isn’t lead generation, but building trust and explaining the methodology and specifics of the product.

And yes, this is no longer just about the structure of marketing — it’s about a general approach to organizational design that applies across all functions.

I’ve built teams in agencies, corporations, my own ventures, and as a consultant — in Russia, Kazakhstan, and the UAE. In my time as CMO at fast-growing companies, designing org structures and building teams used to take up around 30% of my time. And here’s what I’ve learned from experience:

Structure is not a template. It’s a derivative of the problem you’re solving, the ambition behind it, and the specific way you choose to approach it. Even within the same industry, the team configuration can look different — because the client is different, the strategy is different, the stage of growth is different.

That’s why, when someone asks me about building a team, I don’t start with a “proper structure.” I start with questions: what problem are we solving? What’s the strategy? Who is the client, how do they make decisions, how do they interact with the product? Where is value created? What other functions do we need to work with — and why? Only then do we move on to assembling the building blocks and defining the relationships. And today, that configuration includes AI agents and services too.

That’s exactly the approach we use at Vinden.one — to build teams that work, not just look good on paper.