May 5, 2022 • 37 mins
Jim Weber has been the chief executive of Brooks Running since 2001. In his newly released book, “Running With Purpose,” Weber talks about how he turned a company that was on the brink of bankruptcy into a billion-dollar consumer brand.
On this episode of Out of Office, Weber talks business, leadership, and how his battle with cancer—which left him unable to run—has shaped his personal story.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi there, and welcome back to Out of Office. I'm
your host, Melika Kapoor, the CEO of Brooks Running. Jim
Webber has written a book. I just finished reading it
and I have to say I loved it. It's called
(00:21):
Running with Purpose, and it tells the remarkable story of
the turnaround at Brooks Running. Once nearly bankrupt, it's now
a billion dollar brand. I think Brooks is a fantastic
story on a couple of levels. It's a great, you know,
competitive strategy story, David and Golias story to challenge your
brand story, it's a great turnaround story. And there's actually
(00:43):
a couple of cases that have been written in business
schools that that coverage. Jim has been CEO since two
thousand and one. He reflects on his leadership style. He
says he's hard wired to be a glass half book
kind of guy, something he decided on when he was
just a young child. I just couldn't quite find my way.
I was bullied a bit, and I had some horrible
(01:04):
and certain experiences and in the classroom in second grade
and third grade and fourth grade, and and so I
don't know, you know, why I was able to react
the way I was, but I just sort of, you know,
lifted my head up at age ten and I just
decided I wanted to be happier than I felt. Um.
I wanted to be good at something. Five years ago,
(01:27):
Jim was diagnosed with cancer. Though he's overcome the odds
and his cancer for today, it was a big setback
for an avid runner. It's been a journey. I do
not recommend cancer to anyone. It's not a club that
you want to join. But having joined it, I feel
fortunate to be where I am today. Jim explains how
his personal and corporate setbacks have shipped him as a
(01:48):
leader and in turn made Brooks Running as successful as
it is today. We're not trying to be anybody else
for trying to be Brooks. Here was Jim on out
of Office. Jim, welcome to out of office. Thank you
for having me. It's good to be here today. You've
(02:08):
been CEO of Brooks Running for a very long time,
for over two decades. What made you want to write
the book now? You know? It's interesting. I've been thinking
about a book for probably the last six or seven years,
and and the core essence of it is I think
Brooks is a fantastic story on a couple of levels.
It's a great you know, competitive strategy story, David and
(02:31):
Goliah story to challenge your brand story, it's a great
turnaround story. And there's actually a couple of cases that
have been written in business schools that that cover it.
So I you know, I think, I think what we're
doing isn't new, but it's a bit novel because the
brand was at one point high performance, you know, sort
of a class brand for enthusiasts and performance products. It
(02:55):
went more mass and casual products and the like, and
we've brought it back to a premium performance enthusiast brand,
which which is pretty rare in certainly in sporting goods
of UM and equipment. UM. So it's it's uh, it's
it's a fun journey. And what I get excited about
is building a brand for the long haul and we're
(03:17):
doing that with a team around a purpose in in
a fantastic category. So for all those reasons, I just
think it's it was a great story that I wanted
to tell. Well, I'm glad you told it, And did
you enjoy the process reflecting, researching, writing? You know, it's
interesting because um, what started it. I took a four
(03:39):
week mini sabbatical in two thousand and fifteen and I
just committed to being off the grid for those those days,
and I will I wrote four hours every morning, and
so that was really unpacking my own personal journey and
you know, trying to understand why I am who I am,
and I needed to do that work. But it led
(04:00):
right into Brooks. And so, you know, when I had
a meeting with Warren Buffett just over two years ago,
a breakfast meeting where we were talking about all sorts
of topics, and at the end of the meeting, you know,
this was March two thousand and twenty, he said, Jim
Brooks is a great story. You should write a book.
And and so that's you know, that's what really prompted
(04:22):
me to do it. But you know, I think it
started with me sort of unpacking why I am who
I am and the leader that I've income. So it's
sort of all came together in the book. Now, what
makes Brooke Brooks really stand out as a company is
the turnaround story. Is that David versus Goliath story that
you mentioned. The company has gone from being close to
(04:44):
being bankrupt to having its best year you achieved a
billion dollars in revenue in one You've made lots of changes,
but if you had to pick one change that made
the biggest difference, is it possible to even identify that?
You know, everything in life is journey, and Brooks has
been on a journey and it has as it has
several chapters. But I think for me and also for Brooks,
(05:07):
the biggest difference in our success has been this long
term focus on the north Star. We we've had a
purpose around inspiring everyone to run their path, but it's
really been around building as well a great business against
that brand in a fantastic twenty billion dollar global category.
So because we had that north Star and long term focus,
(05:30):
we've stayed on it and focused through every challenge we've had,
and we've had to do pivots and so on and
so forth, but we've always been focused on the Runner
and building this performance brand with them. I think that's
the reason it's such an interesting story, because I could
have easily left four different times in a private equity
mode right where you sort of reached a plateau. Everybody
(05:52):
high fives a success and everybody goes on, And I've
stayed all through each one of those milestones because the
opportunity for this brand is so compelling. And throughout you've
just stayed focused on your niche, which is the runner, right.
You haven't got distracted attempted to fig into other areas
of fitness and sport. You know that's true. And I
(06:16):
think what's so interesting about the business world is that
there's every category maybe has one large leading platform brand
or business and some of them are true platforms. In
athletic footworn apparel and outdoor and fitness, we have one
or more of those, and so if you're not that
leading platform brand, you better have a niche, you better
(06:39):
have a focus signing. What what's so exciting is we've
chosen the biggest category in sporting goods fitness, athletic footwarn
apparel running because it's a special sport, right, it's one
of the maybe the original sport track and field cross
country from from school to the Olympic level, and the
roads and the trails, ultras, etcetera. But it becomes more
(07:00):
than that. It's bigger because it's it's soap for you know,
hundred and fifty million people run. For many of them,
it's an investment in themselves their health and wellness and fitness.
So that's the space that we're trying to that's the
niche that Brooks is trying to build a meaningful, compelling brand,
you know, with with Runners in And we're so excited
(07:22):
about that because it happens to be a huge niche,
a global niche. But that's that's true because we're the
only brand, the only major brand that's really focused just
done running and what that means. And so we're excited
about that. Where I would I I've often said, we're
doing something that really no one's quite done before because
all the other brands that have become meaningful and run
(07:43):
have expanded into all these other categories and and and
those are you know, those are probably good opportunities and
good businesses to We just chosen to be, you know,
highly relevant to a customer cohort and and it happens
to be a huge cohort and a code that got
much bigger during the pandemic, right You've seen a massive boom.
(08:06):
I mean, what else could people do during lockdowns and
stay at home orders except go out and run, you know,
And and when all the lockdowns began to happen, LKA.
We you know, we saw all of retail closed down
in a week across Europe. It rolled through the North
America and of course in Asia. And so when we
saw that happen, we we've seen in trying times in
(08:29):
the past and recessions and just difficult economic times, we've
seen running actually start to grow because it's so convenient.
It's how your back door and uh and it's it's
it's affordable. You don't have to pay a monthly fee
to go run and in your jam or in your
ear back your back neighborhood. So you know, even with
(08:50):
the sports shutdown, we thought as as March, April and
May and in the North American shutdowns were coming to
be that there was a good chance that running would
make the cut. And we feel so grateful this this
you know, this disruption from from COVID and the economic
disruption has been so asymmetric. It's just it's just not
been even across businesses. And we're very fortunate because running, walking, hiking,
(09:14):
just just getting out and moving was a COVID friendly activity.
So yeah, we we ended up being, you know, essentially
perfectly positioned for what was available to people. And running
has grown dramatically in the last two years. So can
I tell you something that I started running UM just
as the lockdowns began, and I've never run before, and
(09:37):
like you said, this was something that was easy to do.
And I joined women's running group and it's called w
r W Women Running the World. Fantastic, That's that's kind
of thing i've heard yet today. That's wonderful. Yes, And
it's about a hundred and fifty women who get together
in my neighborhood Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and we get
(09:58):
together in the park and we just go and we
are off to Berlin in two weeks for the half marathon. Congratulations,
that's fantastic. All the best re Congratulations yet I'm nervous
as hell is the first one. But I know you're
you've been training and that's the achievement in and of itself.
I hope you have a great experience there. And there
are lots of Brooks running shoes in the group. I
(10:19):
do have to tell you that that I always enjoy
hearing that work as a as a niche brand. You know,
we still it makes a smile when we see shoes
on feet. UM, we count run her feet at the time,
so we love to hear that. I didn't realize how
old the company is, honestly till I started researching the
(10:40):
company for for this interview, and I was surprised that
it's more than a hundred years old. How do you
stay relevant while still holding on to some of the
tradition that the company is known for. Yeah, you know,
it's it's it's such a unique story. Brooks was founded
in nineteen fourteen in Philadelphia, and and it quickly became
(11:01):
a full line athletic footwear manufacturer. And that's the reason
I understood only much later on why almost all brands
were making every kind of shoe there was, and and
family footwear athletically styled family footwear, all the webps to
performance because in the in the days when you you
had very you know, focused supply chains, you had to
(11:22):
keep the factory bussy. You had to go from baseball
leads to football leads to running, etcetera. So Brooks was
in everything all the way up through the eighties and nineties.
Even though I'm older, I grew up. I came out
of college in in the early eighties, and the jogging
boom had started in the United States. Right, So I
started running marathons, and after I quit playing competitive sport,
(11:45):
I ran for fitness and fun and so that was
a huge boom time and the company and Brooks was there.
Brooks had some of the most interesting innovative technology for
runners in the seventies, eighties and on. But there they were,
they had several owners, they had many CEOs. They weren't
managed that well as a business, and so when you
fast forward through, you know, we had we still had
(12:08):
good um performance running products in the marketplace, but we
were playing in all of these different categories trying to
be successful and we weren't. We were literally seventh, eighth
or ninth brand in basketball and court shoes and family footwear,
and you know the bigger brands just do that so
so well. So for us, you know, really going back
(12:30):
to almost our roots, where it was a performance piece
of equipment for an athlete and and and runners. The
definition of an athlete is right foot, left foot repeat.
If you're you're moving right, you need good gear. We
think every runners deserves deserves performance. So so by focusing
back on really what Brooks was best known for and
(12:54):
not competing against anything else, it really was empowering for
our people because now we could really focus on that
product getting better every season, putting all our energies and
efforts into making the best running gear that we could.
And the goal is to make the best in the world, right,
that's who we're competing with. So so I think the
journey for Brooks of making an old brand new. Here's
(13:16):
how I see it is that you know you have
to earn your customer every day. And I think that's
what I learned early in my career, is that early
in my career, I learned how to manage a brand,
how to manage a product line. Um. Early in my career,
one of my boss is one said to me, Jim,
that's great. You're you've proven you're a good turn you
can turn around businesses, you can manage through challenges, but
(13:40):
can you grow a brand? And that's where I think
that's the entrepreneurial um mindset, right to be able to
grow a brand this customer focus and attract new customers
into what you're doing. That's a skill set that I
didn't have early in my career. And it's it's fun,
it's challenging, but that the that's what we added to
(14:01):
Brooks instead of just managing a hundred year old brand,
we challenge ourselves every day to make it relevant and
interesting and exciting and compelling, you know, really connecting with
the hearts and minds of runners with performance products and
celebrating their run to win, to win their trial that
these try our products and in our category. You know,
(14:24):
that first brand experience as a product experience. So so yeah,
I think the challenge on growing a brand is very
different from managing one. And we've been doing that now
for twenty years at Brooks, so we've this company is young.
It's a hundred years, but it's young because you know,
every day we wake up and and you know, we
(14:45):
know we're gonna have to earn a runners trust and
trial and and build a relationship with them. So yeah,
huge learning for me because I think before I came
to Brooks that was that was a mindset and let
alone a skill that I was still trying to develop.
(15:08):
You mentioned the world trust just not I'm glad you did.
I was going to come to that next. You talk
a lot about that in your book, the importance of running,
of earning a runners trust, but also about earning your
employees trust. How do you go about earning first of all,
a runners trust, You know, I just see it as
the foundation of of really brand, a great brand, and
(15:32):
the foundation of authentic leadership and frankly, effective leadership is
trust with people. And so you know, we be and
because we were anchored in performance, a runner knows at
mile twenty three, two weeks into the shoe, whether they'll
ever buy that shoe again. And so in early days,
(15:53):
our product wasn't that aesthetically appealing design was was yet
to come. I believe it is beautiful now and we're
producing fantastically gorgeous product, But in the early days, we
were more focused on function because we knew fit, feel
and ride and how that shoe felt both from a
(16:13):
comfort and a performance level, and injury prevention features and
the like, whether we ever get the second shoe, and
so trust is the key to getting the second shoe purchase,
and and that's the piece there. And then in leadership,
you know, I just think you know that ultimately your
customers smart and they're going to figure out what your
(16:34):
company is all about. And and so you know, building
an organization where not only we trust each other, but
we're building foundations in our values in our philosophies and
our strategies. You know, every every peal of of the
onion it brooks. Every time you look under the hooded Brooks,
you're gonna find running. That's what you're gonna find here. No,
(16:55):
I think we've built We've built the brand, you know,
on on building out ability and trust with Runners. That's
the you can't say you're an authentic leader. You can't
say you're an authentic brand. In my view, you have
to earn that. You have to earn that authentic brat badge.
And so for me, it's it's always behaviors. You know,
(17:15):
I think in the long term, um, your an outcome
of your behaviors. And so that's why we talk a
lot about trust in and around what we're promising, what
we're convicted around, what we believe in and uh and
just executing that so consistently that would become trusted for it.
(17:35):
So so it's really about behaviors, I would say, because
that's what becomes culture. That your your behad. Your brand
is a collection of your behaviors. Your culture long term
is a collection of your behavior. So trust is a
big deal for sure. Talking about leadership, Warren Buffett wrote
the forward to your book, and of course Brooks Running
(17:58):
is a standalone company under the book show Hathaway umbrella.
What's it like working with Warren Buffett? It's it's I'm
just going to describe it as a gift. I've so
enjoyed it because when I first met him in probably
two thousand and eleven, I think we sat down and
talked about Brooks and the opportunities with Brooks. I told
(18:20):
him at that time that he didn't know it, but
he had been mentoring me for almost twenty five years
because I began writing his letters and I tell the
story in the book in the nineteen eighties because I
was working at a company that had competed with the
Berkshire Company, not successfully and uh and since that time,
I've just been a student of his thinking around brands
(18:42):
and moats and business and so you know, I what
what the way we built Brooks I knew would be
appealing to Warren and Charlie Munger. I just Charlie's a
vice chairman and Warren's partner. Because we built a unique
brand and distinctive brand. We're not trying to be anybody
(19:03):
else for trying to be Brooks, and we've built it
in a in a really thoughtful way to bring value
to the customer. And it's a great business with good
minds and good returns on capital and the light. So
so when I first sat down with him, my first
goal was to have him fall in love with Brooks,
and and he I think he has. He just sees
the opportunity that we have. But but he's been so interesting.
(19:25):
You know, Berkshire is a one off, I believe corporate
culture in the world because they really have this deserved
trust culture for all of the business units and the
leadership and the business units. And so we we are
responsible for Brooks in its entirety. We're I'm the chief
culture officer, I'm the chief strategy officer, I'm the chief
risk officer. You know, they're cheering us on to look
(19:48):
out ten years long term to build the brand. He
so understands that brands are in the mind of the
customer and you have to build trust and an affinity
and and engage mint and there's plenty of competition out there.
So so they've just cheered us on and doing that
in a long term way, and it's allowed us to
play through challenging times, whether it was the pandemic or
(20:11):
market shifts, changes in consumer behavior. You know, as long
as we've stayed with Runners, we've been successful. And that's
what Warren has encouraged us to do. It's such an
interesting He's such a smart guy. We had him out
for an employee, uh town hall Um seven years ago,
and and he just gets it. You know, you've got
(20:31):
to get your brand in the mind of the runner.
And there's always gonna be runners, and if you stay
with them and evolve and lead them, you know you're
you're gonna have an incredible brand, you know, a decade
from now. And that's exactly what we're trying to do.
So I feel very fortunate. Um. I've you know, I've
learned a lot, and he's reinforced a lot of how
we think about our brand and our business, in our
(20:52):
in our team. One story that really stuck with me
when I read your book is, Um you talk about
the time when you were sick, and I'm glad you're
doing better now, but after your surgery to get rid
of your cancer, you were in hospital and you had
these feeding tubes and uh, you know, if someone sends
(21:13):
you a gift and it's a massive box of candy
and it's from Warren Buffett and you're sitting there thinking, gee, thanks,
but you know I have these feeding tubes. What am
I gonna do with this gigantic box of candy? So
can you tell our audience a little bit about what
happened next when you read the note? Yeah, I'd be
glad to And I'm smiling because it was just a
(21:35):
stunning moment. Warren often sends out boxes of these chocolates,
and his holiday card has always got a funny picture
of him with with a humorous quip, but it always
comes with a box of chocolates. So I'm in the hospital.
It was an eight day hospital stay to fully recover
from a major surgery. Uh And and I've never been
(21:56):
in a hospital before, so the whole thing was an experience.
But I think it was a four. Here I've been
getting cards and well wishers sending support. It was just
such wonderful, you know, to see how much support I had.
So here comes a box of chocolates from Warren Boff
and I put what is he thinking? I'm not going
to have solid food for for a good you know,
(22:16):
two months? You know, what is he thinking with a
five pound box of chocolate? So I opened the card
and it was classic Warren to Jim, these not necessarily
for you, but I'll bet you're getting fantastic care at
the University of Washington Hospitals and UM and so what
I suggested you put this out in the nurses station
and thank them for the great carrier getting and tell
(22:40):
them if that great care continues, there's more where this
came from. So it was priceless Warren. We put it.
We put the caees candies out in the nurses station,
and people smiled every time they came in my room.
It was it was classic Warren. Um, he's so good
at engaging with people. He's got a brilliant business mind,
(23:01):
but in the category of life's not fair, he's just
also just a superhuman being and and doesn't miss a
beat and engaging with people. It was it made me smile.
Then it still does. Oh and I'm betted middle the
nusis smile and made everybody very happy. Yeah, I was.
I was. I was a popular person on the floor
that week. Are you doing better now? I am so,
(23:26):
I'm I'll be five years from my diagnosis. This December.
And you know, like so many people, uh, when whenever
I have a friend or a family member that gets
an X y Z cancer diagnosis, I go to the
internet just to do some research in the like, and
the internet is full of information and often it's it's
it's unsettling because for me, the five year survival rate
(23:50):
for my cancer was one in five. Would be here
in five years. So I'm cancer free. I feel so grateful,
super fortunate to have the healthcare any that we have
here in Seattle. It's world class. So I'm just lucky
in so many ways. And so yeah, I'm I'm. I
have a job I love and working with the team.
I love four grandchildren that are wonderful and pure joy.
(24:13):
So um, I'm I'm grateful to be here and it's
been a journey. I do not recommend cancer to anyone.
It's not a club that you want to join, but
having joined it, I feel fortunate to be where I
am today. Now in your book, you say my early
(24:39):
life experiences created a lot of hard wiring in me,
and it took me about forty years to decide it
and understand why I am who I am. Yet you
don't really talk that much about your early life in
your book. Can you think of one or two experiences
or perhaps people who have influenced to who really sort
(25:02):
of you know, adjusted or influence to your hard wiring
to make you who you are. Yeah, I'm sure it's
it took me a while to figure it out, so
I'll try to be simple about it. But I think
what was interesting about me is, until I was about
age ten, fourth grade, I was just kind of a lost, um, insecure,
(25:24):
troubled kid. I felt different from everyone around me. I was.
I was in a busy family for for a number
four of six kids, um, and we're all within eight years.
So it was a very busy family and stressful. My
my dad was never very happy person. He was an alcoholic,
and he was just stressed out in his world. And
and I didn't know why, and it sort of affected me.
(25:47):
And then I just, you know, like a lot of kids, UM,
I just couldn't quite find my way. I was bullied
a bit, and I had some horrible and certain experiences
and in the classroom in second grade, third grade, and
fourth grade, and and so I don't know, you know,
why I was able to react the way I was,
But I just sort of you know, lifted my head
(26:09):
up at age ten and I just decided I wanted
to be happier than I felt. Um, I wanted to
be good at something. And uh and I saw in
my friends families they just seemed happier and they were
more calm, and and so I just was I just
woke up and said, I'm gonna I'm on a mission.
I want to I want to have a life that's
glass half full versus glass half empty. And and so
(26:33):
I think, you know, what what my wiring what I
what I it took me a while to understand is
how much that that ambition to be something um different
from what I felt like I was at age ten.
It just drove me. So it was more about you know,
working from fear of failure than it was about pursuing opportunity.
(26:55):
It was it was more about avoiding um, you know,
sort of disappointment or failure. And and but that's what
that's what really led me at Brooks to kind of
reach for a long term, a longer term goal and
not just these three year wins. But I think for
me that was some of the hard wiring is that
I you know, I had my head down until I
(27:17):
aged forty in my career before I lifted up and said, um,
it's it's actually more about you know, achieving, you know,
success and not being a failure. Um, it is about happiness.
It is about engaging with people. It is about the
relationships that you build along the way. And I think
for me, that's when it was it became so clear
(27:38):
it's about the journey. You have to enjoy the moments
along the way because in a sense, you know, the
finish lines never were that rewarding to me to successes
were never they were fleeting. And so that's that's the
hard wiring that I had, is that I'm I'm still motivated,
I'm still very competitive, but I'm trying to soak in
(27:59):
you know, every day and the journey along the way.
And I think, you know, in my early in my
early days, coming out of my youth, I was just
on a mission to not be a failure. I would say,
this mission to not be a failure. I guess that
explains I was going to ask you this. Apparently you
never took any vocation, you never really took any time
(28:22):
off till you sat down to write the book. Is
that part of it like this, you know the feel
of feeling or like if you, um, you know, took
your foot off the accelerator, something might go wrong. Well,
and it's interesting. I took vacations with my family, but
often I'd be working on him. I never The four
(28:43):
week break that I took in fifteen was only the
second time I've done more than a week, and that
not good. I take a week at a time and
then I'd be back. Part of it was, I would say,
is I have I have a sense of duty around leadership.
It's it's hard to explain it. It's hard wired in me.
Is that when I when I'm when I'm accountable and
(29:06):
responsible for something um and I think a CEO is
the steward of the enterprise, right and I don't. I
don't feel I have I'm a control oriented leader or manager.
I think I I love being part of a team,
so we have a very empowered, connected team. But my
sense of accountability and responsibility is total and and so
(29:28):
you know, what I've learned now is is how to
distribute that a little bit as well. But it's still
the way I'm wired, and I think it's one of
the reasons it makes me a successful leader within Berkshire
because I do operate as if I own this business,
and I've always done that. I took complete ownership for
every job that I've had. Brooks is the fourth business
(29:51):
that I've run, and each of the other three I
took the same sense of accountability and responsibility for it.
So I that's I'll call that a curse. You know,
I'm just the way I'm wired. I just feel that.
You know, it's sort of the adage that it's a team,
it's an orchestra. You know, there's so many, you know,
(30:11):
so many metaphors for a team running a business, but
in one sense to you're charting a course and you
don't want to crash the chef, right, you just don't.
And and we've had so many disruptive categories. Nobody uh
predicted COVID nineteen and the impacts it had. But as
a leader, you know, you're ultimately uh and immediately responsible
(30:35):
for navigating it. And we've done that really well too,
and we do that as a team. But anyway, yeah,
I'm I would say I'm cursed by a sense of duty. Um,
But I I the truth is, I enjoy it. I
love I love being a leader, and I love being
a part of a team, and and so I wouldn't
trade my job for anything, but I take it very seriously.
(30:56):
Does it sometimes just feel too much? Does your family
plain that you're a bit obsessed with work? Your wonderful wife,
Mary Ellen, who you dedicate the book to, did she
complain sometimes that you're all about work? You know? I think? Yeah,
I think here's what I would take away from where
I've been. I wanted for my boys. Um, I wanted
(31:18):
them to be able to be proud of at least
who I was and the way I carried myself in
my life. Um, and it was, and we've had you know,
we're we have good relationships all around. But I also
know that I wasn't that you know, sort of wingman
partner to them as a father that that some other
(31:39):
fathers are. But I think because this was part of
my hard wiring, the most important thing to me was
is that they wouldn't be, frankly i'll say it, embarrassed
by me, or or because that was my upbringing, or
avoiding me. And so you know that's you. You tend
to parent. Maybe at least I I've parented around you know,
(32:02):
priorities that I didn't have, and so I'm sure you
know I've I've got there's gaps in terms of me
being there for them as a father in every sense
and in every way that I could be. UM. But
you know, I think that I've done the best I could,
and you know, I think they know I love them all,
I'm supporting them all, and I've I've been much closer
(32:25):
to them than I ever was with my father. But
you know, everybody parents differently and uniquely, and and you know,
it's so fun to talk about parenting because it is
the most unique role in all of life. You know,
you can be a manager and a contributor and a
leader and a blah blah blah blah blah. You can
be a runner and a spouse and a partner, but
(32:47):
being a parent is such a unique job and everybody
obviously brings their own playbook to it. UM. So yeah,
I think that, you know, I'm there's no question in
my mind that there are things that I have and
been there for um with you know, with both my
wife and my children. And on the other side of it,
I've done the best I can and I think we're
(33:08):
we have a great family, and we're connected, and I
always try to be there if I can, if I
can be helpful that they need me. Um, that comes first.
And you know, and I we've had health issues with
one of my sons and I this was a moment.
It isn't in the book, but I just told him
I'm your wingman. Whatever it takes, we're going to solve this.
(33:29):
I am with you. And if it means I have
to take time off work, I'll take whatever it is.
This is number one. And and that's the way it's
been with my wife, Mary Allen Tooths. There's no ambiguity
about you know, them being number one. Um. And and
I'll be there if they need me. But for sure,
I think you know everybody's everybody that's parenting, it's uh,
(33:50):
it's a work in progress because they don't hand you
a manual of how to do it. But you know,
I've given my point. I know it's I've like so
many parents, probably I've given them as best I could
what I didn't have and I thought was important. UM.
And I think generally, UM, it's it's worked out. Okay,
they're all doing well. We're grateful. That's fantastic. A quick
(34:13):
question about running. I know you've been passionate about running
all your life. You've been a runner, and you're slowly
getting back into some form of running. You're working out
what's the future of running? And I asked, is because
when I run now, I look around and everyone's got
these wearables, and everyone's constantly looking at that watch, and
there's so many gadgets and devices. Is that the future
(34:36):
of running? You know? It's a great question. And one
of the truth of running, I think is it's the
ultimate non virtual, non digital human experience. It is you
moving in the world, and and it's it's it's undeniably
of human physical experience. And and so I think that's
(34:59):
a a role in one sense right where the we're
the antidote to this digital, you know, virtual lifestyle that
that is all around us, and screen time is just
taking more and more and more and more and more
of our hours. So so at its core, I think
it's the it's the non virtual experience, you know, And
(35:20):
and that's and and I appreciate that so much now,
you know, in the world where you know, we've got
digital natives that are that are literally growing up in
these these these digital communities in the like you know,
running has to fit into that. But I think, you know,
I think at its core, it's going to be that
an that analog version of that digital life and in
(35:42):
all the wonderful things that that brings, the endorphins and
you know, just just being healthy. I think, you know,
over time, I still believe that probably a well lived
life is going to be health and wellness and happiness
and people and relationships and entertainment and fun and purpose
and impact and meaning. Right, So it's all those things.
(36:04):
So there's always going to be a role I think
for physical movement and activity, you know, for us, and
and that's the role we play. So we're you know,
we're we're I think for races and and uh five
ks and ten ks and marathons and half marathons. There's
a there's you know, there's a role for and f
t s and recognition and and so and so forth.
We're working on some things there, but I would say
(36:27):
they're they're they're going to help create an experience around running.
They're not going to supplant the run and so yet
to be seen, but I think that's the role we play.
We we we get to you know, offer a physical
world experience to add to people's digital lives. Jim, thank
you so much for joining me on Out of Office.
(36:47):
I really enjoyed your book Running with Purpose. Thank you
appreciate a great conversation. Thanks for having me that it
was Jim Webber's CEO of Brooks running on Out of Ourfice.
I hope you enjoyed our conversation as much as I
did recording it. Remember Out of Ourfice as an Apple
(37:09):
podcast on Bloomberg dot Com and the Bloomberg Terminal and
wherever you go to for your regular podcasts. This episode
was produced by Magnus Hendrickson. I'm Alka Kapoor. I hope
you stay well and as always, thank you for listening.
Hi there, and welcome back to Out of Office. I'm
your host, Melika Kapoor, the CEO of Brooks Running. Jim
Webber has written a book. I just finished reading it
and I have to say I loved it. It's called
(00:21):
Running with Purpose, and it tells the remarkable story of
the turnaround at Brooks Running. Once nearly bankrupt, it's now
a billion dollar brand. I think Brooks is a fantastic
story on a couple of levels. It's a great, you know,
competitive strategy story, David and Golias story to challenge your
brand story, it's a great turnaround story. And there's actually
(00:43):
a couple of cases that have been written in business
schools that that coverage. Jim has been CEO since two
thousand and one. He reflects on his leadership style. He
says he's hard wired to be a glass half book
kind of guy, something he decided on when he was
just a young child. I just couldn't quite find my way.
I was bullied a bit, and I had some horrible
(01:04):
and certain experiences and in the classroom in second grade
and third grade and fourth grade, and and so I
don't know, you know, why I was able to react
the way I was, but I just sort of, you know,
lifted my head up at age ten and I just
decided I wanted to be happier than I felt. Um.
I wanted to be good at something. Five years ago,
(01:27):
Jim was diagnosed with cancer. Though he's overcome the odds
and his cancer for today, it was a big setback
for an avid runner. It's been a journey. I do
not recommend cancer to anyone. It's not a club that
you want to join. But having joined it, I feel
fortunate to be where I am today. Jim explains how
his personal and corporate setbacks have shipped him as a
(01:48):
leader and in turn made Brooks Running as successful as
it is today. We're not trying to be anybody else
for trying to be Brooks. Here was Jim on out
of Office. Jim, welcome to out of office. Thank you
for having me. It's good to be here today. You've
(02:08):
been CEO of Brooks Running for a very long time,
for over two decades. What made you want to write
the book now? You know? It's interesting. I've been thinking
about a book for probably the last six or seven years,
and and the core essence of it is I think
Brooks is a fantastic story on a couple of levels.
It's a great you know, competitive strategy story, David and
(02:31):
Goliah story to challenge your brand story, it's a great
turnaround story. And there's actually a couple of cases that
have been written in business schools that that cover it.
So I you know, I think, I think what we're
doing isn't new, but it's a bit novel because the
brand was at one point high performance, you know, sort
of a class brand for enthusiasts and performance products. It
(02:55):
went more mass and casual products and the like, and
we've brought it back to a premium performance enthusiast brand,
which which is pretty rare in certainly in sporting goods
of UM and equipment. UM. So it's it's uh, it's
it's a fun journey. And what I get excited about
is building a brand for the long haul and we're
(03:17):
doing that with a team around a purpose in in
a fantastic category. So for all those reasons, I just
think it's it was a great story that I wanted
to tell. Well, I'm glad you told it, And did
you enjoy the process reflecting, researching, writing? You know, it's
interesting because um, what started it. I took a four
(03:39):
week mini sabbatical in two thousand and fifteen and I
just committed to being off the grid for those those days,
and I will I wrote four hours every morning, and
so that was really unpacking my own personal journey and
you know, trying to understand why I am who I am,
and I needed to do that work. But it led
(04:00):
right into Brooks. And so, you know, when I had
a meeting with Warren Buffett just over two years ago,
a breakfast meeting where we were talking about all sorts
of topics, and at the end of the meeting, you know,
this was March two thousand and twenty, he said, Jim
Brooks is a great story. You should write a book.
And and so that's you know, that's what really prompted
(04:22):
me to do it. But you know, I think it
started with me sort of unpacking why I am who
I am and the leader that I've income. So it's
sort of all came together in the book. Now, what
makes Brooke Brooks really stand out as a company is
the turnaround story. Is that David versus Goliath story that
you mentioned. The company has gone from being close to
(04:44):
being bankrupt to having its best year you achieved a
billion dollars in revenue in one You've made lots of changes,
but if you had to pick one change that made
the biggest difference, is it possible to even identify that?
You know, everything in life is journey, and Brooks has
been on a journey and it has as it has
several chapters. But I think for me and also for Brooks,
(05:07):
the biggest difference in our success has been this long
term focus on the north Star. We we've had a
purpose around inspiring everyone to run their path, but it's
really been around building as well a great business against
that brand in a fantastic twenty billion dollar global category.
So because we had that north Star and long term focus,
(05:30):
we've stayed on it and focused through every challenge we've had,
and we've had to do pivots and so on and
so forth, but we've always been focused on the Runner
and building this performance brand with them. I think that's
the reason it's such an interesting story, because I could
have easily left four different times in a private equity
mode right where you sort of reached a plateau. Everybody
(05:52):
high fives a success and everybody goes on, And I've
stayed all through each one of those milestones because the
opportunity for this brand is so compelling. And throughout you've
just stayed focused on your niche, which is the runner, right.
You haven't got distracted attempted to fig into other areas
of fitness and sport. You know that's true. And I
(06:16):
think what's so interesting about the business world is that
there's every category maybe has one large leading platform brand
or business and some of them are true platforms. In
athletic footworn apparel and outdoor and fitness, we have one
or more of those, and so if you're not that
leading platform brand, you better have a niche, you better
(06:39):
have a focus signing. What what's so exciting is we've
chosen the biggest category in sporting goods fitness, athletic footwarn
apparel running because it's a special sport, right, it's one
of the maybe the original sport track and field cross
country from from school to the Olympic level, and the
roads and the trails, ultras, etcetera. But it becomes more
(07:00):
than that. It's bigger because it's it's soap for you know,
hundred and fifty million people run. For many of them,
it's an investment in themselves their health and wellness and fitness.
So that's the space that we're trying to that's the
niche that Brooks is trying to build a meaningful, compelling brand,
you know, with with Runners in And we're so excited
(07:22):
about that because it happens to be a huge niche,
a global niche. But that's that's true because we're the
only brand, the only major brand that's really focused just
done running and what that means. And so we're excited
about that. Where I would I I've often said, we're
doing something that really no one's quite done before because
all the other brands that have become meaningful and run
(07:43):
have expanded into all these other categories and and and
those are you know, those are probably good opportunities and
good businesses to We just chosen to be, you know,
highly relevant to a customer cohort and and it happens
to be a huge cohort and a code that got
much bigger during the pandemic, right You've seen a massive boom.
(08:06):
I mean, what else could people do during lockdowns and
stay at home orders except go out and run, you know,
And and when all the lockdowns began to happen, LKA.
We you know, we saw all of retail closed down
in a week across Europe. It rolled through the North
America and of course in Asia. And so when we
saw that happen, we we've seen in trying times in
(08:29):
the past and recessions and just difficult economic times, we've
seen running actually start to grow because it's so convenient.
It's how your back door and uh and it's it's
it's affordable. You don't have to pay a monthly fee
to go run and in your jam or in your
ear back your back neighborhood. So you know, even with
(08:50):
the sports shutdown, we thought as as March, April and
May and in the North American shutdowns were coming to
be that there was a good chance that running would
make the cut. And we feel so grateful this this
you know, this disruption from from COVID and the economic
disruption has been so asymmetric. It's just it's just not
been even across businesses. And we're very fortunate because running, walking, hiking,
(09:14):
just just getting out and moving was a COVID friendly activity.
So yeah, we we ended up being, you know, essentially
perfectly positioned for what was available to people. And running
has grown dramatically in the last two years. So can
I tell you something that I started running UM just
as the lockdowns began, and I've never run before, and
(09:37):
like you said, this was something that was easy to do.
And I joined women's running group and it's called w
r W Women Running the World. Fantastic, That's that's kind
of thing i've heard yet today. That's wonderful. Yes, And
it's about a hundred and fifty women who get together
in my neighborhood Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and we get
(09:58):
together in the park and we just go and we
are off to Berlin in two weeks for the half marathon. Congratulations,
that's fantastic. All the best re Congratulations yet I'm nervous
as hell is the first one. But I know you're
you've been training and that's the achievement in and of itself.
I hope you have a great experience there. And there
are lots of Brooks running shoes in the group. I
(10:19):
do have to tell you that that I always enjoy
hearing that work as a as a niche brand. You know,
we still it makes a smile when we see shoes
on feet. UM, we count run her feet at the time,
so we love to hear that. I didn't realize how
old the company is, honestly till I started researching the
(10:40):
company for for this interview, and I was surprised that
it's more than a hundred years old. How do you
stay relevant while still holding on to some of the
tradition that the company is known for. Yeah, you know,
it's it's it's such a unique story. Brooks was founded
in nineteen fourteen in Philadelphia, and and it quickly became
(11:01):
a full line athletic footwear manufacturer. And that's the reason
I understood only much later on why almost all brands
were making every kind of shoe there was, and and
family footwear athletically styled family footwear, all the webps to
performance because in the in the days when you you
had very you know, focused supply chains, you had to
(11:22):
keep the factory bussy. You had to go from baseball
leads to football leads to running, etcetera. So Brooks was
in everything all the way up through the eighties and nineties.
Even though I'm older, I grew up. I came out
of college in in the early eighties, and the jogging
boom had started in the United States. Right, So I
started running marathons, and after I quit playing competitive sport,
(11:45):
I ran for fitness and fun and so that was
a huge boom time and the company and Brooks was there.
Brooks had some of the most interesting innovative technology for
runners in the seventies, eighties and on. But there they were,
they had several owners, they had many CEOs. They weren't
managed that well as a business, and so when you
fast forward through, you know, we had we still had
(12:08):
good um performance running products in the marketplace, but we
were playing in all of these different categories trying to
be successful and we weren't. We were literally seventh, eighth
or ninth brand in basketball and court shoes and family footwear,
and you know the bigger brands just do that so
so well. So for us, you know, really going back
(12:30):
to almost our roots, where it was a performance piece
of equipment for an athlete and and and runners. The
definition of an athlete is right foot, left foot repeat.
If you're you're moving right, you need good gear. We
think every runners deserves deserves performance. So so by focusing
back on really what Brooks was best known for and
(12:54):
not competing against anything else, it really was empowering for
our people because now we could really focus on that
product getting better every season, putting all our energies and
efforts into making the best running gear that we could.
And the goal is to make the best in the world, right,
that's who we're competing with. So so I think the
journey for Brooks of making an old brand new. Here's
(13:16):
how I see it is that you know you have
to earn your customer every day. And I think that's
what I learned early in my career, is that early
in my career, I learned how to manage a brand,
how to manage a product line. Um. Early in my career,
one of my boss is one said to me, Jim,
that's great. You're you've proven you're a good turn you
can turn around businesses, you can manage through challenges, but
(13:40):
can you grow a brand? And that's where I think
that's the entrepreneurial um mindset, right to be able to
grow a brand this customer focus and attract new customers
into what you're doing. That's a skill set that I
didn't have early in my career. And it's it's fun,
it's challenging, but that the that's what we added to
(14:01):
Brooks instead of just managing a hundred year old brand,
we challenge ourselves every day to make it relevant and
interesting and exciting and compelling, you know, really connecting with
the hearts and minds of runners with performance products and
celebrating their run to win, to win their trial that
these try our products and in our category. You know,
(14:24):
that first brand experience as a product experience. So so yeah,
I think the challenge on growing a brand is very
different from managing one. And we've been doing that now
for twenty years at Brooks, so we've this company is young.
It's a hundred years, but it's young because you know,
every day we wake up and and you know, we
(14:45):
know we're gonna have to earn a runners trust and
trial and and build a relationship with them. So yeah,
huge learning for me because I think before I came
to Brooks that was that was a mindset and let
alone a skill that I was still trying to develop.
(15:08):
You mentioned the world trust just not I'm glad you did.
I was going to come to that next. You talk
a lot about that in your book, the importance of running,
of earning a runners trust, but also about earning your
employees trust. How do you go about earning first of all,
a runners trust, You know, I just see it as
the foundation of of really brand, a great brand, and
(15:32):
the foundation of authentic leadership and frankly, effective leadership is
trust with people. And so you know, we be and
because we were anchored in performance, a runner knows at
mile twenty three, two weeks into the shoe, whether they'll
ever buy that shoe again. And so in early days,
(15:53):
our product wasn't that aesthetically appealing design was was yet
to come. I believe it is beautiful now and we're
producing fantastically gorgeous product, But in the early days, we
were more focused on function because we knew fit, feel
and ride and how that shoe felt both from a
(16:13):
comfort and a performance level, and injury prevention features and
the like, whether we ever get the second shoe, and
so trust is the key to getting the second shoe purchase,
and and that's the piece there. And then in leadership,
you know, I just think you know that ultimately your
customers smart and they're going to figure out what your
(16:34):
company is all about. And and so you know, building
an organization where not only we trust each other, but
we're building foundations in our values in our philosophies and
our strategies. You know, every every peal of of the
onion it brooks. Every time you look under the hooded Brooks,
you're gonna find running. That's what you're gonna find here. No,
(16:55):
I think we've built We've built the brand, you know,
on on building out ability and trust with Runners. That's
the you can't say you're an authentic leader. You can't
say you're an authentic brand. In my view, you have
to earn that. You have to earn that authentic brat badge.
And so for me, it's it's always behaviors. You know,
(17:15):
I think in the long term, um, your an outcome
of your behaviors. And so that's why we talk a
lot about trust in and around what we're promising, what
we're convicted around, what we believe in and uh and
just executing that so consistently that would become trusted for it.
(17:35):
So so it's really about behaviors, I would say, because
that's what becomes culture. That your your behad. Your brand
is a collection of your behaviors. Your culture long term
is a collection of your behavior. So trust is a
big deal for sure. Talking about leadership, Warren Buffett wrote
the forward to your book, and of course Brooks Running
(17:58):
is a standalone company under the book show Hathaway umbrella.
What's it like working with Warren Buffett? It's it's I'm
just going to describe it as a gift. I've so
enjoyed it because when I first met him in probably
two thousand and eleven, I think we sat down and
talked about Brooks and the opportunities with Brooks. I told
(18:20):
him at that time that he didn't know it, but
he had been mentoring me for almost twenty five years
because I began writing his letters and I tell the
story in the book in the nineteen eighties because I
was working at a company that had competed with the
Berkshire Company, not successfully and uh and since that time,
I've just been a student of his thinking around brands
(18:42):
and moats and business and so you know, I what
what the way we built Brooks I knew would be
appealing to Warren and Charlie Munger. I just Charlie's a
vice chairman and Warren's partner. Because we built a unique
brand and distinctive brand. We're not trying to be anybody
(19:03):
else for trying to be Brooks, and we've built it
in a in a really thoughtful way to bring value
to the customer. And it's a great business with good
minds and good returns on capital and the light. So
so when I first sat down with him, my first
goal was to have him fall in love with Brooks,
and and he I think he has. He just sees
the opportunity that we have. But but he's been so interesting.
(19:25):
You know, Berkshire is a one off, I believe corporate
culture in the world because they really have this deserved
trust culture for all of the business units and the
leadership and the business units. And so we we are
responsible for Brooks in its entirety. We're I'm the chief
culture officer, I'm the chief strategy officer, I'm the chief
risk officer. You know, they're cheering us on to look
(19:48):
out ten years long term to build the brand. He
so understands that brands are in the mind of the
customer and you have to build trust and an affinity
and and engage mint and there's plenty of competition out there.
So so they've just cheered us on and doing that
in a long term way, and it's allowed us to
play through challenging times, whether it was the pandemic or
(20:11):
market shifts, changes in consumer behavior. You know, as long
as we've stayed with Runners, we've been successful. And that's
what Warren has encouraged us to do. It's such an
interesting He's such a smart guy. We had him out
for an employee, uh town hall Um seven years ago,
and and he just gets it. You know, you've got
(20:31):
to get your brand in the mind of the runner.
And there's always gonna be runners, and if you stay
with them and evolve and lead them, you know you're
you're gonna have an incredible brand, you know, a decade
from now. And that's exactly what we're trying to do.
So I feel very fortunate. Um. I've you know, I've
learned a lot, and he's reinforced a lot of how
we think about our brand and our business, in our
(20:52):
in our team. One story that really stuck with me
when I read your book is, Um you talk about
the time when you were sick, and I'm glad you're
doing better now, but after your surgery to get rid
of your cancer, you were in hospital and you had
these feeding tubes and uh, you know, if someone sends
(21:13):
you a gift and it's a massive box of candy
and it's from Warren Buffett and you're sitting there thinking, gee, thanks,
but you know I have these feeding tubes. What am
I gonna do with this gigantic box of candy? So
can you tell our audience a little bit about what
happened next when you read the note? Yeah, I'd be
glad to And I'm smiling because it was just a
(21:35):
stunning moment. Warren often sends out boxes of these chocolates,
and his holiday card has always got a funny picture
of him with with a humorous quip, but it always
comes with a box of chocolates. So I'm in the hospital.
It was an eight day hospital stay to fully recover
from a major surgery. Uh And and I've never been
(21:56):
in a hospital before, so the whole thing was an experience.
But I think it was a four. Here I've been
getting cards and well wishers sending support. It was just
such wonderful, you know, to see how much support I had.
So here comes a box of chocolates from Warren Boff
and I put what is he thinking? I'm not going
to have solid food for for a good you know,
(22:16):
two months? You know, what is he thinking with a
five pound box of chocolate? So I opened the card
and it was classic Warren to Jim, these not necessarily
for you, but I'll bet you're getting fantastic care at
the University of Washington Hospitals and UM and so what
I suggested you put this out in the nurses station
and thank them for the great carrier getting and tell
(22:40):
them if that great care continues, there's more where this
came from. So it was priceless Warren. We put it.
We put the caees candies out in the nurses station,
and people smiled every time they came in my room.
It was it was classic Warren. Um, he's so good
at engaging with people. He's got a brilliant business mind,
(23:01):
but in the category of life's not fair, he's just
also just a superhuman being and and doesn't miss a
beat and engaging with people. It was it made me smile.
Then it still does. Oh and I'm betted middle the
nusis smile and made everybody very happy. Yeah, I was.
I was. I was a popular person on the floor
that week. Are you doing better now? I am so,
(23:26):
I'm I'll be five years from my diagnosis. This December.
And you know, like so many people, uh, when whenever
I have a friend or a family member that gets
an X y Z cancer diagnosis, I go to the
internet just to do some research in the like, and
the internet is full of information and often it's it's
it's unsettling because for me, the five year survival rate
(23:50):
for my cancer was one in five. Would be here
in five years. So I'm cancer free. I feel so grateful,
super fortunate to have the healthcare any that we have
here in Seattle. It's world class. So I'm just lucky
in so many ways. And so yeah, I'm I'm. I
have a job I love and working with the team.
I love four grandchildren that are wonderful and pure joy.
(24:13):
So um, I'm I'm grateful to be here and it's
been a journey. I do not recommend cancer to anyone.
It's not a club that you want to join, but
having joined it, I feel fortunate to be where I
am today. Now in your book, you say my early
(24:39):
life experiences created a lot of hard wiring in me,
and it took me about forty years to decide it
and understand why I am who I am. Yet you
don't really talk that much about your early life in
your book. Can you think of one or two experiences
or perhaps people who have influenced to who really sort
(25:02):
of you know, adjusted or influence to your hard wiring
to make you who you are. Yeah, I'm sure it's
it took me a while to figure it out, so
I'll try to be simple about it. But I think
what was interesting about me is, until I was about
age ten, fourth grade, I was just kind of a lost, um, insecure,
(25:24):
troubled kid. I felt different from everyone around me. I was.
I was in a busy family for for a number
four of six kids, um, and we're all within eight years.
So it was a very busy family and stressful. My
my dad was never very happy person. He was an alcoholic,
and he was just stressed out in his world. And
and I didn't know why, and it sort of affected me.
(25:47):
And then I just, you know, like a lot of kids, UM,
I just couldn't quite find my way. I was bullied
a bit, and I had some horrible and certain experiences
and in the classroom in second grade, third grade, and
fourth grade, and and so I don't know, you know,
why I was able to react the way I was,
But I just sort of you know, lifted my head
(26:09):
up at age ten and I just decided I wanted
to be happier than I felt. Um, I wanted to
be good at something. And uh and I saw in
my friends families they just seemed happier and they were
more calm, and and so I just was I just
woke up and said, I'm gonna I'm on a mission.
I want to I want to have a life that's
glass half full versus glass half empty. And and so
(26:33):
I think, you know, what what my wiring what I
what I it took me a while to understand is
how much that that ambition to be something um different
from what I felt like I was at age ten.
It just drove me. So it was more about you know,
working from fear of failure than it was about pursuing opportunity.
(26:55):
It was it was more about avoiding um, you know,
sort of disappointment or failure. And and but that's what
that's what really led me at Brooks to kind of
reach for a long term, a longer term goal and
not just these three year wins. But I think for
me that was some of the hard wiring is that
I you know, I had my head down until I
(27:17):
aged forty in my career before I lifted up and said, um,
it's it's actually more about you know, achieving, you know,
success and not being a failure. Um, it is about happiness.
It is about engaging with people. It is about the
relationships that you build along the way. And I think
for me, that's when it was it became so clear
(27:38):
it's about the journey. You have to enjoy the moments
along the way because in a sense, you know, the
finish lines never were that rewarding to me to successes
were never they were fleeting. And so that's that's the
hard wiring that I had, is that I'm I'm still motivated,
I'm still very competitive, but I'm trying to soak in
(27:59):
you know, every day and the journey along the way.
And I think, you know, in my early in my
early days, coming out of my youth, I was just
on a mission to not be a failure. I would say,
this mission to not be a failure. I guess that
explains I was going to ask you this. Apparently you
never took any vocation, you never really took any time
(28:22):
off till you sat down to write the book. Is
that part of it like this, you know the feel
of feeling or like if you, um, you know, took
your foot off the accelerator, something might go wrong. Well,
and it's interesting. I took vacations with my family, but
often I'd be working on him. I never The four
(28:43):
week break that I took in fifteen was only the
second time I've done more than a week, and that
not good. I take a week at a time and
then I'd be back. Part of it was, I would say,
is I have I have a sense of duty around leadership.
It's it's hard to explain it. It's hard wired in me.
Is that when I when I'm when I'm accountable and
(29:06):
responsible for something um and I think a CEO is
the steward of the enterprise, right and I don't. I
don't feel I have I'm a control oriented leader or manager.
I think I I love being part of a team,
so we have a very empowered, connected team. But my
sense of accountability and responsibility is total and and so
(29:28):
you know, what I've learned now is is how to
distribute that a little bit as well. But it's still
the way I'm wired, and I think it's one of
the reasons it makes me a successful leader within Berkshire
because I do operate as if I own this business,
and I've always done that. I took complete ownership for
every job that I've had. Brooks is the fourth business
(29:51):
that I've run, and each of the other three I
took the same sense of accountability and responsibility for it.
So I that's I'll call that a curse. You know,
I'm just the way I'm wired. I just feel that.
You know, it's sort of the adage that it's a team,
it's an orchestra. You know, there's so many, you know,
(30:11):
so many metaphors for a team running a business, but
in one sense to you're charting a course and you
don't want to crash the chef, right, you just don't.
And and we've had so many disruptive categories. Nobody uh
predicted COVID nineteen and the impacts it had. But as
a leader, you know, you're ultimately uh and immediately responsible
(30:35):
for navigating it. And we've done that really well too,
and we do that as a team. But anyway, yeah,
I'm I would say I'm cursed by a sense of duty. Um,
But I I the truth is, I enjoy it. I
love I love being a leader, and I love being
a part of a team, and and so I wouldn't
trade my job for anything, but I take it very seriously.
(30:56):
Does it sometimes just feel too much? Does your family
plain that you're a bit obsessed with work? Your wonderful wife,
Mary Ellen, who you dedicate the book to, did she
complain sometimes that you're all about work? You know? I think? Yeah,
I think here's what I would take away from where
I've been. I wanted for my boys. Um, I wanted
(31:18):
them to be able to be proud of at least
who I was and the way I carried myself in
my life. Um, and it was, and we've had you know,
we're we have good relationships all around. But I also
know that I wasn't that you know, sort of wingman
partner to them as a father that that some other
(31:39):
fathers are. But I think because this was part of
my hard wiring, the most important thing to me was
is that they wouldn't be, frankly i'll say it, embarrassed
by me, or or because that was my upbringing, or
avoiding me. And so you know that's you. You tend
to parent. Maybe at least I I've parented around you know,
(32:02):
priorities that I didn't have, and so I'm sure you
know I've I've got there's gaps in terms of me
being there for them as a father in every sense
and in every way that I could be. UM. But
you know, I think that I've done the best I could,
and you know, I think they know I love them all,
I'm supporting them all, and I've I've been much closer
(32:25):
to them than I ever was with my father. But
you know, everybody parents differently and uniquely, and and you know,
it's so fun to talk about parenting because it is
the most unique role in all of life. You know,
you can be a manager and a contributor and a
leader and a blah blah blah blah blah. You can
be a runner and a spouse and a partner, but
(32:47):
being a parent is such a unique job and everybody
obviously brings their own playbook to it. UM. So yeah,
I think that, you know, I'm there's no question in
my mind that there are things that I have and
been there for um with you know, with both my
wife and my children. And on the other side of it,
I've done the best I can and I think we're
(33:08):
we have a great family, and we're connected, and I
always try to be there if I can, if I
can be helpful that they need me. Um, that comes first.
And you know, and I we've had health issues with
one of my sons and I this was a moment.
It isn't in the book, but I just told him
I'm your wingman. Whatever it takes, we're going to solve this.
(33:29):
I am with you. And if it means I have
to take time off work, I'll take whatever it is.
This is number one. And and that's the way it's
been with my wife, Mary Allen Tooths. There's no ambiguity
about you know, them being number one. Um. And and
I'll be there if they need me. But for sure,
I think you know everybody's everybody that's parenting, it's uh,
(33:50):
it's a work in progress because they don't hand you
a manual of how to do it. But you know,
I've given my point. I know it's I've like so
many parents, probably I've given them as best I could
what I didn't have and I thought was important. UM.
And I think generally, UM, it's it's worked out. Okay,
they're all doing well. We're grateful. That's fantastic. A quick
(34:13):
question about running. I know you've been passionate about running
all your life. You've been a runner, and you're slowly
getting back into some form of running. You're working out
what's the future of running? And I asked, is because
when I run now, I look around and everyone's got
these wearables, and everyone's constantly looking at that watch, and
there's so many gadgets and devices. Is that the future
(34:36):
of running? You know? It's a great question. And one
of the truth of running, I think is it's the
ultimate non virtual, non digital human experience. It is you
moving in the world, and and it's it's it's undeniably
of human physical experience. And and so I think that's
(34:59):
a a role in one sense right where the we're
the antidote to this digital, you know, virtual lifestyle that
that is all around us, and screen time is just
taking more and more and more and more and more
of our hours. So so at its core, I think
it's the it's the non virtual experience, you know, And
(35:20):
and that's and and I appreciate that so much now,
you know, in the world where you know, we've got
digital natives that are that are literally growing up in
these these these digital communities in the like you know,
running has to fit into that. But I think, you know,
I think at its core, it's going to be that
an that analog version of that digital life and in
(35:42):
all the wonderful things that that brings, the endorphins and
you know, just just being healthy. I think, you know,
over time, I still believe that probably a well lived
life is going to be health and wellness and happiness
and people and relationships and entertainment and fun and purpose
and impact and meaning. Right, So it's all those things.
(36:04):
So there's always going to be a role I think
for physical movement and activity, you know, for us, and
and that's the role we play. So we're you know,
we're we're I think for races and and uh five
ks and ten ks and marathons and half marathons. There's
a there's you know, there's a role for and f
t s and recognition and and so and so forth.
We're working on some things there, but I would say
(36:27):
they're they're they're going to help create an experience around running.
They're not going to supplant the run and so yet
to be seen, but I think that's the role we play.
We we we get to you know, offer a physical
world experience to add to people's digital lives. Jim, thank
you so much for joining me on Out of Office.
(36:47):
I really enjoyed your book Running with Purpose. Thank you
appreciate a great conversation. Thanks for having me that it
was Jim Webber's CEO of Brooks running on Out of Ourfice.
I hope you enjoyed our conversation as much as I
did recording it. Remember Out of Ourfice as an Apple
(37:09):
podcast on Bloomberg dot Com and the Bloomberg Terminal and
wherever you go to for your regular podcasts. This episode
was produced by Magnus Hendrickson. I'm Alka Kapoor. I hope
you stay well and as always, thank you for listening.
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