Global chief marketing officer at GM retires

Deborah Wahl, global marketing chief at General Motors, has elected to retire effective March 31.

“We appreciate Deborah’s contributions since joining GM in 2018 and wish her well in her next chapter,” GM spokesman David Barnas said in a statement. “We will conduct an external search for a new Global Chief Marketing Officer.”

The news was announced internally on Monday and confirmed publicly on Tuesday, he said.

Deborah Wahl, General Motors chief marketing officer, inside her home in Bloomfield Hills on Friday, Jan. 21, 2022.

Wahl had been charged with messaging the company’s pivot from gasoline-powered vehicles to all-electric. GM has said it planned to bring 30 new EVs to market and have an all-electric lineup by 2035.

GM promoted Wahl at age 56 to the high-profile role in September 2019. Previously, she worked as chief marketing officer for Cadillac since March 2018, having been charged with “redefining Cadillac’s reputation and repositioning it for the future,” CEO Mary Barra said in a company memo at the time.

“By aligning marketing across GM under Deborah’s leadership, we will build stronger brands while ensuring more effective, efficient and agile customer engagement,” Barra wrote.

Wahl had experience as chief marketing officer at McDonald’s USA and the PulteGroup residential home construction company before going to Cadillac. But her experience in the automotive industry was vast, having held marketing roles at Chrysler, Lexus, Toyota, Lincoln-Mercury, Mazda and Ford of Brazil.

There was no mention of her professional news on her LinkedIn professional page on Tuesday.