Supercharging growth and cultural relevance with Crocs

Heather Stern: Crocs. They’ve been affectionately coined dad shoes, sweatpants for your feet, and the ‘It’ shoe of the pandemic. They’ve attracted legions of fans from nurses and chefs to celebrities and athletes. They’ve also faced their fair share of naysayers, something they’ve used to their advantage. But whether you love them or hate them, one thing we can all agree on is they’ve become an iconic part of the footwear industry and pop culture at large. 2023 saw record-breaking sales for the brand, global expansion, and a spot on Time’s 100 Most Influential Companies list. But it hasn’t always been an easy ride to the top, and no one knows this better than today’s guest, Michelle Poole. In her role as president, Michelle oversees commercial teams in the Americas, Asia, and EMEA, as well as product design, merchandising, and marketing. She brings over three decades of experience leading global fashion and lifestyle brands and is never one to shy away from a challenge. Brand building is her world and what lights her up, and she leads her team with authenticity and humility. I am so excited to dive into this conversation, so let’s get to it. Welcome, Michelle.

Michelle Poole: Hi, Heather, and thank you for a great introduction. 

Heather: Absolutely. I mean, you’ve been now at the company for almost a decade. How many pairs of Crocs do you have? And do you have a favorite?

Michelle: Oh my goodness. Well, how many do I have? I’m sample size, so I’m kind of embarrassed to tell you. Let’s just say I have a very large shoe closet. My favorites, gosh. Ultimately, it’s still the classic clog. Obviously, icons is what this podcast is all about, and it’s been at the heart of Croc’s success. Our core classic clog is still the heartbeat of the brand and kind of goes with everything. What I love, though, is Crocs is all about color and the design team do an amazing job on bringing new seasonal colors. So I would say every three months I fall in love with a new color and I have a new favorite color for the season.

Heather: What’s the color this month?

Michelle: Oh my goodness, well, there’s a whole, this is interesting, there’s like this acidic color that’s like this really bright yellow but with some lime in it, like a real,

Heather: Oh, nice.

Michelle: Almost in neon. But then conversely, we have these really gorgeous neutrals. I think we have the shade called Elephant that’s almost like a gray lilac, like super subtle. 

Heather: Oh, I love it. So let’s go back to your decision to join the Crocs family. A mentor of yours said it would be career suicide. Why did you decide to take the job at that time?

Michelle: Yes, absolutely, and those were the words, a dear mentor of mine used. I saw something in the brand that really, really appealed to me. There are companies out there that have labels and then there are brands, and I see them quite differently. And I saw Crocs as a real brand that there was a lot to work with. Firstly, it had an icon at the heart, so everyone knew Crocs for the classic clog. I saw something that was really differentiated with the molded material. Nobody else was really doing molded product at the time. I think there’s a lot more now, all the way up into the luxury space. I thought that this idea of bringing great style and elevated style for a broad consumer base was really, really appealing. Crocs is, in the branded space, really a very strong value brand in terms of price points. And so, I love this idea of bringing great design to a broad consumer base. And I really believed that there was something to unlock that was differentiated in the market. And just saw something and thought, I’ve got to give this a try.

Heather: Well, it’s amazing today because it’s, as I’ve said in my intro, almost accepted as this iconic brand. It can be a bit polarizing, as you’ve also mentioned. What about the brand do people love and then love to hate? Talk to me about why it’s so polarizing and why there is such a passionate fan base.

Michelle: Yeah, so I think polarizing is a good word. And I’ve also heard Crocs described as a Marmite brand. I don’t know, Heather, if you know Marmite.

Heather: I do, I do, yes.

Michelle: So for the listeners, it’s a food product out of Australia that you spread on toast. And I grew up with it in England, but it’s also something that some people despise. I think...I think, first I would say the polarizing nature of our brand is something we welcome and we’re actually not trying to dissipate. I think that there is a tension around our brand that has been really valuable to us. It gets us noticed; it gets us talked about. Many of our competitors, bigger, much larger competitors, don’t get talked about as much because there isn’t that tension. So I think the things that people maybe—certainly in the past when I joined—disliked was they thought Crocs was unfashionable. At the time, the word ugly was used a lot. And it’s interesting because now it’s used kind of in as a positive from an ugly trend. And you have other brands in our space, like Birkenstock, that have these oversized silhouettes. And they’re incredibly popular. So, I think the individuals who were early adopters to Crocs didn’t fit into trends. They were outliers. Maybe they were potentially considered as sort of weirdos or different. And that’s actually something, if I flip to the other side of what do people love, I think Crocs has actively embraced a really broad demographic. And one of our values we put in place in the early years of the turnaround was delightfully democratic, with a small d. And I wanted to make sure that, you know, we were positioning ourselves as a brand that welcomed all and that you didn’t have to look a certain way and that kind of anyone was welcome. And so it’s interesting, some of the things that Crocs was hated for are now why consumers love us. We are bold. When you wear a pair of Crocs, it does say like, I’m comfortable about who I am and I want to express myself.

Heather: It’s an amazing value, delightfully democratic. I think that just speaks so much to the collaborations that you have embarked on, the way that you’ve gone to market, the product design, and something that I could imagine really being a guiding force for people in the company as they think about what the next step should be. So, you’ve been on this upward trajectory. Your passion for why you joined is clear, but did you then have a vision of here’s where it needs to go or has it been something that every year you’ve kind of evolved based on the new roles that you’ve taken on? Like tell me about what that roadmap has been.

Michelle: Yeah, I think, you know, absolutely, in all honesty, you know, coming in, you do have to first learn the brand. I think about working for a brand like being in a relationship, and I think over time kind of osmosis happens, and you learn about the brand collectively, and it’s never static. So, you know, for sure, those first months were just trying to understand, you know, what we had in the business. As I said, even before I joined, I recognized the strength of the icon. So I would say that first sort of year, 18 months was really the time where we were laying the foundations for, you know, our long-term strategy. And what’s interesting is all these years later, our strategy actually hasn’t changed much at all. Which has been a huge advantage because you can then really focus on building your strengths and executing against that strategy. And I think a lot of brands, you know, there can be high turnover of both leadership and also strategy, right? And the teams are sort of lurching from one strategic initiative to another. And I think one of the, I suppose, sort of elements of our success has been that we established a very simple strategy early on and then really stuck to it. 

So I think maybe if I lay out though, maybe a few of the key stepping stones, it might be helpful to understand. So I think the first thing we’d note about Crocs was that we did not have an awareness issue. We had a relevance issue. If I unpack that a little bit, we had unbelievably high awareness that was up with, I would say, Apple. If you drew the Coke silhouette, the Apple logo, some of the biggest brands in the world, Crocs was up there in terms of recognition. So it wasn’t that people didn’t know us, it was that people knew us and said, “Crocs is not for me.” So we had a huge relevance issue. So what we really focused on was unlocking that relevance, and turning Crocs into a brand where consumers said, “that brand is for me.” So first thing we did as an icon brand builder is we revitalized the icon. So when I first joined the organization, the existing team kind of walked me through product and the classic clog was sort of the last thing they talked about, last thing I saw, samples were gathering dust in the corner of the product room. So we really put the classic clog at the center of the brand, and we set about in combination with marketing, we put teams together and really started repositioning the icon. So that was step number one. 

The second thing we did was we created a sort of, I would say, a rallying cry which was “Come as you are.” And that was established I would say back in 2015 I think. So it’s been in place a long time and I already mentioned this but it was this idea of inviting consumers in and really showing up as a brand that stood for self-expression and inclusivity. Right? As I said you didn’t have to look a certain way. You know, come on into our brand. So that really became a foundation both for messaging externally. And of course, we have our Jibbitz, which are the charms that go in the holes. So consumers can literally express themselves through our product. Every pair of Crocs can be different. But we also wanted to make sure that Come As You Are came from the inside. And I believe that brand values are built from the inside out. So we really focus on Come As You as a way to think about our organization and the culture, and to make sure that ultimately our employees, as well as our consumers, could be comfortable in their own shoes, which is our mission. And I would say the next, and perhaps these are all in similar time frames, building the right team. We had some amazing individuals already in the organization with some phenomenal experience in the specific injection molded space, in product, in marketing, in sales. But we also brought in and added to the team some deep deeply experienced footwear leadership. I would say that was really critical to get like-minded leaders on board who could see the potential of the brand and prepare to roll up their sleeves and get scrappy. And then I think probably the last piece was, you know, because we were an underdog, I think one of the recipes for success was that we were really scrappy. I mean, I kind of joked that back in the early days, we were looking under the couch for quarters. It wasn't quite that bad, but it was, you know, every dollar counted. Every head count counted and so we were really, really scrappy. And I think that ties also to the risks we were prepared to take. Because we didn’t have much to lose. So I think as a brand we took a lot of risks in product, in marketing, and the way we kind of went to market. So those are, I mean, it’s been a long journey but maybe those are some of the key stepping stones.

Heather: It sounds simple, but it isn’t. And I think a lot of that scrappiness is also about focus, right? And about making sure you continually come back to that core idea of come as you are, be comfortable in your own shoes. And I love the sentiment, you know, everybody now is talking very much about inclusivity as a really important value of a brand, but that’s really been part of the DNA. And so there’s an authenticity there that you can’t replicate. But tell me about risk. So as you said, in a way, there wasn’t a lot to lose. And so you were willing to take some risks. Talk to me about one or two of those that you think were particularly instrumental in propelling the brand.

Michelle: I mean, we did a lot of different things, but I guess one example that stands out is that we did a partnership with Kentucky Fried Chicken, and we actually did nugget-style Jibbitz that go in the holes in the shoes that were chicken-scented. So, like, kind of bizarre, like, think of another brand that would do that, and consumers went nuts for it, and they actually showed up on StockX, you know, a few weeks later, at… 

Heather: Wow.

Michelle: …like two, three times their value. We had lines around the block. I mean, if anyone had ever said, you know, in those early days of like, Crocs can create this kind of consumer demand, you know, no one would have believed it. So I think there were things like we were really playful. But then it was also the juxtaposition of partnerships. Like we partnered with Balenciaga, and Balenciaga sent these sky-high Crocs platforms down the runway at Paris Fashion Week. And the fashion community just about lost their mind. And so, again, looking back, I mean, that was a very pivotal moment where the media and people started to say, “Oh, something’s really going on with Crocs here.” But also, they could have just written us off as like, you know, a joke. So I think, we were prepared to take risks with product. I think a lot of brands are very, very precious about the design and the creativity of their brand. And I think that we were more open to, I would say, co-creating and co-authoring with our partners. And I think that’s what really turbocharged the creativity back then. We also would do like, some really crazy stunts from a marketing point of view. 

We partnered with Post Malone to launch collaboration, and we actually ended up seeding some shoes at the chicken drive-through that he first worked at. And so, as consumers pulled up for their chicken, they also got free shoes. So just fun, creative, unexpected marketing activations as well. So, I think we just had fun with it, and I think it really came through to the consumers who could see we were having fun with ourselves and we’re also prepared to poke a little fun ourselves.

Heather: It takes a lot of courage in a way, because there is a sense that, you know, brand needs to be buttoned up and really control the message and shape the message. But if you have that ability to open it up a little bit, like amazing things can happen. And as you said, it can be risky too, and I’m sure there’s many things you look back on that, didn’t deliver what you intended it to, but you kind of keep going. So, the brand has just continued to explode. You and the leadership team have declared a growth ambition of becoming a $5 billion organization in terms of sales by 2026. Up until this point, it seems like the strategy has been the strategy that you’ve continued to kind of build on. Do you think getting to that next big milestone is now going to require other elements—digital is obviously a big channel. Global is something you’re focused on. Tell me kind of from here forward how you get to that mark.

Michelle: Yes, I think there are some foundational building blocks that sort of give us confidence that that longer-term vision is accessible to us, and that we have a high chance of success there. And it actually doesn’t change a great deal, Heather, from where we’ve been, which is exciting, right? Because we’ve got a winning strategy, and we can continue to build on it and amplify that. I think there are a few key building blocks. I think first is that we believe what Crocs has to offer is really well-aligned with where the consumer is going for the long term, not just in the next year or two. Comfort, right? Comfort is now table stakes. I mean, consumers simply will not wear uncomfortable product on their body on their feet. Versatility, self-expression. We’re really accessibly priced, as I mentioned earlier, and for a constrained consumer who has to balance their checkbook and sees rising costs out there. You know, Crocs is still a very accessible brand. And then lastly, self-expression, right? Consumers, you know, consumers want to show who they are. And so we believe that self-expression is a macro trend that’s here to stay. You know, and then I think about a very diverse consumer base. So we have...women’s, men’s, kids’ business. I like to say sometimes that we might be the first shoe a consumer ever puts on in their life, and perhaps the last.

Heather: Yes.

Michelle: We have a year-round business. I think Crocs was originally thought of as a sort of summer brand, but we have a really strong year-round business. We also have a very robust sandal business, which is around 400 million now. So we’re one of the biggest sandal brands in the world. People don’t realize that. And then when I think about, we have geographic diversity. So we have really strong business now in all three regions of the world, led by the US. We have Europe and our Asia business all kind of growing. And then from a channel point of view, we have a really great diversity between a direct consumer and a wholesale business, pretty much 50-50. So we really aren’t relying on any one single element. It’s really sort of this portfolio of opportunities that really give us confidence that Crocs is here to stay and built to last.

Heather: It is really amazing when you think about that saying it might be the first thing that you put on your foot and possibly the last. And it’s true, I mean, I see my aging parents and they choose Crocs and I still have saved this little baby Croc from when my boys were really little. They now wear them when they go to the hockey rink. It’s their shoe of choice. And so just to kind of see all the different stages.

Michelle: We also, I would say, we also have chefs and doctors and nurses, right? We have gardeners. So we have all these micro communities as well. So it’s amazing. It’s such a broad reaching, going back to the word democratic product, there are just so many uses for it.

Heather: One of the things that you’ve mentioned about being core to the brand and the idea of co-creation, collaborations are really a big part of, I think, what builds buzz, what appeals to those micro communities. How are you thinking about collaboration as part of the core brand ethos? And what are some of your favorite ones?

Michelle: Yeah, yeah. So setting up collaborations, you know, was definitely a strategy that I had kind of coming into Crocs and I had executed some really successful collaborations in the past with brands I’d worked on. The challenge I would say at the beginning of the turnaround with Crocs is that nobody answered the phone. We had a ton of ideas. But it took a while for other partners to see the value in partnering with Crocs. And I think that a really successful partnership is when both brands win, but ultimately the consumer gets something even better than just one brand alone. And it’s interesting because I think it was Lisa McKnight I was listening to she was from Mattel, one of your recent guests. And she actually used the same equation that I used. So I’m not sure if I heard it from her or she heard it from me or we both heard it from someone else. But this idea of one plus one equals three. It really is, I think, this idea that when you partner with another brand or another individual, another entity that has its own personality, the consumer wins. And so ultimately, the way we think about collaborations or partnerships is that, they’re a huge driver of relevance, right, because there’s a lot of consumers, I would say in the last five years, who have come to Crocs for the first time. And we see it on our social feeds, we see people saying, “I can’t believe I bought a pair of Crocs, but I saw the Post Malone Crocs and I had to have them.” Or “I saw the Barbie Crocs and I had to have them.” And then once they get Crocs on their feet, they’re hooked. There’s actually a viral campaign on TikTok, if you look it up, it says, “Don’t wear Crocs,” that has had tens of millions of views. And it’s a consumer saying, looking at the camera and saying, “Don’t wear Crocs, because first you say, I’ll just wear them at home. Then you start wearing them to the supermarket. Then you go for coffee in them. Then before you know it, you never take them off.” And we play with that. 

So, you know, I think partnerships are a great way of bringing in new audiences and also in continuing to engage and retain existing consumers. So we think about partnerships really as a tapestry that we kind of stitch together very intentionally. Often they can look externally like it’s kind of random, but behind the scenes is actually, I’d say, a heavy dose of kind of science to the art. And the way we think about it is we think about where in the marketplace we want this partnership to be positioned. So is it something that’s really, really niche and very limited edition? Or is it something very, very broad, like a McDonald’s, for example, that will reach a really broad democratic back to that word audience? We also think about, we think about geography. So do we want this to be global in a particular market or local in a particular market? And then we think about what we call consumer affinities. And this could be fashion, sport, music, food. We’ve done some really successful food. We have an unbelievable arsenal of licenses to work with, some of which are behind me. You’ll see Hello Kitty, Lightning McQueen. So we have this unbelievable portfolio that we can tap into to bring characters and properties to life as well. And we really treat them like collaborations with special launches and exciting activations. So...we want to, you know, obviously make sure that it isn’t the brand, it’s really icing on the cake. And that, behind the partnerships is very, very kind of clear brand DNA for the Crocs brand itself. But they bring a lot of conversation, they bring a lot of fun to the brand. They really are able to demonstrate how innovative and creative we can be as a brand.

Heather: Do you ever say no to a collaboration? And what’s the filter by which you use to decide?

Michelle: That’s a great question. We do, yeah. I think that at the end of the day, probably the reasons where we say no are usually around product. Like, do we have something exciting to present to the consumer? If we have an idea that ultimately when we think about the product, it just feels like what we call a logo slap. You know, we just stuck a logo on. The consumer doesn’t care, and we’re not creating something exciting. I think ultimately it’s about when we put these two brands together, can we really create something compelling for the consumer? And if the answer is no, then… 

Heather: The answer is no.

Michelle: The answer is no. Yeah.

Heather: But what a great position, you know, from coming from a place of, you know, not having people answer the phone to now, you know, being really thoughtful and purposeful about these collaborations.

Michelle: Yes, it’s been a 10-year overnight success, as I like to say.

Heather: Yes, exactly. Snap of the finger. So you talked a lot about the classic clog and that really being the superpower of the brand. And yet there’s so much innovation that’s taking place. How do you balance that? So that there is that staying true to the core, but there’s something new and different and exciting. And then connected to that, what is coming out or what has just come out that you think is quite innovative and exciting that you want listeners to know about?

Michelle: Yeah, that’s a great question. So I think balance is the right way we think about it. So we have a balanced portfolio of category initiatives, and that’s clogs, which is our heartbeat, sandals, which I just mentioned is now close to $400 million business, and then personalization, which is our Jibbitz, the charms that go in the holes. People have all sorts of names for them, but Jibbitz is actually the official name. So we think about these category offenses and we balance that and then within that we have these evergreen silhouettes. So we’re never taking our eye off the ball as I said of our classic clog always reimagining, spinning kind of creating new flavors, so think of it as sort of new flavors of the icon. And then we’re really pushing into other places, really through molded innovation. So as I said our molded technology, which is injected EVA, it’s our core ingredient. And so what that allows us to do is really play with different shapes and silhouettes and finishes. And we think about expanding into the height space. So we’ve done some really interesting platforms and products that take the consumer up off the ground. We’ve done a lot in the sports space, really appealing to that sort of street sport consumer, as well as, as you said, sort of pre and après game. And then we play around in the, kind of I’ll call it the adventure space. You know, we’re not a performance brand, we’re kind of on the edge of performance, but you know, we’re a brand that consumers love to take to, you know, the lake or the mountains, etcetera, kind of pre-post hike, etcetera. So we have a lot of different, I would say, wearing occasions and silhouettes to play with. But really, the common, what we call the green thread, that runs through it all is molded comfort.

Heather: Wonderful. So, obviously we’re talking a lot about your career at Crocs, but you’ve worked in building and leading many iconic brands: Sperry’s, Timberland, Converse. Is there something that you find has been consistent in terms of like a truism, across each of these experiences and is there anything specific that you took from one of them that you’re carrying through in this current role?

Michelle: I mentioned team. So I always kind of start with the people because it is all about do you have the team and talent to really drive the brand forward. It’s never ever a solo endeavor. It’s all about bringing in great people. But aside from that, I think my single biggest area of focus and sort of learning is, it sounds fundamental, but I think a lot of brands kind of get lost around on this sometimes is it’s all about the product. Now, I would say that because my background is product, I’m a merchant leader, but it really is. I mean, I think at the heart of every brand is great product. I mean, that is the promise, right? Is that we have a product that is, you will feel emotionally connected to and you’ll feel great in it, right? And I think ultimately, product is what consumers are gonna spend their hard-earned cash on. And I think sometimes that gets a bit lost in the mix. And I guess adjacent to that is something actually that Nancy King, another guest of yours, from Airbnb, mentioned, which is I’ve really learned that it’s critical to have very strong alignment between the merchandising product engine and marketing. I think that again, a place where brands can sometimes get lost is that product goes in one direction and the marketing team go in another and they’re actually kind of pulling against each other. And so that the vision that the, ultimately the product team had, which was about designing product for a specific consumer, that gets lost because marketing have got a different vision for where the brand should be. And Nancy talked about, that was a big unlock at Airbnb, was bringing kind of the teams together, the brand marketing and the product teams together, really to focus on category. And I think that’s a really important and critical ingredient to success. So, we’re very much here a merch-led brand, but it’s kind of a one-two punch of merch-led, marketing-enabled.

Heather: Speaking about talent and the teams that you’ve built and continue to nurture, is there something that you are looking for today in your future marketing leaders, your future design leaders that is very different than what you might have been looking for, right? There’s a lot of discussion around the new skill sets required. you know, pace of technology and how we need to think differently about data and personalization, and all of these things. Are you looking for something fundamentally different or is it just an evolution of what you’ve always felt makes for a great marketer?

Michelle: I think the foundations haven’t changed. I think passion, commitment, a shared commitment to doing great work, a commitment to being part of a great team. The old cliché, you know, there’s no I in team, but it’s true, right? And good old, good old-fashioned hard work. I mean, I think sometimes new generations want to feel like there’s a shortcut. My experience, there isn’t. I think definitely the market is moving much faster, the consumer is moving much faster. So I do think an agile mindset and the sense of an ability to pivot is really, really critical. But I don’t feel that’s new. I’ve been talking to [the] team about this idea of being able to change direction when needed as a critical management skill for decades. It just looks a little different, but I actually don’t think it’s that new. So I might be missing something. You know, I’ve been doing this a long time, but I actually think the fundamentals of successful team members and success in your career is kind of what it’s always been. I would add that something I learnt perhaps more in my, certainly in the last decade is there can be a tendency as you grow in your career to feel like you know more and you need to learn less. And I actually think it’s the opposite, which is I have never been, I would say, more curious. My team laughs because I quote podcasts 10 times a day, but I’m just an avid consumer of podcasts. There is so much to learn out there. And so I do feel, and the advice I give to my team is, just keep learning and stay curious, because I think that is a really important ingredient of being successful.

Heather: I think that’s great. And it’s also the discipline of finding that time and carving out that time. We have such long, never-ending to-do lists, and it’s easy to get bogged down in the details. And taking time to really poke your head out and get inspired and learn is, I think, a really important reminder for us all. Building on that, I mean, you are a brand builder at your core and everything that you’ve done in your career speaks to that. But you now have a title that is president. And with that, a lot of other responsibilities still centered around the product and the brand. But tell me about the role in terms of, how everything that you’ve done in your career, and I know you’ve held that title in other places, prepares you for the role of president. I think people are just very interested in different career paths and the path to get to that level, anything you can share about it and what you love about it, what’s challenging about it. 

Michelle: Yeah, I think it’s more about the soft skills, to be honest, is what building the soft skills is, is I think what most prepared me to be president versus the hard skills. I think there are, for sure, when I came into this position, there were parts of the business I didn’t know, and I had to go find out and ask a lot of questions and learn. But I think ultimately, in this role, it’s how I lead that is probably the most critical element of my impact. As I took the role, I worked with a coach and I really thought very long and hard and very intentionally about the kind of leader I wanted to be. So I actually, even though I had been in the organization for many years, I actually took it as an opportunity to really reset and pause to think about how do I want to show up? What is the energy I want to give out as a leader? And for me personally, it was this idea of being a wholehearted leader. And so for me what that meant was transparent, authentic, kind. Again, not necessarily words. You think about, when you think about president, head of the company, running things. But this was my choice and my very sort of intentional journey around how I wanted to be. And it’s an aspiration, right? I mean, not every day goes great. Not every meeting goes great. Do you always show up like that? Of course not. But it was my guiding North Star. And I had never worked…I’ve never had a female boss my whole career. And I was the first female on the leadership team at Crocs when I joined. Ever, ever. And so I was also, although I wasn’t, I didn't really think about being a female in a male environment in my early years of my career. Certainly, since I’ve had this role, but even before then, I really paid attention to it, and I would say became much more aware that I could be a role model for other women, you know, in the spirit of if you can see it, you can be it. And, I’m a wife and a mom. My son turns 15 next month. And I have been unapologetic about being a mom. I’ve been, very, very open that, I have a family and that’s a big part of my life and I’ve just been very transparent. And there are times where family has had to come first and, again, I haven’t apologized for that. It’s a journey, but hopefully that has had an impact on my leadership style and hopefully has had an impact on the organization.

Heather: Well, how lucky for those that get to work with you, under you, and be mentored by you. And I think the idea of being unapologetic. I mean, there are times when I even find myself starting an email apologizing for something that actually is not even my fault. And it’s this instinct or to apologize for something that has required me to put my focus on my family. And I think what I’m hearing you’ve been modeling for others is the opposite, to just not be apologetic and to embrace it as part of what makes you a wholehearted leader. But tell me just other things that you are seeing, some of those that you’re mentoring either struggle with or be curious about and other...pieces of advice that you’ve given over the years that you think our listeners would value hearing as well.

Michelle: I think ultimately only you can set your own priorities, right? Nobody can walk in your shoes and so I think maybe two pieces of advice. One is that you have to set them and not expect necessarily your manager to know what your priorities are. So, I think putting them out up front, and as a mom, I’m realizing the years go fast, and it sounds like you know that, too, and you don’t get that time back. So I think making the right prioritization has to be led by you, right? I think your boss might know you, might know your personal life, etcetera, but they just, only you really know what is most important. So I think that’s one piece of advice. And then I think the other piece of advice is like you care more about your career than anybody else, right? And so you have to be in charge of it. And again, yes, in an organization, hopefully they’re doing the right development work. Hopefully they’re helping you develop and grow in your career, but ultimately it is on you to take the responsibility to take the initiative and speak up about what you’d like. Put yourself out there and say, you know, have conversations with people you work with or people whose job you aspire to have one day and go talk to them. You know, if people knock on my door and say, can I ask you some questions? How did you get here? Like, I am an open book, you know, and I think most greatly, strong leaders are who want to develop others will share their journey and share their advice. So I think for people listening, maybe who, maybe there’s someone in your organization that you work with and you say, how did they get there? You know, demystify it and go and ask. But definitely I think my advice is, sometimes I see people kind of waiting to be tapped on the shoulder and just sort of waiting for something to happen and my advice is, you gotta go ask for it.

Heather: Yeah, I love that. And again, another element of being unapologetic, which I think is great. So, there’s a lot of predictions out there about what the year is gonna bring. As you look forward, you know, thinking about the brand and the journey and the aspirations, what are you most excited about? Looking to 2024, and what, if anything, is keeping you up at night. 

Michelle: I think one of the things I’ve been talking to my team about is, you know, when you head into a challenging environment, where can we strengthen? What are the areas we can strengthen? And actually, one of our board members, we had a conversation with about when the times are turbulent, this is a time when you can actually widen the gap against your competition. And so, we’ve definitely been talking about as a brand those places, right? And really understanding where are the areas of underperformance so we can strengthen them, right? I always say, you know, I mean, failures data collection, right? Like, you are gonna get things wrong, but like, how do we learn from them? So I think continuing to really encourage our teams to of course celebrate the wins and make sure we understand how did we achieve that so we can repeat it, but probably in equal measure, examine what didn’t work and learn from it. So that’s, I would say, one element. And then I think, from a brand and product point of view, I have seen our product pipeline all the way through now to the end of this year. And again, as a product-centric leader, I mean, buckle up, there is so much great fun, fashion forward, exciting, unexpected product coming. And I think innovation is our lifeblood. We’re putting product at the center of everything we do. We have phenomenal talent. And so I am pretty confident we can continue to widen that gap.

Heather: That’s very exciting. And speaking about the year, and I know you’ve spoken a lot about the various regions, you, I imagine, travel quite a bit. Do you have a destination on your calendar coming up that you’re particularly excited about?

Michelle: I do actually. I’m heading to Asia tomorrow…

Heather: Oh wow.

Michelle: …tomorrow night. So I’m heading to see our team in Singapore and then on to Korea and then end up in Japan before heading back to Colorado. So our Asia team are crushing it right now. Our brand is really resonating with consumers across China, Korea, Japan, India, Southeast Asia. Our core clog business, but also our sandal business, and our Jibbitz business is on fire there. So, you know, I think more consumers than ever are discovering Crocs. And so it’s been a hard one, and we’ve got a lot of opportunity ahead. So I’m super excited to be able to be in the market with our team and celebrate the successes, but also help them with unlocking the opportunities for the future.

Heather: Fantastic, that sounds like quite a whirlwind trip, but as you said, I’m sure you pick up so much about different customers and things that are resonating there that you can take back, and so it sounds very exciting. So we always talk about the value of getting to that place where you’re overseeing an iconic brand and in a way have built an iconic career. And I would say, you check the box on both of those. It’s been amazing to just hear your journey, hear how you’re leading, what your North Star is, the risks that you’ve taken, but I do like to end each episode, um, asking you a question. And that is who is your icon?

Michelle: I thought long and hard about this, and I think the answer I have is different than some of your guests, is I don’t have a single icon, but thinking about this, I think they were kind of a two-pronged answer to this. There are definitely a number of individuals who I really admire their work, who have put, I would say, great design and product at the center and the forefront of what they do, and those would include, obviously, iconic Steve Jobs and bringing great design to the masses at Apple. Jenna Lyons, and I was an absolute J.Crew devotee in those heyday years and really admire what she did. And then I don’t know if you're familiar with Angela Ahrens, who was the CEO at Burberry, went onto Apple. So those would be a few from a career point of view. And then I think in terms of, I had a bit of a pivot here in terms of an answer, but I was thinking about not necessarily iconic people, but kind of iconic behaviors or energy that inspires me. And I’ve been thinking a lot about this idea of wholehearted and having positive energy in the world. And I think that the people who most inspire me, and you know it when you feel it, is people who are living really authentically, they are just comfortable in their own skin. They just emanate positivity and authentic energy. They can be in any walk of life. And I think that there is a grace that those individuals carry through their life. And so to me, those are sort of aspirational values. So, it’s a little bit of a pivot to your question, but something I’ve been thinking about.

Heather: I think that’s amazing, you know, the idea of iconic behaviors. And also, you’ve used the word energy a few times. And I think we go about our days. And for all we know, this is the one life that we have to lead and to surround ourselves with people who give off that kind of energy and that optimism, I would say you are absolutely one of those people. It has been such a pleasure to have this conversation. I’m just completely inspired by your career, by the way that you’ve led, by the fact that you have never had a female boss before and yet are able to be such a strong, steadfast role model for so many. And I think maybe leaving with this idea of come as you are. There’s so many different ways to think about that. And I, and I love that sentiment. And so thank you, Michelle.

Michelle: And the same to you. This was wonderful conversation. Thank you so much. I really enjoyed it.