Mark Parker Quotes
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I'm a relentless sketcher. It goes back to how you process the world around you - the whole left-brain, right-brain thing. Some people are data-driven. I've always been more visual.
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One of the challenges of innovation is challenging a set model. A traditional way to manufacture footwear existed for hundreds of years. Now we have a whole new way.
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Curiosity is life. Assumption is death.
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I'm inspired by visual stimulation.
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I tend to gravitate toward people who are a bit more eccentric and creative and artistic in some ways. And I like bringing disparate kinds of creative people together to create some great work, even to share points of view on a new direction.
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I ran over 10 years without missing a day, averaging close to 15 miles. I loved being able to run a long distance and get that feeling of strength and exhilaration from being in good shape. There was a meditative quality about it. Almost effortlessness. That's a special feeling.
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Our brands - Nike, Converse, Jordan Brand and Hurley - are loved by customers all over the world. But we never take that for granted; we know that every day we have to earn their trust - by serving them completely and adding real value to their lives through products and experiences.
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You don't always have to start over to create an emotional reaction to your product. It's always powerful to deliver a breakthrough, but there's also a true art to making something great even better.
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There is always an underlying spirit of invention at Nike - we love to create something that has never before existed. And not just new for the sake of new - it has to be better.
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I don't like when I say 'honestly' - not to imply that I'm otherwise not honest.
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I love working with athletes. They're all very demanding.
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The biggest sources of opportunity are collaboration and partnership. And today, with digital communication, there is more of that everywhere. We need to expose ourselves to that as a matter of doing business.
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The psychology of performance in athletic footwear and apparel is very real. Most athletes do not say, 'Just give me what works the best - I don't care what it looks like.' They're very concerned with what it looks like and how it makes them feel.
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I always carry a sketchbook around with me, and I sketch whenever I can... I might be in a financial review and be sketching because I find that I actually listen better when I sketch. Truth be told, there are probably more sketches in my books than there are written notes.
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One way a collaboration can go wrong is if your connection is inauthentic or overly prescriptive.
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I have sketched since a young age, so there's always been an artistic side, a visual side to my personality.
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My wife will go, 'You know, you're drawing a shoe right now.' I do that all the time.
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One of my biggest sources of angst is having people so comfortable with a formula that works that they are not challenging themselves or their ideas.
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I think a really great creative person is almost by nature incredibly curious and digging deeply into cultures and technologies and getting all this input and using it to make things better - basically, creating better solutions.