There is a lot of media on Nike being removed from the S&P, the turnaround progress, and the numbers in the quarterly reports. What would be great is if anyone in the media did a deeper dive into the real reasons behind Nike's fall, specifically the leadership. I have yet to see an article on the fact that the poor decisions over the last decade that have led Nike to this were made by leadership that is mostly still at Nike and still able to build a layer under them of their hand picked individuals who are mostly unqualified, have no vision for how to turn the company around, and / or don't want to make a decision because then there might be a level of accountability. These multiple rounds of layoffs have actually just made the issue worse with strong leaders being exited and those that will do what they are told being kept out of the layoff pool or promoted because of it. That's a story that will provide a lot more context to the downfall of Nike over the last ten years.
9 replies (most recent on top)
@Op Selling to private equity, going private would require much more logistics and money not to mention who would lead the sinking ship? Also mention PHK is aging out mentally and physically guessing more the board and advisors sinking the ship for the next turn.
@am EH crashed it, current ELT crashed it, not current enough for ya
Reporters have noticed. They need solid evidence and sources willing to be named, and that is the part that does not exist.
Anyone senior enough to explain how those decisions were made has usually left under a settlement, and settlements normally carry confidentiality and non disparagement terms. This is standard corporate practice everywhere, and it is worth being clear about what HR, legal and employee relations exist to do. They protect the company from liability. Their job is to get a case closed and contained, and employees tend to read those functions as neutral parties when they were never set up to be.
The evidence a reporter would need gets absorbed into that process, one case at a time. Nobody needs to suppress a story after that point. It stays unwritten because the record sits behind agreements that the people who lived it are not free to discuss.
From my experience at Nike, below is the rough distribution of our leaders:
- No expertise and no background but good person in general: 50%
- Not qualified as a leader in all aspects and worst of all not even a decent person: 20%
- Qualified in terms of expertise & experience but not a decent person: 20%
- Visionary leader and decent person at the same time : 10%
To me, #2 is easier to detect so less problematic but I am very concerned about #1, they are equally as bad as #2. And the sad thing is, in order to be successful at Nike, #1 will slowly become #2... And then, when #2 & #3 become the top of the top like VP, they tend to promote / hire #1...
It’s best to ignore prior leaders actions.
Loke trump still blaming Biden 2 years later.
@ah where is the accountability. At some point you have to fire the coach and not the players. Footwear reorgs since 2020 but same leaders in place or in bigger roles.
This, this, this. Same footwear leader now leads ann even big footprint. Just continuing to dig deeper through mediocrity and poor decision making, leading to eroding product quality and desirability. He was in over his head two roles ago and now he’s just taking the whole place down. That was EH’s mistake. Putting him in the even bigger role.
Who’s been leading footwear since the decline? Asking for a friend
You are right, and the only answer or reason for the madness, I mean just years of stupid S$$t, it must be on purpose and under direction of PHK. He rules the Roost.
He stepped aside and created SWOOSH, ran the stock up by embracing anything and everything, just sell more, just sell more shockingly poorly made shoes, and when he had juiced it all he could, he deflates it.
Pump it , then jump it when it goes down to 38, take it Private.