From the Boardroom to the Pitch: Michael Smith on Building Teams, Tech, and Community

From NIKE to The Estée Lauder Companies — and now the football fields of Northern Ireland — Michael Smith has built a career around people, purpose, and progress.

As the former CIO of Estée Lauder, a 22-year NIKE executive, and a C-suite leader across multiple Fortune 500 companies in sports, fashion, beauty, and pharma, Michael shares how leadership principles transcend industries. He reflects on lessons from mentors, the power of feedback, and how technology can strengthen human connection rather than replace it. In 2023, he became the majority owner of Carrick Rangers FC, where he’s investing in community, inclusion, and opportunity. He also founded Tech Day of Pink and co-founded TechPACT to expand impact beyond work.

Hosted by Rich Honiball, Judy Sedjiny, and Guy Courtin, this episode explores how culture drives performance, how courage sustains change, and how true leadership reaches far beyond the boardroom.

Michael Smith Bio

Michael W. Smith is a business executive, investor, and philanthropist with more than 25 years of global leadership experience across technology, retail, and consumer brands. He has served as a C-level executive at multiple Fortune 500 companies across sports, fashion, beauty, and pharmaceutical industries, including former Chief Information Officer (CIO) of The Estée Lauder Companies and 22 years in senior leadership at NIKE, Inc., spanning technology, commercial operations, and supply-chain management.

In August 2023, Michael became the majority shareholder and chairman of Carrick Rangers Football Club in Northern Ireland — a passion investment focused on community impact, youth development, and expanding opportunity in sport.

Beyond business, he is the founder of Tech Day of Pink, a global initiative supporting breast cancer research, and co-founder of TechPACT, which advances diversity and access in technology careers. A lifelong soccer enthusiast and advocate for purpose-driven leadership, Michael continues to merge commerce, culture, and compassion to create lasting impact.

Chapters

• 1:32 Opening And Guest Introduction
• 4:11 Three Pivotal Leadership Moments
• 7:58 Feedback, Coaching, And Continuous Growth
• 13:24 Strengths Versus Weaknesses
• 20:25 Culture, People, Purpose As Constants
• 22:45 AI, Risk Appetite, And Retail Innovation
• 27:26 Cross-Industry Lessons And Tech’s Impact
• 32:38 Traits That Derail Teams
• 35:00 T‑Shaped Careers And Roles Beyond Tech
• 38:09 Owning Carrick Rangers: Why And How
• 42:46 Empowering Talent And Managing A Club
• 46:30 Authenticity, Transparency, And Leadership Myths
• 50:30 Tech Day Of Pink: Origin And Impact

Transcript

Rich H: 0:46

Have you ever wondered what happens when a global tech executive takes his playbook from the boardroom to the football pitch? Well, for Michael Smith, the answer comes down to one word. People. Hi, I'm Rich Honiball, and I'm joined today by Guy Courtin and Judy Sedjini for a conversation that explores how leadership, culture, and community connect across every level of work and life. We are joined today by our guest, Michael Smith, who is a business executive, investor, and philanthropist with more than 25 years of global experience across technology, retail, and consumer brands. He served as the CIO for the Estee Lauder Companies and as a former Nike executive where he spent more than two decades leading innovation across technology, supply chain, and commercial operations. In 2023, he added another title: Majority Owner of Carrick Rangers FC, a Northern Irish football club he calls his passion project, and a commitment to legacy, local pride, and opportunity. Beyond business, Michael is the founder of Tech Day of Pink, a global initiative supporting breast cancer research and co-founder of TechPact, which advances diversity and access and technology careers. Lifelong soccer enthusiast and advocate for purpose-driven leadership, he continues to merge commerce, culture, and compassion to create a lasting impact. From the corporate arena to the community pitch, Michael has built his career on the same foundation. Invest in your people, empower great teams, and lead with purpose. Stay tuned for this episode as he shares how feedback helps shape his growth, how culture drives performance, and how small amounts of empathy can spark lasting change. Welcome to another episode of Retail Relates. I am joined today by our co-host, Judy Sejini. How are you today?

Judy S: 2:33

I'm good. How are you?

Rich H: 2:35

I'm doing great. So, Guy, obviously you have to join us not just from a tech perspective, but if we're talking football.

Guy C: 2:41

Absolutely. You know, as an as an aging soccer player, Rich, like I'm always looking for the next club that might need a 53-year-old goalkeeper with bad knees, a bad back. Uh, but otherwise, you know, I'm ready to go.

Rich H: 2:52

There you go. So it's our pleasure today to welcome Michael Smith to the program. And he fits the bill on a couple of different perspectives. Obviously, as a retail executive, having read his bio, as the majority owner of the Carrick Rangers, and as somebody with a strong tech background, but a leadership background overall. Michael, welcome to Retail Relates.

Michael S: 3:15

Thank you. It's great, great to be here. Nice to see you, Rich, Judy, and Guy.

Rich H: 3:21

So we've read your bio. It's going to be a fascinating journey to go through. We start with the same question with every one of our guests, and that is narrowing down a lifetime of accomplishments to three pivot points, and they can be professional, personal, or a mix that have brought you to where you are today.

Michael S: 3:45

Well, I think that in terms of things that have really shaped my path, I'll go in chronological order actually. One of the greatest influences for me in terms of my leadership style was my father. And, you know, I as a you know elementary school, middle school, high school student often traveled with my father uh when he was on business. He would uh, you know, the whole family would go along in the car. And a lot of times the people that worked with him would also be in the car as well. And so, you know, you'd have this time to talk, you'd have this time to watch that his conversation, to see his conversation. Uh, and and then also just the opportunity over dinner and other things to to talk. And the one thing I learned from him was his care for the people that that were in his charge. You know, uh it's a term we don't use often, but this idea of like love your people, you know, that's really something that I learned from him. And it's something that over the years I had many, many people tell me about uh how he uh how he uh really poured himself into them and uh and always had their back and was always looking to create opportunities for them to develop. And and I will say it's the one thing he was probably the most proud of was how many people continue to grow and advance and achieve their career ambitions. Those moments I think really shaped uh my leadership style and taught me the kind of the duty of care uh for for leaders. Uh you know, I my first job out of college was at Autosone and uh large uh retail discount uh auto parts company here in uh North America. I was fortunate, and this will date me, but I I joined at a time that uh the entire IT department was really mainframe computers, you know, COBOL, CICS, and I was the only person who came in and knew anything about PCs. And it gave me this incredible opportunity to kind of be one moment in the, you know, fresh out of school, one moment sitting down with the CEO and the president and and talking about uh what we would call analytics today, but uh reporting at the we would talk about it at the time. And what did they need and how could you develop it? And then the next minute, I'd be hopping in my car and driving 11 miles down the road to the distribution center, and I'd be on the shipping floor trying to take apart a uh a printer or a computer trying to figure out why shipping labels weren't printing. And so it gave me that uh that that experience really of kind of you know working across uh from really from the boardroom to the to the shop floor and and to learn that at a very uh very young age. And then uh and then I think the the other pivotal moment was my first major promotion at Nike. Uh one of the things that Nike did really well is once you were promoted, you had an executive coach assigned to you. And and that coach did a 360 uh as you would expect in a typical coaching engagement. I think that was the first time I got real honest, candid feedback uh about kind of the assumptions people made about you, the assumptions they made about your intentions. And and and I have to say it was hard, you know, because it wasn't all great feedback. There was some good feedback, but there was also a lot of things to work on. And I think the thing that, you know, the the first thing I learned from that was to be very clear about my intentions and not just leave room for people and what's your rationale and all of these things behind decisions that you make to be very transparent with those things, uh, so that you leave no room for misinterpretation. But maybe more importantly, I learned the value of feedback. And I I learned how to work through it no matter how hard it is. And I learned over time with these executive coaches, you know, because every time I got promoted, new coach, new 360, I also learned that it's a lot like uh peeling an onion, right? You address a lot of feedback and you think, okay, now I'm now I'm doing great. And you get more feedback and you realize, oh, there's more stuff to work on. And so it's a it's a never-ending, uh, never-ending process, but uh to try to try to be a better leader.

Rich H: 7:56

Yeah, JC Penny had that when I was first promoted into the junior executive ranks. They would send you to St. Louis for the day for, I would make jokes and say a series of testing, and it ended with a a 360 and a session with an executive coach, and you would get that coaching card. And it was, I will admit that it was the first time I had a 360, and I've had subsequent ones. And it's hard not to tear up a little bit and and take the good, but you know, you end up focusing on on the feedback. Uh, you know, my follow-up question is is this the path that you imagined, or does this journey surprise you in some way? What did you want to be when you were growing up?

Michael S: 8:37

Yeah, I think uh well, I wanted to be a professional soccer player, so but uh that didn't pan out. Um but I um it's it's not the path I imagined. I I went to I went to university with uh uh pursuing a humanities degree with concentration in religion. It was only kind of midway through university due to a engagement with part-time job I had while I was in college, uh, that I learned I loved COVID. And uh and so I scrambled and got a uh got a degree in uh what we called management information systems at the time, uh, and then leveraged that into my first job at Autism. But uh I I didn't expect this path. And I certainly I didn't expect from a career standpoint to uh to to do the things that I I had done. I mean, you know, when I when I started, I never envisioned working for great companies uh like Nike and like the Estee Lauder companies. Even when I got to Nike, my career ambition, the peak of my career ambition was to be the head of global distribution systems, which is the department I'd started in, and I went to a bunch of other things, came back, got that job maybe 10 years in, and I thought I'd reached the pinnacle of my career and uh I had achieved all my ambitions. So I so I never I never thought I I'd be doing the things that I've had the opportunity to do.

Guy C: 9:57

Michael, this is great. One one of the things that I I'm hearing and I love for you to expand upon too is you know, what did what was the one aspect in your mind that kept you sort of flexible to understand the next opportunity? What you said is fantastic, right? Take the feedback and build off of it. I do think it's one of those areas where I've, you know, I don't want to talk about millennials and all this, but it's like, is that lost in this generation of being able to take? I mean, I'll freely admit, like I, I, like all of us, like, you know, it's hard to take some of that feedback, but I feel like the next generation, will they even listen to it? But what is the one sort of thread that you saw for yourself that allowed you to take this feedback, build on it, move to the next step, and obviously have a very successful career, even though not in professional soccer, but in something else?

Michael S: 10:37

Yeah. You know, people talk sometimes you hear people say, oh, the the work is not personal. But for me, the work is personal. You know, one of my favorite quotes is uh uh from Andrew Carnegie, which is my heart is in the work. And so when you get that feedback, for me, I I had almost no choice but to say, How am I going to respond to this? And and and in fact, my coach had to tell me, like, some of this feedback, you need to decide are are you just okay with living with that? Right. And and maybe that's part of who you are. Maybe you just set that aside and what really matters. And so uh that was helpful and that helped me deal. And but as hard a work as it is, for me, it's always been about, okay, well, how can I, how can I give the best of myself and the most of myself? And and to do that, you have to listen for feedback and you have to respond to to feedback. I guess my advice when you is for people is to say, you know, we we should always be committed to kind of continuous growth, whether that's curiosity, whether that's uh, you know, being willing to learn more, to uh to respond to feedback, this idea of being committed to continuous growth is something that I I've had the privilege to work with incredible CEOs over the course of my career. And the one thing they all have had in common uh is this commitment to continuous growth uh in all aspects of, and so I feel like it is a little bit of a let me stop. I was gonna say it's a little bit of a lost art, but I'm not sure. I I think it's just it's human nature to not want to hear negative feedback. It sometimes it's it's not necessarily human nature to be curious, it's not necessarily human nature to to to be committed to do the work to get better. If it was, things would look a lot different than they do today.

Rich H: 12:19

I'm gonna take this down a little bit of a of a tangent because I want to explore it a little bit. You talk about curiosity and having that recognition of where you can improve. Do you find that it's more beneficial to work on your weaknesses or to work on your strengths?

Michael S: 12:38

I you know, I will say I probably until I got to the Estee Lawrence companies, I was focused mostly on working on my working on my weaknesses and trying to shore those things up. But one of the things that is part of kind of our executive learning, we talk about streets and how do you build upon your strengths. And so I I would say my men's my mindset has shifted over the years and leaning into sharpening, honing, leveraging your strengths is super important. I don't think you can ignore the areas where you need to improve, but it's you don't necessarily pour all your energy into that. That's where you leverage teammates and you leverage peers and colleagues. And, you know, I I try to I've tried over the years to build teams that are, you know, made up of individuals that are absolutely stronger than I am in in many, many areas, uh, but particularly the areas where where I'm not as strong.

Rich H: 13:30

Yeah, I find that is a practice in retail, and G. I don't know if you've seen it as well, where I find at times retailers are uber focused on the stores that are that are red, the where the declines are happening, those categories that aren't declining. And you can't ignore that, but they're in overinvesting in that at the expense of riding the wave of the green, either in categories or stores. And I think sometimes that mitigates growth.

Judy S: 13:59

Yeah, 100%.

Michael S: 14:01

Find what's winning and scale. You know, the things that aren't winning, then you know, you do have to assess them, but you can don't hang on to them too long.

Rich H: 14:09

And I have a favorite buyer who coined a mantra, and if she's listening, she will hold this against me. But her strategy was to suck less. And it's because she was in a category that no matter what effort she put into it, probably wasn't going to be green. But she knew that if she could manage to less red, it would make the green more green. And and candidly now she's producing an increase. But I thought that that was a real great sense of awareness.

Guy C: 14:39

Yeah, I I think it's spot on. I think, you know, to use a soccer analogy, Michael, right? If if you've got a center half who's got a great right foot, like don't force him to play left foot, like play on the right foot, play on the right side. But I think it's the same thing. Like, I've talked to a lot of retailers too about Amazon, right? And they're like, well, you know, Amazon's fulfillment is so fantastic and ours stinks. I'm like, but you can't beat them there. So why waste the time and chase that? Because you're never gonna turn to your point, Rich, the red to the green. What are where are you strong? Oh, you're strong because you've got hyper-localized experience that Amazon can't get. Double down on that. You're never gonna have airplanes and boats like Amazon does. So don't focus there. And I think that's the lesson that too often we ignore personally and professionally. And I think that's interesting. I guess to follow on to that, Michael, from your perspective, man, I love, love what you said about your father, right? Love your people. How would you think your father would say, or what would he do in terms of giving that feedback, right? Because part of the love is tough love. Like we always hear that. But what would you think? How would your father handle that? Like, how would he, you know, for today's age, right? How would he handle providing that feedback? And I love what you said too about, you know, if there's some negatives that are just going to be negative, if you can live with them, live with them. But how do you, how do you, or how would your father sort of express that to today's labor?

Michael S: 15:53

I believe in direct indirectness. To your point, it's critical that you give that that tough feedback. It needs to be balanced with um acknowledgement of where strengths are. I mean, back to back to this conversation we just had. Acknowledge where the strengths are, encourage people to build on those things. Uh but you but you have to get direct feedback because if you're not if you're not being honest with someone and you're cutting around the edge, it's it's it's only going to it's an integrity issue, in my opinion, right? And so uh it only erodes your credibility, if not with that individual, with the other people uh around you and that are part of your ecosystem. And so uh I I think even in this day and age, uh direct feedback is super, super important. Now, how you decide to deliver it is very much about the individual, right? And understanding what motivates that individual, how are they going to receive the feedback? But uh but it it still has to be clear and uh in direct, not hide it.

Guy C: 16:52

Do you think we're just not teaching some of this, these skills in in the in undergraduate business or in the MBA programs where, you know, I will freely admit, like too often some of the classes I took in that, it felt too flowery. It wasn't like, hey, be direct and here's how you're direct. Do you think there's a lack of education, formal education around this?

Michael S: 17:08

I I'm gonna let Rich answer that one, to be honest. But I I I just I haven't been in the cla in the classrooms enough to know, but but when I see young talent coming out, I I haven't seen that. I haven't seen that be a problem with the with some of the the great interns that we've had.

Rich H: 17:23

Well, let me ask you you uh you were part of the first class I taught at George Mason. Was I a tough grader or did I give you tough feedback?

Judy S: 17:32

No, I would say that most of your feedback was um generally good feedback. And I feel like that really motivated me to do the best work that I could, honestly. Um I've experienced both good and bad feedback, and I would say whenever you know mistakes on my papers or in research, when the feedback was negative, but given in a nicer way, that's when I wanted to improve the most, I would say. Um and Michael, I wanted to go ahead and ask you the next question. So you've held a lot of roles um throughout your career technology, supply chain, sales, customer service, and more. Um, what common threads have you found along your journey?

Michael S: 18:06

You know, I I think the the the biggest ones, first of all, uh regardless of the the function for the industry or um that you're in or the company, uh culture, culture is the key. You can have great strategies, you can have great uh plans, you can even have great talent, um, great brands. But if the if the culture is not the right culture to support a high performance team, a high performance organization, uh it's it's it's not gonna work. The other thread I see in all of these kind of functions and disciplines is you know, people are the difference between good and great. You're gonna go back to you have good culture, you have great strategy, great process. The quality of people you put in that mix is gonna determine whether you're you're great and exceptional and making massive impacts, or if you're just good or you're just solid. And so people are people are really the key. And then and then the third one is people always need purpose. They need to understand what the impact is and why it's important. And it has to be something that's bigger than themselves. And and and to me, those three things always hold true, um, kind of regardless of where uh of where you're at, or kind of common threads throughout.

Guy C: 19:19

Oh, when you look today, you know, if you can give us sort of what is your sense or what are the challenges when you look at retail, right? The technology innovation, the people, right? I think that's an important part. Where where are all of this happening? And and with sort of the the umbrella of, of course, now all we hear about is AI, AI, AI. But what are you seeing, or what what was your journey in this and where do you see it today?

Michael S: 19:39

You know, I I think I think AI is a a good kind of point to anchor on to answer this with, right? Because it is the newest uh technology. It's the it represents a fundamental shift, right? It's it's it's not uh and and the time is now. It's not like uh a couple of years ago when we were into to metaverse and everything else, and which by the way, we'll we'll see it's time at some point, but uh, but the idea and the vision was way far and the hype was way far ahead of reality. Whereas AI is is really is here, really is a fundamental shift. So it's a good thing to anchor on. What I would say the big challenges that I found is one is I'll go back, culture is key. You have to have a culture that's willing to accept change, to embrace change, uh, and try to try to drive change. And the biggest challenge I find is risk aversion. I think, particularly in tech, everything we learn in tech uh tends to teach us about minimizing risk. I would also argue that that I found retail to be largely risk, risk averse. Don't get me wrong, risk management is a critical skill that every C level executive should have. They should have an appreciation of understanding what the risks are, how to manage those risks. But what I learned at Nike uh was the right balance of when do you take a risk and be willing to take a risk and understand what those parameters are. And so for me, the biggest challenge that I see is this idea of risk aversion. And so you see that going back to AI, you see that now in the way companies are are deploying AI solutions. You have you have one group that that that thinks they're going big on AI and that they're transformational, and you have another another set that are saying, well, we're we're experimenting and we're gonna scale some things, we're gonna scale some pilots. The reality is the the the ones that think they're going big really most of them aren't. And the ones that are dabbling are just never they're never gonna scale these projects to make a real difference. And so this idea of just really being able to do something too truly transformational, uh, you have to have the right culture, you have to have the right appetite for risk. And uh I see that as the biggest challenge for innovation in uh in retail right now.

Rich H: 21:53

What led you to end up in the tech space based on where you started?

Michael S: 22:00

I mean, I did start in tech the first job, but uh then I did a whole bunch of other things and came back to tech. I you know, I I think what once I was there, I felt like I could make an impact. It was an area that um I felt like had the most impact on the broadest impact and the most potential for impact, not just on companies, but on industries. When you look at things like Nike ID, which was very, very early days, uh being able to customize your shoe, Nike Plus, ability to drive uh global e-commerce at Mylan, the opportunities to to improve patient outcomes through you know connected, digitally connected uh drug delivery devices, um, things we've done at uh S Day with with the uh voice enabled makeup assistant that that provides confidence and really confidence and independence for people that are visually impaired. You know, the the list goes on and on. These are things you can do attack that you're not necessarily gonna other disciplines necessarily. You open up new channels, you reach new consumers, you potentially change the way consumers behave or even provide something to consumers that they know they need it. You truly can create something new that exists.

Guy C: 23:14

Uh Michael, you mentioned so this is really interesting because I love looking at your CV, like you mentioned obviously Nike, S Day and Pharma, right? So two big massive brands, CPG we all, and then pharmaceuticals, where it's you know, it's about patient wealth, health, and well-being. From that perspective, is there a common or or is there something you noted, like what are the differences between these industries in terms of their adoption of technology, but also in terms of you know their openness to risk?

Michael S: 23:40

As you can imagine, uh pharma is the most uh I don't want to say risk averse, I think the the most risk conscious uh for obvious reasons, right? You're you're you're talking about producing a product that people put in their bodies. And uh uh there's some very clear, clear reasons to be uh a little more conservative on the risk side uh with pharma. I you know, I think the the common threads that I found uh through the companies that I was in is um the focus on the consumer or the patient, in its case may be with pharma, the desire to innovate, uh, to reach those consumers and provide things that those consumers had had not had. Obviously, there's big things like marketing, really understanding brands. I was at a generic pharmaceutical company, so uh we were patient focused, but we weren't uh we weren't a big marketing company, we weren't a big branding type of company, uh, but we were focused on innovation, we're focused on superior products. And uh, you know, I find those things uh consistent across all three of three industries. The nice thing about when I went to S Day Lauder Companies is I came from a background of Nike with retail, uh really on true true Omni retail, big investment in innovation and tech, great brands, uh great products, uh all those things translated. But Nike in the fashion world doesn't really do their own manufacturing, right? It's all outsourced as contract. Whereas if you go to pharma, the nature of the manufacturing is very similar to the manufacturing of cosmetics products. And so there's not a lot of difference between them. They're both uh regulated by the FDA. At Myland, we owned our own uh manufacturing. So it was really a mashup of those two experiences back through the supply chain all the way to the consumer. Really was a was a nice fit and uh something that uh just felt all right.

Judy S: 25:40

Okay, so throughout all the businesses you've worked on and various positions, was there a specific trait or characteristic that makes it challenging to work with somebody?

Michael S: 25:51

Yes. Um first of all, lack of integrity. Anyone with a lack of integrity is very uh difficult to work with. Anyone that you find, and and this is related to lack of integrity, in my opinion, but uh anyone that's really just self-serving. And you know, I think we've probably all worked at some point with those people that just is really about building my career and building you know my reputation. And and then those folks that are just really narrow-minded, that are not open to to new ideas and willing, willing to try some new things. And that's where I go back again to a little bit of this risk averse. But it's also just the inability to kind of take the blinders off and see the world differently. Those uh folks, the ones that are narrow-minded, those are the ones that get disrupted. You know, those are the ones that uh uh ultimately are not gonna evolve with the times.

Rich H: 26:45

So typically when I'm talking to my students or interns or trainees, my advice along the way has changed as the as the business world has evolved. And for the first five years of somebody's career, I'm trying to encourage them to not just pick a single discipline and to explore as much as possible. And then we start to find ourselves specializing in tech or in marketing or or logistics. But having reached the C-suite, and I don't know that I've asked this question before, have you looked at other areas like marketing or like finance or like HR and said, you know, I could do that and that would be fun? And not from an ego perspective. I won't I won't put that on you, but have you looked at another area and said, I think I could do that?

Michael S: 27:34

Short answer is yes, but to to to your point, I I I encourage uh whenever I speak to to interns or students, I I always encourage them to become these T-shaped employees, like you were talking about, right? Broad experience across many areas and and and kind of uh deep expertise in one. And I was I was fortunate in Nike because as I said, I started in tech and then I went across all these different roles, and then I came back to tech, and then that's when my career really uh started to grow. And I think I really benefited from that broad experience. But yes, I would there's two roles, there's probably two, well, I'll say three roles that I would love to do at some point, or would have loved to have done at some point. Love to head up HR. I feel like HR is uh an area where you can really make an impact on individuals. I think marketing is fun, and you know, I'm dabbling in that a little bit now that with Carrick Rangers. And then it's just a general general management role is is always fun. And again, kind of getting that with Carrick Rangers at this point. Kind of doing everything but tag at Carrick Rangers.

Rich H: 28:43

So let's transition into that because I you know I want to have a little bit of fun with it. And and full disclosure, I came across Carrick Rangers in an indirect way, and I proudly own a share and I proudly visited the stadium. But I I love what you are doing. How did that happen? And why did it happen? And then Dee, I'm gonna let you explore because you may need a 53-year-old uh aging goalkeeper at some point. Like, though, I don't think that'll be the case.

Michael S: 29:10

Certainly, if you're gonna play any position after 50, it would be goalie. But uh, you know, I for me, I just I've always loved the game. Uh I was the front end of the curve of of soccer taking off in the in the United States. And um I just uh I've loved the game uh in in in a way that's hard to even put in words. You know, and I I try I tried after after college after playing in college. Um, and I I wasn't a very good college player, by the way. I was mostly on the bench. It didn't stop me from trying out for teams and trying to play professionally, and it just never played out. And so I kind of turned my attention to uh would I have the opportunity to own a team? And even right after I started at Nike, I I looked at a uh a regional kind of semi-pro team here in the Portland area, and uh and I realized pretty quickly that I could afford to buy the team, but I couldn't afford to run the team. It was just losing money left and left and right. And so kind of put it on the side burner for a few years uh till my career grew. And then then I started playing around with um at clubs include mostly around the national league. This was before the whole Wrexham story. And you know, back then you could you could purchase a club for a pound or two pounds, but you were assuming millions of dollars of debt. Whenever I would really get serious about looking into something, there was no path, there was no path to profitability at the time. That that's probably different now that they have big TV deals and everything else, even down to the fifth division. But um, and and there's a lot more sharing of uh money across UEFA and and those types of things. But I'll go back to Who uh, you know, it was shortly after my father had passed, was on vacation, was just kind of reflecting and realizing, you know, pretty quickly how how short life really is. And if I was going to get serious about something, I was it now was the time to do it. And I picked up the phone and called a gentleman named Steve Paris, who I'd uh worked with on some other things, and he connected me to uh to one of his interns who was uh did a tremendous amount of research on clubs and leagues and everything else. And the first one he told me about was Carrick Rangers. Sounded great, but I said, let's just keep looking, let's find other options. And uh, and we kept looking, but I kept coming back to Carrick Rangers. And uh once I once I had a uh a Zoom call with the chairman, it just felt right. I went over, visited uh with the board, the coaching staff, and uh it did it just the commitment to the community, the project that it rec that it represents to to potentially make a massive impact in that community uh was something that was just too good to pass up.

Guy C: 31:48

Michael, uh a question about that too, right? So obviously managing a a footy team is very different than managing an IT department or but I find like the proofs and the pudding in soccer, and we're in sport, right? It's the scoreboard, it's how well you're doing, and you want to provide players feedback. So that that 365 view, like how do have you taken some of those learnings from your professional life and how have you infused them, you know, with your soccer club? Because I'm assuming I shouldn't, but you know, you probably have a bunch of teenagers or early 20s played football with lives, they're probably been the best player in their little village, and now they're playing professionally and they have aspirations, and you're not gonna tell them that you're not gonna play for the North Ireland national team anytime soon. But you also want to build that camaraderie, that team, and and get the best out of them. Are there some lessons you've taken from Estee Lauder and Nike and other places and have deployed them now in a sporting venue?

Michael S: 32:37

Yes and no, but not but not so not so much with the the the players. And and by the way, our bench the other night, our bench to people on the field range from 16 to 38, right? So we we have some pretty uh experienced players and uh the the 38-year-old, by the way, in August won player of the month for the league. So he's he's one of these guys that is uh ageless, basically. He's just as fast now as he was when he was 20. I guess one of the lessons I've I've applied is uh you see great talent and uh and you empower. In that sense, I've applied it because we went out and we got one of the best managers in the history of uh of the Iris League and Steven Baxter, and he's empowered, right? He makes all the decisions related to football. And now that means he's accountable for those decisions and the results that they uh that they produce or fail to produce, uh fortunately producing. But I I would say I I've kind of applied that lesson of seeking great talent and empowering them. And and it's true. We have a great board, great board of directors. I uh, you know, I haven't made any changes to that over the over the couple of years. Uh our chairman is also a major shareholder that uh I actually purchased my share from him, uh, but he remains a major shareholder. They they're doing a phenomenal job, and uh you keep great talent in place and you you empower them to do the work and you you get in and you help where where needed. And and and for me, I'm I find myself doing a little of uh a little of everything actually, uh, but it's mostly helping other people where they need help and or taking try to take a burden off of people where there might be a burden.

Rich H: 34:17

Well, and I see that, and it's what led me to ask the question, and I thought you were going to say marketing, because I see that in the emails that you send to the the stakeholders, the shareholders of the team, that level of transparency and authenticity when it comes to things like the jerseys and that sense of community. And I had shared with you the taxi ride where the driver was talking about how whoever just bought the Carrick Rangers has been investing in the community. And I don't think I shared this story, but when my wife and I were there, obviously the the pitch was closed, there was an older gentleman who lived there who walked us around to the upper part of the ramp so we could get a better view of the of the pitch. And he had that investment in the in the team, in the in the community. So it's interesting to see that. It does that come natural to you? Is it things that you've learned by watching what's gone on in retail? What are you channeling for that?

Michael S: 35:15

It feels like it comes naturally, but I I think I I think it is all things I've kind of learned from really learning quite frankly from my Nike days growing up in Nike with 20, 22 something years and and and watching great leaders there. And you know, one thing you mentioned was authenticity and transparency. That that was one thing that was so highly valued at uh at Nike. And you know, just I it gets so ingrained in your DNA, it's hard to know what it what did I learn versus what what just came uh came naturally. But then the ability to apply that in in different companies down the road is uh only kind of continued at home home that wanted to let you jump in.

Judy S: 35:53

What's something people think about your area of expertise? Uh that's completely wrong.

Michael S: 35:58

Probably that you have to be deeply, deeply technical. Whenever I talk about being a CIO or being in the the tech industry, I think immediately uh a lot of people think that I, you know, that I'm gonna be deeply, deeply technical, and that's not the the case and uh technically savvy and can go deep in certain areas. The key is more about how you lead, you know, other other kind of what I would consider softer's softer skills.

Judy S: 36:22

All right, that's good to hear, especially with everybody knowing how to code lately. Um I'm not I don't know how to code at all, so I'm like, am I behind in something?

Michael S: 36:30

Yeah, I don't want to, I don't want to diminish. I I feel like um I was at a fairly small conference actually, and Tim Cook was uh speaking and and he talked about the fact that he believed that everybody should learn coding as a second language before they learn you know a spoken second language. I don't know that I agree with that 100%, but there's a lot, a lot of truth to that.

Rich H: 36:53

Was it before or after he released the AirPods It'll Translate Anything for You? This was this was quite a while before that. He knew it was coming. Yeah, probably probably so so. If anybody is listening to this, they won't see that Gee is representing Pink today. But it is a a good time to ask. You're the founder of Tech Day in Pink. Yes. How did that come about? I hesitate to ask how meaningful it is because I I've seen the post on LinkedIn, I've seen you you share. Uh I wore my pink Oxford uh on the day I just forgot to post, but how did that come about?

Michael S: 37:31

First of all, thank you. Thank you for supporting it. Thank you for giving me a chance to to talk about it. But tech the peak is uh where we rally the tech. I it started with rallying the tech community uh in the mission to end breast cancer. Now we've we've expanded beyond the tech community. It's not uh not just limited to people that are in tech, but uh but that's where it started. And the way it started was when I first joined the Estee Lauder companies in my very first executive leadership team meeting, uh, we had members from the company's breast cancer campaign uh speaking to the executive team about uh the preparations for what was going to happen in October, which is breast cancer awareness month. And the breast cancer campaign is is Estee Lauder's largest philanthropic effort. They they do many, many incredible things uh with Alzheimer's, AIDS, just many, many different things that they um clean water, huge number of things, but breast cancer is the the largest effort. And when you see the Empire State Building or the Eiffel Tower or the pyramids lit up pink, that's our regional organizations that are that are doing that. Or you see products that are in pink packaging and they sell that and donate the proceeds to VCRF. These are the things I was hearing. And I was sitting there thinking, well, I I run technology as cost center. What am I going to be able to do to support the cause? And so I decided at least within the tech team, what I would do is ask people to wear pink on the second Thursday of October and use the hashtag Tech in Pink2017 at the time. And I would donate for every post to uh the breast cancer research foundation. And so we did it. And, you know, the entire organization was in pink around the globe. And uh I started scrolling through that evening looking at the different hashtags, and I realized it wasn't just people at S Day Lauder Companies, it's people I've worked with at Nike, people at Myland, some companies I'd been on the board with, uh, a couple of our partners. And I thought, you know, this is an opportunity to really rally to use my platform and rally a much bigger uh group of people. And so I reached out to CIOs and CTOs in my network and said, for 2018, and said, Will you will you join me? Will you join me in rallying your teams? Will you join me in donating for every post? And uh and it's become uh this past year, this past uh Tech Day of Pink, which was October 9th, it was the ninth annual year. You know, we've we've raised hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars, uh, tens of thousands of research have been funded. You know, this was the fourth year for benefit concert that we did in New York as well. That benefit concert has raised, uh now the number will be right around $750,000 just from the benefit concert. It's really opened up, I think, uh, this idea uh or this understanding of how breast cancer impacts so many people. Uh, you know, it's one in eight uh women will be diagnosed with breast cancer. This year alone, 316 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in the U.S. Uh so it impacts virtually everyone. And you know, what what we're really focused on is raising money primarily to support the breast cancer research foundation, BCRF. That's because BCRF, every major breakthrough that's happened in breast cancer research, uh, whether it's been treatment or prevention over the last decade has been through a BCRF funded researcher. They're also the highest rated in terms of money directly to research. And so that's why I kind of picked uh pick them. But but I also tell people look, if you're supporting any uh organization or any set of uh groups that serve survivors, that's great. It doesn't have to be BCRF specifically. The other thing I mention is a lot of this research, these breakthroughs are not just specific to breast cancer. They also have benefits and applicability to uh many, many other types of cancer, from brain cancer to colon cancer, different liver cancers. The breakthroughs tend to benefit uh other areas of research.

Rich H: 41:37

I'm tempted to ask you what is the best advice that you've ever received, but I'm gonna pose it a little bit differently. If you could take everything you've learned to this point and go back to being in college, what's one thing you might do differently?

Michael S: 41:52

I'm not sure that I would do much differently. I I feel like my humanities degree has been it, even though I pursued a technology degree, I feel like it has benefited me. My first job at Autosone, even though it paid a ridiculously low amount of money, uh gave me uh tremendous experience uh kind of working at all levels of the organization that that benefited me through the years. You know, 22 years at Nike, a lot of people would say, well, why didn't you leave? You could have been in bigger positions, making more money sooner. That's probably true. That's not what motivated me. My what motivated me is you know just making an impact. And and and I I felt like I was making a real impact in lives of people, lives of the industry, lives of the company, and and and so I I have no regrets uh for for staying there as long as I did. I I it it's hard for me to say that there'd be anything that I would do uh differently, except for, you know, I guess any of the lessons I learned along the way, whether it was ask for help or uh seek feedback, you know, those types of lessons I wish I'd learned them earlier, maybe. I guess the the other thing I might say is it's not as scary as it looks when you're in college and you're about to start. You know, you're not nobody's perfect. And it a lot of it is how you're gonna respond, respond to mistakes, how are you gonna pivot from those.

Rich H: 43:07

And therein lies great advice for not just every college student out there, but everybody in an emerging career. As we move into the rapid fire round, and I'm gonna queue up Judy and then Gee to ask questions one and two, and I'll ask question three while they're deciding which ones we're gonna throw at you. If you could ask students one question, what are you looking for in a career?

Michael S: 43:32

What do you expect? What do you want out of a great company? What do you want out of a great uh role and a great leader? And you know, one thing that I learned at the SD Lard Company is a huge benefit to me, is uh we had a reverse mentor program. And so we had more junior talent actually be the mentor for the executives. And uh I had multiple reverse mentors. And the and the idea was you know, that that's a big part of who our consumer is. It's certainly kind of the new uh workforce. How do you how do you make sure you really understand you know the Gen Z and so part of that was through reverse mentorship? And so I highly encourage uh any more seasoned executives, should we say out there to uh to consider looking for reverse mentors and people that can give them a different perspective? We always tend to think about I want somebody with more experience, more uh years under their belt. I also need to be thinking about the new uh new generation, new workforce, and and my consumers that are definitely younger.

Rich H: 44:38

Well, again, and Ghee, that marries back to kind of that harmony between personal and professional, because oft how many, how many times do we see retailers or brands that go in search of a solution when they haven't identified the problem or the goal? Gee, why don't you go ahead and kick off the rapid fire?

Guy C: 44:55

I'm gonna go way off script here, Michael, and and Rich is used to this, but uh this is my favorite rapid fire question. If you could travel in time with no impact on the world, so would you go back in time or would you go to the future?

Michael S: 45:09

Good question. Um I think I would go to the future. I believe I'd go to the future just because back in time we can, you know, it's more known, whereas the future is completely unknown.

Guy C: 45:20

And how far out in the future would you go? Ooh.

Michael S: 45:24

Uh probably enough to at least see great grandkids as as young adults. Great grandkids as young adults.

Guy C: 45:32

Very cool.

Michael S: 45:33

Judy, you're up.

Judy S: 45:34

Um, if you could transport yourself to any part of the world without having to go on an airplane, where would you go for 24 hours?

Michael S: 45:41

Transport myself anywhere in the world for 24 hours.

Rich H: 45:44

And you don't have to, you don't have to be concerned with travel time.

Michael S: 45:47

Okay. You can instantly get there. Instantly get there. Well, I I have told people many, many times, uh living in Manhattan on the the far east side of Manhattan, if they invented a portal that you can just like, you know, you can beam anywhere like they do on Star Trek, I would not use it to go anywhere except cross town. If I could just get across town immediately instead of dealing with cross-town traffic, I would do that. But I don't think that's the spirit of the uh of the question. I'd want to go somewhere really, really, really remote. And wow, I don't know. I'm kind of torn between like some completely remote beach or like in the middle of uh the savannah in the middle of like a safari. So somewhere one of those two. I'm not sure. We'll take that.

Rich H: 46:32

Okay, so I'm going to ask the final question and put a little twist on it. P and Judy are going to laugh. So you can have a dinner with three people. They can be alive or passed on, they can be real or fictional. What three people would you have at dinner and the twist? What musician would you add to the mix who would be playing a soundtrack for you?

Michael S: 46:57

Oh wow. I'm not entirely sure. I would I would want people that had like on completely different ends of the spectrum of political or religious belief. I would I would want a dinner where there was like this real deep conversation about uh about politics and um and religion that was a real conversation. I I'd want to learn from them. This is the one question to be honest, Rich. I was hoping you wouldn't ask me because I'm not entirely sure. I think look, if I had to if I had to pick something I and and I put it in modern modern times, I would probably go with uh some bizarre kind of mix of like uh Trump, Putin, and she or something like that.

Rich H: 47:48

So I before before we get to the musical accompaniment, I I love that because and you'll probably text me in 15 minutes and say, I want to change to these three. Yeah, but I think that curiosity from opposite ends of the spectrum is the intent of of the answer. And I think that is you know, that's a powerful reflection of of what we've just talked about. Now, who would who would you invite from a musician or a band perspective? Wow, with that with that particular group? Yeah, I'm almost wanting to withdraw the question because I don't know that you can assign a musician to that and and it may need to not have music to it, but yeah. Uh probably the probably that group, maybe the Beatles. Wow. You know what? There is uh I I like the logic to that. All right. Well, fantastic. Michael, uh appreciate you joining us. Uh good luck with the Carrick Ranger season. Thank you. I am looking forward to continue along the journey. Now, are you in New York or are you in Portland right now? I'm in Portland at the moment. Ah, good. Okay. Well, perfect. Thank you very much for joining us on Retail Relates. Gee, Judy, pleasure to see you as well. Michael, we'd love to have you back. Maybe pick a topic and have a roundtable discussion. We just don't know whether we want to make it around leadership, sports, politics. Maybe we'll leave politics alone. Tech.

Michael S: 49:09

Yeah, let's leave politics alone. Anything that unifies. So that's what I'm looking for. So outstanding.