The Swoosh is rapidly making a pitch for gender equality in the top management suite with the appointment of two women to replace two of the five senior male executives who have been forced out in the last few weeks. At least a sixth one is said to be on his way out, too.
One week ago, Kellie Leonard was named “chief diversity and inclusion officer,” taking the place of Antoine Andrews, who had the less illustrious title of vice president of diversity and inclusion. Earlier this week, Nike announced the appointment of Amy Montagne, as vice president of global categories, replacing Jayme Martin.
As previously reported, Martin was let go last March at the same time as Trevor Edwards, president of the Nike brand. They had both been designated as possible successors to Mark Parker, the group's chairman, president and chief executive. They were followed in the course of last month by three other top managers: Vikrant Singh, a senior brand director for Nike basketball in North America; Daniel Tawiah, vice president of global brand digital marketing innovation, and Greg Thompson, vice president of footwear.
Montagne has been with the group since 2007, occupying executive roles in category management and merchandising for women's training apparel, sportswear and running. She served as general manager and vice president of global merchandising for one year before she was made vice president and general manager of Nike Women's in September 2014. She will report to Michael Spillane, president of categories and products.
Leonard has been involved in communication at Nike for more than 15 years, most recently holding the title of vice president of corporate and employee communications. In her newly created position, she will report directly to another woman, Monique Matheson, a 19-year Nike veteran who was promoted last July to the position of executive vice president of global human resources, succeeding David Ayre.
Last month, Matheson sent out an internal memo where she denounced the fact that the company had “failed to gain traction” in the diversity of its organizational structure. She proposed that Nike should increase the number of women and minorities in leadership position, arguing that this would trickle down through the lower ranks, helping to attract more talented women and minorities at all levels.
According to The New York Times, which deployed three investigative reporters and three other contributors to look into the Nike culture, the latest actions on the executive front follow the results of a secret internal survey on discrimination unleashed by a group of female employees, whose results landed on Parker's desk on March 5. Their previous complaints to the human resources department and directly to Parker had apparently been ineffective.
According to the Times, many of the issues surrounding the work place culture at Nike where closely related to the attitudes of Edwards, a Black American executive who had a cult-like following of senior male executives known as “Friends of Trevor”.
As our U.S.-based colleague and friend John Horan aptly observes, Nike is an intensely inward-looking company with a strong collaborative approach to work that instills a certain conformity on its staff. They use the same buzzwords, and the employees who don't buy into this culture completely never get very far or last very long. On the other hand, Horan admits that Nike attacks a problem, when it recognizes it, with the same focus that its staff turns on its competitors.
Gender equality has been working out particularly well at Puma under the control of Kering, a group that has consistently preached for the respect of women as well as sustainability. It was the major sports brand with the strong representation of women in management positions last year, with ratios of 38 percent globally and 46 percent in North America. No wonder that its recent strong momentum has been largely driven by the women's market.
In her memo, Matheson noted that only 29 percent of the vice president at Nike were women. Also at Adidas, less than 30 percent of senior roles are held by women, but Karen Parkin, executive board member in charge of human resources, states on the company's website that she and the group's new chief executive, Kasper Rorsted, are committed to a more gender-balanced leadership.
