Nike’s outgoing CEO, John Donahoe, is a former Ivy League-educated tech executive and Bain consultant. The man who will take his place, Elliott Hill, started at Nike as an intern and spent his entire career with the Swoosh, save for a brief stint as an assistant coach for the Dallas Cowboys.
The difference in profiles is marked, and it is one that… Nike The hopes will reassure shareholders and energise staff for the monumental task ahead: shaking off an existential crisis that has threatened its position as the world’s biggest sportswear maker and one of its most recognised brands. Sales have slowed, its products have gone out of fashion and its retail strategy has been out of step with consumer preferences.
To regain its authority in the industry, The board decidedNike needed an experienced executive, not a career executive, to lead it. But despite his experience at Nike, Hill will have his work cut out for him.
Current and former employees, people familiar with the executive transition and early reports from Wall Street analysts indicate that Hill will receive a warm welcome from the staff when he takes the helm on Oct. 14. Reaction to the hiring of Hill, who is coming out of retirement, was overwhelmingly positive within Nike, according to one current employee. “Elliott is truly a respected and respected CEO,” said Hill. leader in the company,” they said.
“I’ve worked with a ton of people over my three decades at Nike, and Elliott was by far one of the most inspiring, supportive and down-to-earth colleagues I’ve ever met,” said Scott Reames, an internal Nike historian who retired in 2021, in an email. “Judging by the way my phone has been ringing since the announcement, I’m far from alone in this!”
The abrupt executive transition comes after months of speculation on Wall Street about Donahoe’s future at Nike. At the time of his appointment in late 2019, the company had already articulated goals of reaching $50 billion in revenue and increasing online sales directly to consumers — benchmarks that a seasoned executive with experience at Bain and eBay would be well-qualified to achieve.
Donahoe met those demands ably, guiding Nike through the Covid-19 pandemic and even managing to return to sales growth In late 2020, less than a year into her role, when diversity, equity and inclusion became a priority for large companies, she received early praise from employees for listening to their concerns.
But his downfall was his well-known weakness: Unlike previous Nike leaders, such as his predecessor Mark Parker, Donahoe was not a “product guy” – someone who was aware of design. Retailers such as JD Sports and Foot Locker have spoken freely in recent months about Adidas, On, New Balance and Hoka’s most popular sneakers.
Nike’s decision to clear shelf space from its retail partners in favor of its own direct selling strategy (which predated Donahoe but accelerated under his leadership) only opened the door for competitors to grab market share.
Even Donahoe’s management style marked him as an outsider. From the beginning of his brief reign, said Employees wanted new ideas presented in black-and-white, bulleted PowerPoint presentations, rather than colorful, creative presentations.
Board members were actively discussing succession plans this summer, one person said, and also considered two other internal Nike candidates, Craig Williams, president of geography and market, and Heidi O’Neill, president of consumer, product and brand. But Williams, who joined in 2019 from Coca-Cola, and O’Neill, who came to Nike in 1998 from Levi Strauss, couldn’t match Hill’s decades of experience.
In a mail In X, former Nike marketing team member Kyle Stack wrote that “having a 30-year Nike veteran at the helm is refreshing… Hill experienced Nike’s frenetic growth in the 1990s as part of the sales organization. He understands the business as well as anyone.”
Hill, who turns 61 on Oct. 2, will become Nike’s fifth CEO and the third to hold the post for life after co-founder Phil Knight and Parker. The only Nike CEO to join the company before Donahoe from outside the company was William Perez, a former SC Johnson executive who held the role for just over a year.
Nike has rehired other executives with extensive internal experience over the past year, including Tom Peddie, former vice president of North America, Who will help? The company is rebalancing its wholesale partnerships.
Nike’s turnaround efforts are entering a crucial stage. The company is expected to report quarterly results on Oct. 1, detailing the important back-to-school period that analysts are looking for as signs of demand for basketball shoes and hoodies. Nike has also set its first investor day in nine years for November, where it will lay out a more detailed outlook for shareholders who have been concerned about recent stock declines.
Nike shares are down more than 20 percent in 2024, though they were up 6 percent on Friday.
UBS CEO Jay Sole wrote on Friday that “Hill is an experienced and effective leader who could return Nike to a growth path.” However, “that sentiment could become more pessimistic as the market realizes that Nike’s fundamentals are probably not very good and that there are probably no quick fixes for Nike’s problems,” he added.
Sole said Hill’s background in sales, rather than product development, could be a weak point for the company, which has been slow to introduce compelling new sneakers in recent months.
Changes at Nike’s top will not stem the tide of competitors undermining its popularity. “What has not changed is the heightened competitive environment framed by emerging brands and certain re-emerging legacy brands,” wrote John Kernan, chief executive of TD Cowen.