Even decades after leadership thinker Peter Drucker said his famous sentence “the business enterprise has two–and only two–basic functions: marketing and innovation” there’s still a—surprisingly lively—debate as to whether marketing’s (and marketers’) role should be exalted. Here are five research-backed facts that prove all marketing skeptics wrong. Marketing and CMOs are crucial for company success! Full stop.

Egon Zehnder: Can a management position in insurance marketing act as a springboard for a career leading to the top? Egon Zehnder International took a deeper look.

McKinsey: It takes a mix of talent to pursue a variety of growth strategies simultaneously. Companies looking for growth should focus on leaders with a capacity to understand customers’ evolving needs.

McKinsey: Between 2008 and 2010, companies with more diverse top teams were also top financial performers. That’s probably no coincidence.