Nike CEO Elliott Hill just announced major leadership changes after little more than six months on the job. He’s replaced Nike president Heidi O’Neill with another Nike veteran, Amy Montagne, who previously headed up Nike Women. O’Neill assumed the role of president, consumer, product and brand in 2023 and has now decided to retire after 26 years with the company. 

Hill also split the president’s responsibilities across functions, giving him more direct oversight of critical product development, marketing and growth initiatives with new leaders reporting directly to him. 

“I’m confident that with this new structure and leadership team in place we will be able to better line up and leverage all the advantages that make Nike great,” Hill said in a statement. 

He and Nike need the help. In the first full quarter under Hill’s new “Win Now” strategic plan, revenues continued to fall, down 9% to $11.3 billion. Nike stock is trading nearly 30% off levels since Hill joined. And the brand continues to be plagued by controversies, likely not of his making but that still require him to cleanup the mess.

The ‘Win Now’ Plan

Nike’s new “Win Now” strategy focuses on five key initiatives: 

• Ignite Nike’s corporate culture of winning, suggesting it’s lost some of that edge. In the third quarter earnings call, Hill said, “Success for Nike has never been about protecting our turf. We force others to play our game; We drive trends; We grow markets; We lead.”
• Shape the Nike brand for distinction through storytelling that celebrates the “passion and emotion” of sport.
• Accelerate a complete product portfolio focused on five “fields of play,” specifically running, basketball, football, training and sportswear. The recently signed NikeSkims deal broadens the brand’s reach into the athleisure performance category and Hill promises on-going innovation to bring “breadth and depth” to the product portfolio across the fields of play.
• Invest in and empower Nike teams in three key countries – U.S., China and U.K. – and five key cities – New York, Los Angeles, London, Beijing and Shanghai.
• Elevate and grow the marketplace, balancing its more premium Nike Direct platform while growing its wholesale partnerships.

Nike’s ‘Win Now’ Implementation Team

Hill quickly realized that leadership changes were needed to get Nike back to winning. Among the shifts are promoting Phil McCartney from vice president of footwear to chief innovation, design and product officer overseeing Nike, Jordan and Converse product development. 

Nicole Graham is moving from chief marketing officer to executive vice president and CMO overseeing Nike. She will be responsible for enhanced brand storytelling. 

And 45-year company veteran, Dr. Tom Clark, with a Ph.D. in biomechanics and previously a strategic advisor to the CEO, will take on the new role of chief growth initiatives officer. All will report directly to Hill.

However, the most consequential change is promoting Montagne to president. She will be responsible to lead across the consumer and sports functions. Having been promoted from heading up the women’s group, Montagne’s new position suggests that growing the women’s business is a corporate priority. 

In 2023, women made up about 40% of Nike customers, yet in 2024, women’s generated only $8.5 billion in revenues compared to $20.9 billion in men’s.

Nike’s Women’s Problem

Nike has a poor track record when it comes to its female athletes, going back to 2019 when Olympic track gold medalist and long-time Nike-sponsored athlete Allyson Felix penned a New York Times op-ed claiming Nike penalized her for becoming pregnant. This was followed shortly by another New York Times op-ed by teenage track star Mary Cain speaking out about taunting abuse she suffered as part of Nike’s Oregon Project. 

Other prominent female athletes have also abandoned the brand, including gymnast Simone Biles, steeplechase Olympian Colleen Quigley, tennis star Sloane Stephens and runners Alysia Montaño, Kara Goucher, Phoebe Wright and Lauren Fleshman. 

Caitlin Clark Still On The Bench

More recently, there are questions surrounding Nike’s treatment of WNBA superstar Caitlin Clark. The company prioritized the introduction of fellow WNBA star A’ja Wilson’s signature shoe over the release of the potentially even bigger Clark sneaker, though Clark has publicly expressed no dissatisfaction with her Nike sponsorship. 

“Nike is still ignoring Caitlin Clark and destroying shareholder value,” wrote sports podcaster Ethan Strauss under his House of Strauss handle. “They won’t sell Clark, at least just yet. Apparently to appease Wilson,” he wrote, and added, “The whole endeavor seems astroturfed to satiate Wilson’s demands and a loud Internet/WNBA cohort who’ll get mad if Caitlin Clark is prioritized.”

Sidestepping A Critical Women’s Sports Issue

Nike turned up the juice on the women’s front in its first Super Bowl ad in 27 years featuring Caitlin Clark, A’ja Wilson, Sabrina Ionescu, Jordan Chiles, and Sha’Carri Richardson. The “So Win” ad was praised by many, but also generated controversy, being considered by some as condescending and inauthentic, given Nike’s checkered history with female athletes.

The voice over provided by rapper Doechii repeated statements that women supposedly hear that challenge their performance. “You can’t be demanding. You can’t be relentless. You can’t put yourself first. You can’t be confident. You can’t challenge. You can’t dominate. You can’t speak up. You can’t be emotional,” she said, ending with “Whatever you do, you can’t win, so win.”

The last statement is particularly ironic since in athletic competition, there is one place in which women can’t seem to win: when they compete against biologically male, trans athletes. The participation of transgender athletes in women’s sports has become the most critical sporting issue of our time, intersecting with wide-spread debates about fairness, inclusion, and the integrity of sporting competition.

Nike stands on the inclusion side of the debate. “We’re continuing our commitment to helping shape a strong culture of LGBTQIA+ belonging and visibility in sport. We’re working to expand sport for the next generation through community grants, athlete partnerships, impactful storytelling, and products that celebrate the full spectrum of LGBTQIA+ expression. Because sport is better when all athletes are free to play as themselves,” it stated in 2023. 

Tide Is Turning

However, Americans overwhelmingly support keeping women’s sports exclusively for biological women. A New York Times/Ipsos public opinion poll conducted this year found 79% of Americans believe that trans athletes who were male at birth should not compete in women’s sports. Likewise, a NBC poll among 20,000 Americans found 75% oppose trans women competing in women’s sports, including nearly two-thirds of the GenZ cohort aged 18-to-29 years.

Perhaps this is why Nike has remained largely silent after Outkick and the New York Times Magazine revealed it provided funds to Boston Children’s Hospital and researchers Kathryn Ackerman, a BCH attending physician and associate professor at Harvard Medical School, and Joanna Harper to study the physiological impact of gender-affirming care on athletic performance. 

While Outkick reported an unnamed Nike executive said the study “was never initialized” and “is not moving forward,” the Boston Children’s Hospital Magazine winter 2024 issue revealed such a study, supported “in part” by Nike, was in process to “fill a crucial gap and inform future policy decisions.”

Treating children with puberty-blocking hormones, e.g. gender-affirming care, is a contentious issue on its own, without bringing the sports performance issue into it. The U.K. has indefinitely banned the use of puberty blockers on children under 18, though its decision will be reviewed in 2027. Some 25 U.S. states have enacted laws against gender-affirming care in children and one such Tennessee law is under review by the Supreme Court. 

All of which brings into question the ethics of performing medical experiments on youth to measure their sports performance, not to mention Nike’s support of such experiments. 

“Why on earth would a company that makes running shoes fund — or at the very least incentivize —medical experiments on children?” questions Jennifer Sey, founder of XX-XY Athletics and outspoken advocate for keeping women’s and girl’s sports exclusively for women and girls.