Chances and choices
Far and away, the biggest chance I was given in life was to join P&G after graduating from Harvard Business School in the summer of 1977.
P&G was my lowest salary offer. In fact, it came in a full 50% below my best offer— consulting at McKinsey. The starting position - brand assistant - was the lowest rung on the brand management ladder. And, I would have to spend six months selling before I could even take on that role. This was not the choice that many of my fellow Harvard MBA graduates would have made in my situation.
I joined the Navy in 1970 and served as the Navy Exchange Officer in Atsugi, Japan - a location that served thousands of Marine Corps and Navy service members and their families.
At the time, P&G gave me absolutely no credit for managing a $10 million, 500 person retail and service operation in the Navy.
I didn’t care. I had worked loading freight cars and trucks, on paper making, riveting and punch press machines, even tending bar and waiting on tables.
I knew I wanted to work in brand management — creating and marketing consumer products — and ultimately wanted to serve in general management at a titan industry leader like P&G.
P&G has always had a clear purpose, principles and values. They believed in touching lives and improving life for millions. That mattered to me. It’s what attracted me to P&G and kept me challenged and energized for more than 36 years.
Winning is creating value for all stakeholders — consumers, employees, customers, suppliers, investors and share owners. At P&G, this was doubly important as many employees were share owners. When P&G focused on the consumer as boss, we improved our probability of success by creating a preferred consumer experience.
P&G also knows the importance of strategy. We embarked on one strategy in 2000/2001, and pivoted to another strategy in 2013/2014. Fortunately, both sets of choices have worked out well for consumers and the company.
The only strategy the consumer, customer, competitor, market ever see is what P&Gers execute every day in the real world. At the end of the day, innovation is PG‘s lifeblood. It’s in everything we do, from product design and formulation, to how we develop our business model, organization structure and work systems, business processes and more.
No other company in the world has ever created, built and sustained more leading brands, while keeping promises every day with consumers. Their brands are built to last.
No other company in the world recruits better talent from more than 100 countries, or offers more opportunity for development and growth, and graduates more successful leaders and managers in and outside the company than P&G.
Just look at how successful P&G alumni have been overtime. Look at how many have become CEOs of leading public and private businesses— large, medium and small, established and start up, nonprofit and for-profit.
As a final point, I’ll note that my record over my 36+ years at P&G is a very public one. The results are what they are. Every step along way was a team effort and a team accomplishment. Nothing gets done at P&G without the full energy, effort and execution of every team member — incredible people whom I shall always appreciate and never forget.
