U.S. Polo Assn. CEO was told he wasn’t right for a promotion—so he ‘outworked’ anyone else who wanted the job for 6 months straight
Fortune – Tech
fortune.com
Summary
Today, he hosts polo events with Prince William and runs a $2.7 billion empire—but J. Michael Prince’s first taste of leadership was a complete accident. Not only that, he was almost passed over entirely. When the CFO role opened up at Converse in 2005—then freshly acquired by Nike—Prince had been on the payroll for barely half a year. The company made it plain he wasn’t in the running; he was simply there to keep the seat warm while they headhunted. And he did it from southeastern Oklahoma, one of the poorest corners of America, with a degree from a small regional university most hiring managers had never heard of. By the time he announced his retirement earlier this year, he was earning a $26.3 million salary. And it was all thanks to volunteering to cover his boss. “One of the reasons that I got the opportunities that I got was that I would raise my hand when my boss was out of town, and he or she was visiting stores or something,” McMillon once recalled in an interview with Stratechery. He’d offer to step in for his boss in meetings and would put himself in leadership positions so consistently that he eventually became, in his own words, “a low-risk promotion”—because people had already seen him do the job. But even when he was eyeing up a promotion, he kept his head down and made sure to prove himself in the role he was in. “The next job doesn’t come if you don’t do the one you’ve got well,” McMillon added.
From the source
Today, he hosts polo events with Prince William and runs a $2.7 billion empire—but J. Michael Prince’s first taste of leadership was a complete accident. Not only that, he was almost passed over entirely. When the CFO role opened up at Converse in 2005—then freshly acquired by Nike—Prince had been on the payroll for barely half a year. The company made it plain he wasn’t in the running; he was simply there to keep the seat warm while they headhunted. But instead of feeling rejected, the now-CEO of US Polo Assn. treated it as a deadline to prove them wrong. “They literally told me, ‘You’re not our person, you’ve been at Nike for six months… you’re not really one of us, and we’re going to pull someone from the inside that’s been with us for a long time,’” Prince exclusively told Fortune . “You’re not going to get the opportunity, but we need you just to kind of keep the ship going until we figure out who’s going to be in that position,” he added. “And I thought, I’ve got six months to pr
Read the full article
Published by Fortune – Tech on fortune.com


