Elliott Hill

Overview

Elliott Hill
Born	c. 1964
Citizenship	United States
Education	B.S. in kinesiology; M.S. in sports administration
Alma mater	Texas Christian University; Ohio University
Occupation	Business executive
Employer(s)	Nike, Inc.
Known for	Longtime Nike executive who rose from sales intern to president and CEO
Title	President and Chief Executive Officer of Nike, Inc.
Term	2024–present
Predecessor	John Donahoe
Board member of	Nike, Inc.; Texas Christian University Board of Trustees
Spouse	Gina Hill
Children	2
Website	https://about.nike.com/en/company/people/elliott-hill

🏃 Elliott Hill (born c. 1964) is an American business executive who serves as president and chief executive officer (CEO) of Nike, Inc. Hill first joined Nike in 1988 as a sales intern and spent more than three decades rising through the company’s commercial and geographic leadership ranks before briefly retiring in 2020. In September 2024 Nike’s board recalled him from retirement to replace John Donahoe as CEO after a period of slowing growth and share-price decline, with Hill tasked with leading a strategy reset that places sport, product innovation and the company’s relationships with athletes at the center of its agenda.

👟 Intern-to-CEO trajectory. Hill is widely associated with Nike’s internal talent pipeline, having progressed from an entry-level sales role in the late 1980s to senior positions overseeing North America, Europe and the company’s global “geographies and integrated marketplace” before becoming president of consumer and marketplace in 2018 and eventually CEO. His career arc, frequently summarized as “from sales intern to chief executive,” is used by Nike and his alma mater Texas Christian University (TCU) as an illustration of long-term development, persistence and alignment with the company’s “Just Do It” ethos.

📈 Turnaround mandate. As CEO Hill has set out a “Win Now” plan focused on five broad pillars—culture, product, marketing, marketplace and in-person presence—intended to restore Nike’s competitiveness in performance categories and re-balance its mix of direct-to-consumer and wholesale distribution. His early tenure has involved restructuring Nike’s senior leadership, reorienting stores and product lines around core sports such as running and basketball, and rebuilding relationships with major retail partners, while simultaneously tackling pressure on margins and soft demand in markets such as China. Investor reactions have been mixed but generally supportive; Nike’s share price initially rose on his appointment and directors such as Tim Cook later increased their personal holdings as a sign of confidence in Hill’s overhaul.

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Early life and education

🏡 Austin upbringing and family background. Hill grew up in a blue-collar neighborhood in Austin, Texas, where sport pervaded everyday life and community institutions such as local recreation centers played a central role in his childhood. He was raised by his mother, Candace, a schoolteacher who spent more than half a century in the classroom and whose example of diligence, compassion and service profoundly shaped his values; Hill has said that “watching her helped create the values that I have today.” Money was limited, but exposure to athletics was abundant, and Hill developed an early fascination with the competitive intensity and camaraderie of team sports.

🎓 Texas Christian University and athletic training. Determined to remain close to sport, Hill enrolled at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, a decision he has described as financially risky for the son of a single mother but one he felt compelled to pursue. To help pay his way, he worked as a student athletic trainer for the TCU Horned Frogs, taping ankles, treating minor injuries and traveling with teams. Future basketball coach Jamie Dixon, then a TCU player, later recalled Hill’s charisma and energy in those years and admitted he never imagined “the guy taping my ankles” would become CEO of Nike. Hill initially considered medicine but realized that what truly captivated him was the “magic of teams” and high-performance environments, leading him to switch from pre-med to kinesiology and earn a Bachelor of Science degree in 1986.

🏈 Early professional experience and graduate studies. After graduating, Hill secured a role as an assistant athletic trainer with the National Football League’s Dallas Cowboys, gaining first-hand experience in elite professional sport while consolidating his interest in the business side of athletics. Seeking a broader strategic perspective, he entered the sports administration master’s program at Ohio University, where a sports marketing class became pivotal: an assignment to write a research paper on Nike sparked his realization that the company represented an ideal intersection of sport, business and culture. When Nike executive Tim Joyce visited campus, Hill directly approached him to express his desire to work for the company, initiating a months-long campaign of follow-up calls that displayed the persistence he would later be known for.

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Career

🧭 Entry into Nike and formative sales years. Hill’s determination paid off in 1988 when Joyce phoned with a terse challenge: “If you want to work for Nike, be in Memphis on Monday.” Hill drove overnight from Ohio to Tennessee to take up a short-term sales internship at Nike’s Midwest regional office starting 1 June 1988. In Memphis he performed whatever tasks were required, and within six months he had proved himself sufficiently to be given his own sales territory of 168 accounts across Oklahoma and Texas, servicing them from a Chrysler minivan loaded with Nike apparel. Hill later joked about trying to sell neon Lycra to small retailers in the region, but he has stressed that these years in the field taught him humility, resilience and an intimate understanding of retailers and consumers. A 1990 company sales meeting in Oregon, at which he saw the first “Just Do It” commercial featuring octogenarian runner Walt Stack, reinforced his sense that he had joined a brand with a distinctive, empowering ethos.

📊 Progress through commercial and geographic leadership roles. Through the 1990s Hill moved from front-line sales to management, holding positions including director of Nike’s team sports division and vice president of U.S. commerce, responsible for domestic sales. His remit later expanded to include senior roles in Europe and North America, and he developed a reputation for integrating product storytelling with market expansion. One example cited in company and media profiles is his role in persuading basketball icon Michael Jordan to expand the Jordan Brand beyond North America, helping transform Air Jordan from a regional phenomenon into a global franchise. By the early 2010s Hill was among Nike’s most experienced commercial leaders, overseeing large geographic portfolios and complex wholesale relationships.

🌍 President of Geographies and promotion to Consumer and Marketplace. In the mid-2010s Nike’s leadership increasingly deployed Hill as a problem-solver across its sprawling regional structure, appointing him president of geographies and integrated marketplace with oversight of sales operations worldwide. His remit included aligning wholesale, retail and digital channels in key markets as Nike navigated rising competition and the shift toward e-commerce. In March 2018, after the resignation of Nike brand president Trevor Edwards amid internal complaints about workplace conduct and corporate culture, the company elevated Hill to the newly created position of president, consumer and marketplace, consolidating global sales, marketing and retail operations under his leadership. The move reflected board and management confidence in Hill’s understanding of Nike’s brand, his operational track record and his reputation as a culture carrier.

🏁 Retirement from Nike and work in private equity. When long-time CEO Mark Parker decided to step aside in 2019, Nike’s board selected former ServiceNow and eBay chief John Donahoe—an external candidate with a technology background—as his successor. Hill, by then one of the highest-ranking internal executives, was not chosen and opted to retire in early 2020 after 32 years with the company. In retirement he co-founded Open Road Resources LLC and became a senior adviser and then operating partner at merchant bank BDT & MSD Partners, focusing on family-owned businesses. He also joined the boards of Weber Inc., the grill manufacturer, and Western-wear retailer Tecovas, while serving in trustee and advisory roles at institutions such as TCU. Hill later remarked that although he had left the company, “my first job never really left me,” underscoring his continuing affinity for Nike’s culture and mission.

🌀 Return to Nike as president and CEO. In 2024 Nike experienced slowing growth, inventory challenges and a steep decline in its share price—more than 50% below its 2021 peak—prompting increased scrutiny of Donahoe’s tech-focused strategy and its impact on the brand’s product pipeline and cultural relevance. In September 2024 Nike announced that Donahoe would retire and that Hill would return as president and CEO, with his appointment effective 14 October. Executive chairman Mark Parker described the decision as the outcome of a “thoughtful succession process” and emphasised Hill’s deep company knowledge; investors responded positively, and Nike’s shares rose around 8–10% in after-hours trading on the news.

🎯 Sport-first strategy and leadership reorganisation. On his first earnings call as CEO, Hill told investors that Nike had “lost [its] obsession with sport” and pledged to “lead with sport and put the athlete at the center of every decision.” He articulated a “Win Now” turnaround framework with pillars focused on organisational culture, product innovation, marketing excellence, marketplace balance and physical retail presence. In May 2025 Hill overhauled Nike’s leadership structure, retiring some senior roles and elevating four internal executives to new positions reporting directly to him: a president of the Nike brand, a chief product and innovation officer, a chief marketing officer and a chief growth officer. He abolished standalone chief technology and chief commercial officer roles in favour of a more integrated chief operating officer position and flattened reporting lines so that regional general managers reported directly to the CEO, reflecting his belief in staying “closely connected to what’s happening on the ground.”

🛒 Marketplace reset and wholesale relationships. Hill’s commercial strategy reverses aspects of Nike’s prior push toward direct-to-consumer sales. While continuing to invest in Nike-owned stores and digital platforms, he moved quickly to rebuild ties with wholesale partners, restoring the company’s presence on Amazon and deepening relationships with retailers such as Foot Locker, Dick’s Sporting Goods and select fashion chains. He has argued that meeting consumers “where they shop” need not dilute Nike’s premium positioning if product assortments and storytelling remain disciplined. At the same time, he ordered a sharp pullback in promotional discounting on Nike’s own e-commerce channels and authorised targeted price increases on some products, asserting that preserving brand equity requires a focus on full-price sales and carefully controlled markdowns. These moves contributed to a rebound in wholesale revenues—reported to have risen by high single digits year-on-year in subsequent quarters—even as gross margins remained under pressure from channel mix and cost inflation.

🏬 Product focus and physical retail. Hill has emphasised a renewed focus on Nike’s historic performance pillars—running, basketball, football and training—alongside the Nike Sportswear line, re-allocating resources away from less differentiated lifestyle ranges. He oversaw a revamp of Nike’s flagship “House of Innovation” store in New York City, reorganising floors by sport and using the site as a test-bed for experiential retail concepts; company statements indicated double-digit sales growth following the redesign, and Nike has signalled plans to replicate elements of the format in other locations. Hill has also spotlighted running as a leading growth engine, noting that the category recorded more than 20% growth in late 2025, and has tied these performance gains to a broader internal push to “create the most innovative, coveted” products across categories.

📉 Business performance and internal culture under Hill. As of late 2025 Nike’s financial performance under Hill remained a work in progress. Analysts expected fiscal 2025 revenue of roughly US$48–49 billion, below the company’s fiscal 2023 peak above US$50 billion, and Nike’s shares traded in the low US$60s—higher than at the time of Hill’s appointment but still on course for a fourth consecutive annual decline. Observers attributed ongoing margin compression in part to the revived wholesale push, higher costs and the time required for new product cycles to take effect. Internally, however, reports suggested that Hill’s return had buoyed morale: his first message to employees addressed them as “Nike Family,” a phrase some staff said they had not heard from senior leadership in years, and long-serving employees commented that the atmosphere “felt like the Nike [they] always heard about” from earlier eras. Boardroom and media accounts describe Hill’s presence on campus—walking the grounds, greeting employees and referencing Nike’s history—as part of a broader cultural reset.

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Financial profile and wealth

💼 Compensation as CEO. Regulatory filings detail a compensation package for Hill that reflects both the scale of Nike and the turnaround challenge he faces. His annual base salary as CEO was set at US$1.5 million, with a target annual bonus opportunity equal to 200% of salary and long-term equity incentives with a target grant-date value of US$15.5 million, split between performance-based stock units, stock options and restricted stock. To entice him out of retirement Nike also awarded a one-time sign-on package comprising US$3 million in restricted stock units and a US$4 million cash bonus, bringing his potential first-year compensation to roughly US$27 million—slightly below Donahoe’s previous pay level but still among the higher CEO pay packages in the consumer sector. Much of this compensation is contingent on Nike’s share-price performance and financial metrics over several years, aligning Hill’s incentives with those of shareholders.

📊 Net worth and shareholdings. Public disclosures and analyst estimates suggest that Hill’s personal net worth is in the tens of millions of dollars rather than the billionaire range associated with some founder-led companies. A Benzinga analysis in late 2025 estimated his net worth at around US$26 million, largely derived from holdings of Nike stock accumulated during his long tenure and supplemented by post-retirement roles and board positions. Hill has previously reported ownership of more than 120,000 Nike shares and sold roughly 180,000 shares for about US$9.2 million around the time of his 2020 retirement, leaving him with a modest fractional stake in the company compared with founding shareholder Phil Knight, who retains a multi-billion-dollar position, or activist investors such as Bill Ackman, who has amassed an approximately 1% holding. Hill’s wealth is thus characteristic of a long-serving corporate operator whose financial fortunes are closely tied to the performance of the company he leads.

🏦 Other business interests and governance roles. During his hiatus from Nike, Hill broadened his exposure to private markets by advising BDT Capital Partners (later BDT & MSD Partners) and co-founding Open Road Resources LLC to invest in and advise family-owned businesses. He also served on the boards of Weber Inc. and Tecovas, positions typically accompanied by equity grants or director fees, though he relinquished these roles upon rejoining Nike’s executive ranks to avoid conflicts of interest and concentrate on his turnaround mandate. Hill continues to hold non-profit and educational governance positions, most notably as a TCU trustee, where he contributes to strategic planning and philanthropy. External votes of confidence in his leadership have come not only from investors but also from fellow board members: in December 2025 Apple CEO and Nike director Tim Cook doubled his Nike shareholding in a multi-million-dollar purchase explicitly framed as support for Hill’s overhaul efforts.

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Personal life and philanthropy

👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Family and residences. Hill met his wife, Gina, early in his Nike career, and the couple have been married for more than three decades. Both come from families headed by single mothers who worked in education, a shared background that has informed their longstanding commitment to supporting schools and students. They have two children, a son and a daughter, and for much of Hill’s career the family was based near Nike’s headquarters outside Portland, Oregon, while maintaining close ties to Austin, Texas, where Hill grew up and where the couple now have a primary residence. In interviews Hill has described time with his family as his priority away from work, framing them as a stabilising influence amid the demands of global leadership roles.

🚴 Cycling and life in Tuscany. Outside the office Hill and his wife are avid cyclists and spend part of their time at a “home away from home” in Tuscany, Italy, where they ride custom-built gravel bikes on local backroads. A profile by Portland-based builder Breadwinner Cycles recounted how the couple commissioned matching bikes suited to Tuscany’s mixed terrain and use them for long rides that, in Hill’s words, allow them to enjoy the countryside “up close and personal” and justify Italy’s rich cuisine. Hill also continues to run and train regularly, often in Nike apparel, reflecting a lifelong identification with sport as both a personal passion and professional context.

🤝 Leadership style and personal ethos. Accounts from colleagues and media portray Hill as a personable, informal leader who prefers sneakers and a T-shirt to traditional corporate attire and who is as comfortable chatting with store staff or interns as he is addressing coaches or board directors. He credits his mother with teaching him to “treat every human being like they matter,” a maxim that underpins his habit of greeting employees by name and cultivating what he calls a “family” atmosphere inside Nike. At the same time Hill is described as highly competitive and capable of delivering rousing speeches that link Nike’s mission—“to bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world”—with the day-to-day work of designers, marketers and operators. In internal discussions he is known to ask repeatedly, “How does this serve the athlete?”, using the question as a filter for strategic decisions.

🎓 Educational and community philanthropy. Hill and his wife channel much of their philanthropy toward education, youth and community development, reflecting both their family backgrounds and his own trajectory as a scholarship-supported student-athlete. In Portland they organised a high-profile auction of sports memorabilia from Hill’s personal collection—including rare Nike Air Jordans and customised TCU sneakers—to endow the Candace Newland Holley Scholarship in honour of his mother, raising around US$1.5 million and supplementing the proceeds with a further US$750,000 personal contribution. The scholarship supports underprivileged students attending Catholic schools in the city. At TCU the Hills have funded scholarships for aspiring educators and contributed to campus infrastructure; in recognition, the university named a residence hall “Hill Hall” in their honour. Hill also supports local initiatives in Austin and Portland, including parks and recreation projects, consistent with his interest in sport, outdoor life and community spaces.

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Controversies, critics and challenges

⚖️ Corporate culture and 2018 Nike workplace issues. Over his multi-decade career Hill has largely avoided personal scandal, and available reporting during Nike’s 2018 reckoning over workplace culture does not implicate him in the complaints that led to the departure of several senior executives. At that time Nike commissioned an internal survey that highlighted concerns about a “boys’ club” culture, prompting the company to examine its leadership ranks and policies. Hill’s promotion to president of consumer and marketplace in the midst of that process was interpreted by some observers as an attempt by Nike’s board and then-CEO Mark Parker to install a leader viewed as aligned with the company’s stated values and capable of helping stabilise morale.

🥊 Strategic headwinds and competitive landscape. Hill’s second act at Nike unfolds against a challenging backdrop for the global sportswear industry. Emerging brands such as On and Hoka have gained share in running and lifestyle segments, while established rival Adidas has rebounded from previous setbacks with new product successes. Nike has grappled with slower growth in key markets, including China, and has faced criticisms that its pipeline of headline-grabbing innovations and culturally resonant campaigns has thinned, particularly among younger consumers for whom the brand’s legacy carries less weight. Hill’s decision to refocus on core performance categories, prune underperforming lifestyle lines and re-embrace wholesale distribution has been welcomed by some analysts as a necessary course correction, but it has also entailed trade-offs, including short-term pressure on profit margins and the risk of ceding ground in fashion-forward segments.

🧪 Innovation, social issues and expectations of change. Commentators have noted that simply bringing back a long-serving insider does not automatically resolve questions about Nike’s capacity for disruptive innovation or its cultural relevance in an era of fragmented media and shifting consumer expectations. A Bloomberg feature on Donahoe’s tenure described him as “the man who made Nike uncool,” raising the question of whether legacy approaches can fully address the brand’s youth-culture challenges. Hill has responded by stressing the need to “create the most innovative, coveted” products and by greenlighting bolder storytelling around athletes, yet he has generally been less publicly outspoken on political issues than some earlier Nike campaigns that featured figures such as Colin Kaepernick. Under his watch Nike has continued to invest in diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, including appointing a new chief DEI officer in 2025, while reiterating the company’s inclusive definition of “athlete” as encompassing everyone with a body.

📣 Investor scrutiny and activist pressure. As with many large public companies, Nike’s leadership operates under significant scrutiny from institutional and activist investors. Hill’s appointment was reportedly welcomed by Bill Ackman, whose Pershing Square Capital Management has built a sizeable stake in Nike and advocated for operational and strategic changes. At the same time, Nike’s board has shown a willingness to move decisively when performance falters, as evidenced by Donahoe’s relatively abrupt exit even before activists formally forced the issue. Hill has acknowledged that the turnaround “will not be a straight line” and has framed his decision to take the role as an example of “raising [one’s] hand” rather than “pointing fingers,” a remark he uses to encourage accountability and problem-solving within the organisation. His tenure will ultimately be assessed on whether he can translate cultural and strategic shifts into sustained revenue growth, margin improvement and renewed brand momentum.

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Legacy and public image

🏆 Intern-to-CEO narrative and symbolism. Hill’s life story—rising from a modest background in Austin and an entry-level sales internship to the top job at Nike—has been highlighted by the company, his university and media outlets as emblematic of upward mobility within corporate structures when talent and perseverance converge with organisational opportunity. Nike’s first corporate historian, Scott Reames, has described Hill’s return as a “critically important inflection point” that signals to employees the value placed on long-term commitment and alignment with the brand’s ethos, while the enthusiastic reaction to his appointment on professional networks such as LinkedIn underscored the resonance of his “intern to CEO” journey in the broader business community.

🧑‍🏫 Mentor figure and late-career CEO. Hill became a first-time public-company CEO in his early sixties, an age at which many peers are contemplating retirement, and this timing contributes to perceptions of him as a mentor-like figure for younger professionals. He frequently speaks to students at TCU and to Nike interns about the importance of curiosity, listening and adaptability, drawing lessons from his own path through an evolving corporate and cultural landscape. Unlike some high-profile executives, he maintains a relatively low media profile, granting few interviews in his first year as CEO and often deflecting attention toward Nike’s teams and athletes when he does appear in public forums. Video features produced by outlets such as Fast Company and Nike itself present him as a hands-on leader who wears and tests products, speaks in accessible language and frames his ambitions for the company in terms of making “epic” products and experiences for athletes.

📜 Connection to Nike’s heritage and boomerang leadership. Hill is the first non-founder CEO in Nike’s history to have retired from the company and later been brought back to lead it, placing him in a broader corporate pattern of “boomerang” leaders such as Apple’s Steve Jobs and Disney’s Bob Iger while also underscoring Nike’s reliance on homegrown talent. Having spent nearly his entire professional life at Nike, interrupted only by a short spell in private equity and board roles, he brings extensive institutional memory and a strong personal attachment to the firm’s heritage. Hill frequently invokes the philosophies of co-founders Phil Knight and Bill Bowerman, including Bowerman’s line that “if you have a body, you are an athlete,” and keeps memorabilia such as early “Just Do It” campaign posters in his office as reminders of the brand’s origins. He has described his affinity for Nike as an “irrational love,” a phrase that encapsulates both his emotional connection to the company and the expectations placed upon him to steer it successfully through the competitive and cultural challenges of the 2020s.

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