CFOs and executive leadership face a constant tug-of-war between growth and profitability. A big part of the art and science of leadership is to know which one to pursue, and when. Looking back to our always enjoyable “CFO at the Movies” at the end of last year, I reflected on my write-up of the movie, “Air.”
“A shoe is just a shoe until my son steps into it.”
Funny that Nike CEO John Donahoe now says the company’s historic level of innovation has declined by its workforce figuratively turning in its running shoes for in-door slippers.
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That movie exchange, spoken by Michael Jordan’s mother Delores to Nike executive Sonny Vaccaro, encapsulates the moment when a running shoe company decides to go all in, the collision of an organization that has to solve both profitability and growth at the same time. And to do so, they pushed all their chips in on a skinny college kid from Wilmington, North Carolina.
Maybe it is unrealistic for Donahoe to go out looking for the next Michael Jordan, or even to hire the next designer or marketing genius that has MJ’s creative DNA, but the Nike CEO realized the roadblocks in place:
“In hindsight, it turns out, it’s really hard to do bold, disruptive innovation, to develop a boldly disruptive shoe on Zoom,” he said.
Similarly, CFOs face workforce challenges of too few qualified accounting and finance professionals because a generation, facing social and structural barriers, is opting for different opportunities. And while there is a sizable — and sometimes negative — impact on the world of CPAs, there may be an opportunity for finance chiefs.
As reporter Adam Zaki writes today, Gen Z workers have an awareness of financial needs and job opportunities that these traditional business functions can help solve. But, as Donahoe says, you have to get them in the door first.