Tanya Fihosy
Marketing lead
Virgin StartUp
Tanya Fihosy joined Virgin StartUp, the not-for-profit side of Virgin supporting early-stage business founders, in October 2025, following over 10 years of agency experience.
She believes people, creativity and communication are central to marketing and the key reason she fell in love with it. “Those things still matter but today, they matter more than ever,” she adds.
Although AI and “constant noise” have altered the landscape over the course of her career, she feels that “human touch” is what always cuts through.
“It’s about building trust, creating work that feels real, and showing up with purpose,” she says, suggesting this means she focuses on “impact, not vanity metrics”.
In line with this, she feels the greatest opportunities within marketing lie in “building relationships rooted in trust and value”, which can be done by “using data responsibly”, “creating content that feels human” and “showing up where it matters most”.
“Tech can make us faster, but empathy makes us better. If we combine insight with authenticity, we can turn audiences into communities and campaigns into conversations,” Fihosy states.
“As technology takes care of the tasks, our job will be to deepen human connection by listening harder, creating with empathy, and building trust at every touchpoint.”
She says building these meaningful connections and “leading with integrity” is one way to overcome what she believes is the biggest challenge in marketing – “trust”, and people becoming “tired of empty promises and endless content”.
She sees the job of marketing changing over the next decade as the role of technology grows.
“We’re already storytellers and community builders, but in the next decade, we’ll need to dial that up. As technology takes care of the tasks, our job will be to deepen human connection by listening harder, creating with empathy, and building trust at every touchpoint,” says Fihosy.
To tackle this, she feels “communication, adaptability, and problem-solving will always matter”, with the key being to “learn, relearn, and learn again”.
Indeed, she describes learning as a “superpower” and advises those looking to start a career in marketing to “lean in”, whether that’s through side projects or volunteering for “side of desk opportunities”. She also says not to fear “not knowing”, and to “build relationships, ask questions, and stay curious”.
“Define your personal mission. We know the company’s purpose, but what about yours? What do you stand for, and how does that shape the roles you choose and the impact you make?”
