Heidi Petz

Overview

Heidi G. Petz
Born	c. 1975 Central Pennsylvania, United States
Citizenship	American
Education	B.A. in Leadership Studies; MBA
Alma mater	University of Richmond; Loyola University Maryland
Occupation	Business executive
Employer	Sherwin-Williams Company
Known for	First female CEO of Sherwin-Williams
Title	Chair, President and Chief Executive Officer
Term	2024–present
Predecessor	John G. Morikis
Board member of	Ulta Beauty; University Hospitals Health System; Policy Advisory Board of Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies
Children	3

👩‍💼 Heidi G. Petz (born c. 1975) is an American business executive who serves as chair, president and chief executive officer (CEO) of the Sherwin-Williams Company, a United States-based paint and coatings manufacturer. She was elected CEO in October 2023, with effect from 1 January 2024, after previously holding the roles of president and chief operating officer (COO). A former marketing and sales leader at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), Target and Newell Rubbermaid, she entered the coatings sector with Valspar in 2013 and moved to Sherwin-Williams when it acquired Valspar in 2017. Petz is the first woman and only the tenth individual to lead Sherwin-Williams since the company's founding in 1866, and under her leadership Sherwin-Williams reported record net sales of US$23.1 billion in 2024 despite a soft housing market.

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Early life and education

🏡 Family background in Pennsylvania. Petz grew up in central Pennsylvania as the middle child of three in what she has described as a close-knit family environment, where extended family gatherings and Sunday dinners were a regular feature of childhood. She often recalls helping her grandfather prepare Sunday pot roast and organising activities for cousins and relatives, an early indication of the organisational instinct and informal leadership she would later bring into her professional life.

🏫 Student leadership at the University of Richmond. After high school, Petz enrolled at the University of Richmond’s Westhampton College in Virginia, attracted by the university’s intimate campus and the then relatively new Jepson School of Leadership Studies. An active student, she competed in sports and participated in student government, serving as class president in her first year and discovering a preference for roles that combined collaboration with accountability. This environment reinforced her interest in how organisations function and the dynamics between formal and informal leaders.

🎓 Jepson School and leadership studies. At the Jepson School, Petz majored in Leadership Studies, complementing this with minors in business administration and speech communication. She later emphasised that the programme’s attention to organisational culture, ethics and “followership” offered a distinctive lens on leadership beyond traditional management courses. One formative class paired her with a local fourth-grade pupil whom she mentored over a semester, forcing her to adapt communication and expectations to a real-world setting she later described as “cutting-edge” training in situational leadership.

🧠 Advanced study and leadership philosophy. Petz graduated in 1997 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Leadership Studies and subsequently completed a Master of Business Administration at Loyola University Maryland, further strengthening her grounding in finance and organisational behaviour. She has credited her formal education with shaping a leadership approach rooted in collaboration and humility, summarising her philosophy as, “It’s never been about me. It’s about surrounding myself with really smart people and winning with them.” This team-centric ethos, present in her student years, later became central to her management style in complex corporate settings.

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Career

💼 Early corporate roles in marketing, sales and finance. Following her graduate studies, Petz embarked on a corporate career spanning marketing, sales and financial positions at several large companies, including PwC, Target Corporation and Newell Rubbermaid. Over roughly 15 years she progressed through roles that exposed her to consumer products, retail operations and financial discipline, building a broad skill set that combined analytical rigour with front-line commercial experience.

🛒 Transition into the coatings industry at Valspar. In 2013, Petz made a significant sectoral shift by joining Valspar, a major paint and coatings manufacturer, as vice president of marketing for its consumer business. The move placed her at the intersection of branded consumer products and industrial coatings, and she was tasked with strengthening Valspar’s position with big-box retailers and professional contractors. Colleagues from this period later described her as a hands-on leader who quickly absorbed the technical and commercial nuances of the coatings market.

🎨 Integration into Sherwin-Williams and Consumer Brands leadership. Sherwin-Williams acquired Valspar in 2017, and Petz was among the executives selected to transfer into the combined group’s leadership structure. She took on senior roles within the Consumer Brands Group, which manages a portfolio of well-known retail paint brands sold through home-improvement chains and other channels. By focusing on brand positioning, customer relationships and supply-chain reliability, she helped the division navigate both the integration of Valspar’s business and an increasingly competitive retail environment.

🧱 Pandemic-era demand and the Consumer Brands Group. As president of the Consumer Brands Group during the COVID-19 pandemic, Petz oversaw a surge in do-it-yourself (DIY) paint demand in 2020 as homebound consumers invested in renovation projects. Under her leadership, Sherwin-Williams launched initiatives aimed at professional painters, including the “Pros Who Paint” programme, which sought to capture business from small contractors and position the company as a partner rather than merely a supplier. Management commentary from this period highlighted her ability to capitalise on unexpected demand while managing raw material constraints and operational disruptions.

🌐 The Americas Group and crisis management. In 2020 Petz became senior vice president of sales and marketing for the Americas Group, Sherwin-Williams’ core stores division, and in 2021 she was promoted to president of the group, overseeing more than 4,500 company-owned paint stores and an extensive salesforce across North America. The role coincided with what Sherwin-Williams described as “some of the most challenging environments” in its history, encompassing natural disasters, raw material shortages, steep cost inflation and COVID-19-related disruptions. Then-CEO John G. Morikis praised Petz for “creating momentum” across the division, emphasising her focus on employees and customers while sustaining operational performance under pressure.

📈 President and chief operating officer. In February 2022 Sherwin-Williams announced that Petz would be promoted to president and chief operating officer, effective March that year, placing her in charge of the company’s three operating segments and global supply chain. The appointment reflected what external analysts regarded as a carefully managed succession process, with Petz increasingly visible on earnings calls and investor days as the executive responsible for day-to-day operations of the more than US$20 billion enterprise. In this capacity she continued to emphasise investment in store expansion, logistics and technology while maintaining strict cost discipline.

💹 Elevation to CEO and strategic direction. On 11 October 2023 the Sherwin-Williams board elected Petz as the company’s next CEO, with effect from 1 January 2024; Morikis remained executive chairman. The company highlighted her track record of “driving growth and operational excellence” across multiple divisions and expressed confidence that she would accelerate progress towards long-term growth and profitability goals. Petz was 48 at the time of her appointment and became the first woman, and only the tenth chief executive, to lead Sherwin-Williams in its more than 150-year history, a milestone noted in coverage of gender representation among large public-company CEOs.

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Compensation and wealth

💰 Executive pay and incentives. As CEO, Petz receives a compensation package typical of large U.S. industrial companies, combining base salary, annual incentive pay and long-term equity awards. For 2024, public filings indicated total compensation of approximately US$13 million, including a base salary of about US$1.28 million, an annual bonus of around US$1.45 million, and stock and option awards valued at roughly US$9.9 million. This represented a substantial increase from earlier years; in 2022, when she was still progressing through divisional leadership roles, her total pay was reported at about US$3.5 million.

📊 Share ownership, perquisites and pay ratio. Petz’s remuneration is partly performance-linked, with variable pay tied to metrics such as earnings per share growth and return on invested capital, aligning her incentives with shareholder returns. In addition to cash compensation and equity, disclosures note standard executive perquisites, including limited personal use of the corporate aircraft, capped at a set allowance. Sherwin-Williams reported a CEO pay ratio—the relationship between CEO compensation and median employee pay—of approximately 232:1 for 2024, a figure that attracted some scrutiny from commentators in the context of broader debates about executive pay. Petz also receives director fees and equity for roles on other boards, including Ulta Beauty and University Hospitals Health System, which diversify her income beyond Sherwin-Williams.

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Leadership style

🤝 Team-centred, collaborative ethos. Throughout interviews and speeches, Petz has consistently framed her leadership style as collaborative and team-oriented, encapsulated in her remark that “it’s never been about me—it’s about surrounding myself with really smart people and winning with them.” She credits her undergraduate training in leadership studies with encouraging an emphasis on followership, organisational culture and shared accountability, rather than a purely hierarchical view of authority.

🏃‍♀️ Athletic mindset and competitive drive. Petz, a keen participant in sports during her youth, has likened corporate management to athletic competition, suggesting that “there’s a lot of athleticism in business,” by which she means a blend of preparation, stamina and teamwork. Colleagues have described her as both intensely focused and “contagiously enthusiastic”, noting that she sets high expectations while working alongside teams to solve problems in demanding environments such as supply-chain disruptions and cost spikes.

🧭 Adaptability, communication and mentoring. A recurrent theme in Petz’s public remarks is the importance of adaptability and emotional intelligence in getting the best out of teams. “For me to get the best out of my team, it is about my ability to adapt to them… meet them where they are,” she has said, underscoring a belief that leaders must adjust style and communication to different personalities and situations. She is known for frequent visits to Sherwin-Williams stores and plants, as well as for remembering front-line employees by name, behaviours that have contributed to her reputation as an accessible senior leader. Mentoring is another focus: in addition to formal programmes, Petz has engaged informally with rising managers, particularly women and under-represented groups within the company’s leadership pipeline.

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Personal life

👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Family life and work–life balance. Petz is married, uses the surname Petz professionally (former classmates recall her as Heidi Gottschalk), and is the mother of three children. She has spoken candidly about the challenges of balancing family responsibilities with the demands of a senior executive career, advising students and early-career professionals to “make sure your head and heart are aligned—check in with yourself and be honest about what lights you up,” arguing that genuine enthusiasm for one’s work is essential for sustaining long hours and high-pressure decision-making. Those who have worked with her frequently comment on her grounded manner and willingness to discuss the realities of parenting while holding a top corporate role.

🌆 Community involvement and public engagement. Outside her corporate duties, Petz is active in civic and industry organisations in and around Cleveland, where Sherwin-Williams is headquartered. She serves on the board of University Hospitals Health System, one of Ohio’s largest healthcare providers, and sits on the Policy Advisory Board of Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, reflecting an interest in housing and urban development issues relevant to the coatings sector. In May 2024 she returned to the University of Richmond to deliver the commencement address, sharing her unconventional career path from liberal-arts student to CEO and encouraging graduates, particularly women, to consider careers in manufacturing, operations and other fields where female leaders remain under-represented.

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Controversies and challenges

⚖️ Temporary suspension of 401(k) matching contributions. One of the earliest high-profile tests of Petz’s CEO tenure came in September 2025, when Sherwin-Williams announced that it would temporarily suspend its 6 per cent matching contribution to employees’ 401(k) retirement plans as a cost-saving measure. Management cited weaker-than-expected sales, high interest rates in the housing market, inflation and tariff pressures as reasons for the decision and warned of continued macroeconomic headwinds into 2026. The company noted that it had paused the match in previous downturns, including 2009 and 2020, presenting the measure as a temporary response to cyclical pressures.

🏢 Employee reaction and public criticism. The announcement nonetheless provoked strong criticism from some employees and commentators, particularly because it coincided with the opening of Sherwin-Williams’ new headquarters tower in downtown Cleveland and followed years of robust profitability, including nearly US$1.3 billion in profit in the second quarter of 2025 and ongoing dividend payments and share repurchases. A paint-industry blog reported anonymous accounts from current and former employees alleging wage concerns, retaliation and unsafe working conditions, and argued that the suspension of retirement contributions had damaged morale and trust. Critics framed the episode as inconsistent with Sherwin-Williams’ messaging around being a “people-first” employer.

📉 Response, communication and internal engagement. In response to the backlash, Petz and her leadership team sought to explain the decision directly to employees, stressing that the suspension was intended to preserve jobs and avoid more severe measures such as layoffs. She increased the frequency of internal town-hall meetings and supported the creation of forums for staff to raise concerns anonymously, aiming to restore confidence among the workforce. Commentators described the dispute as an early leadership test for Petz, highlighting the difficulty of balancing cost discipline and shareholder expectations with employee engagement in a period of economic uncertainty.

🧪 Environmental, product-safety and reputational issues. Beyond labour-related challenges, Sherwin-Williams—like other legacy paint makers—has faced scrutiny over environmental and product-safety matters, including historic litigation linked to lead-based paint, issues that largely predate Petz’s tenure but continue to shape the regulatory backdrop in which the company operates. The company has invested in research and development aimed at lower-emission and low-volatile organic compound (VOC) products and has established sustainability targets, initiatives that Petz has endorsed as both environmental and commercial imperatives. In public statements she has generally avoided partisan political issues but has spoken about environmental, social and governance (ESG) themes—particularly diversity and inclusion in leadership—as important to talent attraction and innovation. Earlier reputational missteps, such as a widely criticised 2020 decision to dismiss a store employee whose paint-mixing videos had attracted a large audience on TikTok, occurred before her appointment as CEO but contributed to a broader internal reassessment of how the company engages with social media and emerging marketing channels.

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Other activities and recognition

🌱 Symbolism as a woman CEO in a male-dominated sector. Petz’s appointment as CEO of Sherwin-Williams was widely noted in discussions of gender representation among senior executives, as she joined a relatively small cohort of women leading Fortune 500 companies—around 10 per cent of the total by the mid-2020s. Commentators observed that her rise from a liberal-arts background into the leadership of a large manufacturing firm challenged assumptions that such roles must be filled by executives with engineering or finance degrees. While Petz has often stated that she prefers to be regarded simply as a capable leader rather than as a “woman CEO”, she has acknowledged the symbolic weight of her position for younger women considering careers in industrial sectors.

🌍 Speaking engagements and external commentary. In addition to her commencement address at the University of Richmond, Petz has participated in industry conferences and leadership forums, where she has discussed topics ranging from supply-chain resilience to culture-building in global organisations. Her recognition has included appearances on lists of “rising stars” and “powerful women in business”, and she has been cited in business media and professional networks as an example of a leader who combines strong operational grounding with an emphasis on people and culture. Such coverage has reinforced her profile beyond the coatings industry.

🔭 Legacy and future outlook. Observers suggest that Petz’s long-term legacy at Sherwin-Williams will depend on how effectively she steers the company through structural shifts in housing, retail and industrial markets, as well as through increasing expectations around sustainability and digital engagement. She has expressed particular enthusiasm for “designing and building” organisations and has compared the role of CEO to choreographing a complex performance in which strategy, operations and people must be synchronised. As Sherwin-Williams expands globally and invests in new technologies and store formats, her tenure is expected to shape the next chapter of a company that has been a fixture in the coatings industry for more than a century and a half.

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