Linda Boff: from the GE brand to a new chapter at Forbes CMO Network

Linda Boff spent twenty years as chief marketing officer (CMO) at General Electric (GE), turning the industrial giant into a brand the public came to see as human and modern. Under her leadership, GE ran original campaigns — from projecting images of women scientists onto the ceiling of New York's Grand Central Terminal to collaborating with musician Matthew Dear to turn factory-machine sounds into electronic music. She also steered the company's marketing strategy through the complicated period when GE split into three independent companies.

When she left GE in 2024, Boff could easily have taken another senior corporate marketing role — instead, she chose an unexpected path, taking the helm at the agency Said Differently. Unlike the traditional agency model, it runs not on a large permanent staff but on a "global talent network" of designers, analysts, and digital strategists. As Boff puts it: "Coming from the CMO seat, I know what marketing leaders need to win and how to help brands through periods of major change."

Having seen both the client side and the agency side gives Boff a clear-eyed view of where CMOs and agencies most often let each other down. In her view, success actually starts with the brand itself: "If brands don't know what they want, no agency can help them." She's equally measured when it comes to AI: "You don't fly a jet engine with AI — it's a tool, not a co-pilot."

On February 12, 2026, Forbes named Boff president of its CMO Network, succeeding Seth Matlins, who led the group for four years before moving to Vox Media. In her new role, Boff will oversee the annual CMO summits in Aspen and London, events tied to Cannes Lions, and the strategy behind the "World's Most Influential CMOs" ranking — now in its 14th year and featuring more than 350 marketing leaders.

Boff's career — from a major corporate brand at GE, to a small, nimble agency, to now leading a global CMO community — shows just how varied the path of a modern marketing leader can be. Experts see 2026 as the year CMOs stop being seen merely as a "cost center" and instead become a core driver of company growth — and Boff's new role is aimed squarely at leading that shift.