E150: The Marketing Genius Behind Nike: Greg Hoffman

The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett

FlightStory

Society & Culture, Business, Education

4.6 • 13.2K Ratings

🗓️ 9 June 2022

⏱️ 80 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Greg Hoffman is the former Chief Marketing Officer at Nike, and the author of Emotion By Design, a book about how to find emotional ways to tell business stories and connect your ideas through creative storytelling.

Joining Nike when he was just in his early 20s, to becoming one of the most senior people of colour in corporate America, his life story is like no other. Here he tells us not just how to find new ways to get your story across, but delves into his own story as he tells us how he met his real family for the first time only a couple of years ago, and how that felt for him.

Greg is an entirely new voice on how to be a caring leader and deal with the stresses of high-level executive roles. Because when it’s your job to find ways to connect ideas with other people, you first have to connect those ideas to yourself.

Topics:

Childhood, racism, and finding your voice
What makes Nike successful?
How to create a winning work culture
How do you incentivize risk?
Necessity sparks innovation
Creating emotional connections
Finding the right story & branding to make your business succeed
Attention to detail
Advice to become a successful marketer
Finding out about your biological family
Our last guest’s question

Greg’s book:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Emotion-Design-Creative-Leadership-Lifetime/

Greg:

https://www.instagram.com/ghoff70/

Watch the episodes on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/TheDiaryOfACEO/videos

Sponsors:

Huel - https://my.huel.com/Steven

Craftd - https://bit.ly/3JKOPFx

Vodafone Business - https://bit.ly/3NIM35n

https://bit.ly/3AuPKsA

Transcript

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0:00.0	That was told that the KKK was gonna get me.
0:02.8	And that's frightening when you're a child.
0:08.0	Chief marketing officer to Vice President of Global Brand
0:10.5	and almost three decade career at Nike.
0:12.3	That's right, yeah.
0:13.3	You know, Nike was really the only brand
0:15.7	that was putting people of color in their communication.
0:19.2	That showed me you could make a living
0:22.2	doing what you love.
0:24.2	Why is the Air Force One shoe an example of Nike not chasing cool?
0:28.2	It wasn't created to make a statement in culture.
0:32.0	It was created to make a statement on the court.
0:34.8	And the fact that Moses Malone won on the court
0:38.3	in the Air Force One.
0:40.1	That's cool.
0:41.7	Your authenticity is your cultural currency.
0:44.2	The minute your audience can no longer see
0:46.7	your original pursuit,
0:48.1	they partner with someone else.
0:50.4	April 2021.
0:52.1	Significant month for you, you know what I'm saying?
0:54.0	I got a DM through 23 and me.
	...

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