Nike announced last week that eBay CEO John Donahoe has joined their board of directors. As well as sitting on eBay’s board he already sits on the board at Intel.
Philip H. Knight, Nike co-founder and chairman said “John’s executive management experience in digital commerce, technology, strategic planning, and marketing for a global brand makes him an excellent addition to our board. We look forward to his contributions to expand Nike’s position as the world’s leading athletic brand and industry innovator.”
Translating that means they want to leverage some of John Donahoe’s experience of running strategic planning and marketing for a global brand with the bonus of histechnology and e-commerce expertise.
One might think with the recent hacking incident, the loss of David Marcus at PayPal and need to find a replacement, John Donahoe’s focus should be on eBay Inc at the moment. The reality is that it makes sense to mix with your peers and gain experience at multiple companies, not just for long term career development but a day here and there at Nike is a break from eBay and doubtless just as John’s eBay experience will assist Nike, there will be some experiences gained at Nike which could positively influence his decisions at eBay.
6 Responses
Oh dear,,,,
I really feel sorry for Nike.
On the bonus for them, expect Nike to get a leg up on ebay…..
The ‘Hoe’ has been an unmitigated disaster for eBay on a par with the last dog days of Whitmans reign.
Put simply eBay has been consistently underperforming its rivals in the market and profitability has been shored up by the success of Paypal.
Just look at how much more money you would have made if you had invested a $ in Amazon as against eBay since the start of this self styled ‘disruptive’ CEOs reign.
Even now despite trousering tens of millions in cash and stock options the basic processes on eBay are still a joke with both search and visibility now a complete lottery for most sellers.
Put simply he has been a utter failure and should be sacked forthwith.
He is a embarrassment to all MBAs who actually know how to run and grow their businesses faster than their competition.
His legacy will live on in MBA case studies of how NOT to run an online global business.
If he does for Nike what he has done ebay the company will soon lose customers.
have never met this guy
but one things for certain hes probably more successful and has more money than anyone that wastes time posting here !
myself included,
I wonder what the job advert looked like?
Probably something along the lines of “Due to recent unrest and the biggest strikes in Chinese history over the pay and conditions of Nikes 30,000 factory workers we are looking for a Director who has vast experience of being beaten out of China with a shitty stick”
Thats got my name written all over it thought Donahoe.
Donahoe….. go where ever you want but please leave Ebay for good and allow someone else in who actually knows what it’s really like to sell items on here.