What Linda Boff Learned After Leaving GE for the Agency World

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Linda Boff, the former CMO of General Electric, didn’t just shape the narrative of an industrial giant — she redefined it. Now, one year into her role as CEO of Said Differently, a custom creative agency built on a distributed talent model, Boff offers a rare dual-lens view into the persistent disconnects between brands and agencies.

Her diagnosis is blunt: brand teams often suffer from “myopia,” assuming their context is universal. “You live inside your brand thinking about investors, employees, customers and forget that outsiders won’t immediately grasp that nuance,” she says. That blind spot, Boff notes, slows down agency ramp-up and strains collaboration.

Agencies, meanwhile, too often lean on style over substance. “Clients told me they’d worked with shops full of creative talent, but shallow on business understanding,” Boff recalls. Her advice? Be a “business growth excavator”— the kind of partner that immerses itself not just in messaging, but in the mechanics of how the company makes money.

The insight that surprised even Boff? The centrality of clarity. “If brands don’t know what they want, no agency will,” she says. A sharp brief isn’t optional but a runway.

Boff remains excited about AI, particularly its role in early-stage research. But she draws a line: “You wouldn’t launch a jet engine with AI. it’s a tool, not a co-pilot.”

Her final takeaway, fittingly human: don’t forget your audience is made of people. “Even Dove made a bar of soap emotional,” she says. “That’s not magic. That’s good marketing.”