After a Career Building Brands Through People,

It was on to Retirement.

Then a Text Message Changed Everything.

CMO Edge wasn't born from a business plan. It was born from a career building brands through people, and a moment that made it impossible to stay retired.

Pete Dornsife and Joe Cadle came up together at GSK — two marketing directorsnavigating the relentless pace of consumer healthcare, bonded by a sharedbelief that developing people was the most meaningful investment a leader couldmake.

Joe is now SVP and Head of Marketing for a large team. He had two high-potential ABMs, bright young women in their mid-twenties, full of potential and hungry to grow.
He knew what they needed. And he knew how to reach Pete.

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Joe

January 23, 2026

Good morning Pete! Hope all is well with you and your family. I was wondering in your retirement if you are doing any contract work. I have two extremely talented ABMs who have all kinds of talent and upside but need tutelage on brand management basics in the spirit of the MLP program you once led. Would you be interested in doing some virtual tutoring with the two of them? You will like both of these young ABMs — they are bright young women in their mid-twenties.

“Think of having your daughters sitting across the table from you — and the impact that can be achieved.”

Joe Cadle, SVP Head of Marketing, Microbiome Labs

The Story Behind CMO Edge

Built by Someone
Who Has Been Exactly Where You Are.

Pete Dornsife spent three decades running brands in CPG and pharma — developing strategy, activating plans, building teams, and sometimes learning the hard way what separates a marketing organization that consistently delivers from one that doesn't. Midway through that career, he was recruited to GSK's world headquarters in London to direct a global marketing capability program spanning more than 20 countries and hundreds of marketers. He built modules with practical frameworks and tools by watching what landed and rebuilding everything that didn't. Many of the tools introduced during that period are still in active use today. That is the standard CMO Edge is built to.

Why CMO Edge

The Name Says Exactly What We Do.

It starts with a question every marketing leader eventually asks:

Why does this team perform at the level it does — and what would it take to raise that bar?

The answer almost always comes back to capability. Talent is the raw material. Capability is what determines whether that talent compounds or plateaus.

Capability development includes the frameworks that turn good instincts into consistent execution, the tools that make complex brand decisions easier, and the coaching that extends beyond a workshop. That's what an edge looks like in a marketing organization.

The CMO in our name is intentional. We work with the senior marketing leaders — directors, VPs, and chief marketing officers — who are accountable for brand performance and serious about the team that delivers it. People who've sat in the chair, know the pressure, and understand that a capable team isn't a nice-to-have. It's the whole game.

The Edge is equally deliberate. Not a promise of overnight transformation. An edge is something you build — systematically, through the right frameworks applied to real brands, reinforced by managers who speak the same language, and measured in how the work actually changes.

What Pete Believes

Capability Is a Muscle.
And Muscles Require the Right Training.

The organizations that consistently outperform aren't just the ones with the most talent. They're the ones who build on top of it — with the right frameworks, the right reinforcement, and a leadership team that takes development seriously enough to make it a system, not a one-off event.