Suggestions
Bracken Darrell
CEO, VF Corporation
Bracken P. Darrell is the President and Chief Executive Officer of VF Corporation, a leading portfolio of lifestyle brands.123 He was appointed to the position in July 2023.3 Before joining VF Corporation, Darrell served as President and CEO of Logitech International S.A. for 10 years, beginning in January 2013.23 He is credited with turning around Logitech’s business by expanding into new categories, improving market share via innovative products, and elevating design as a key company strategy.3
Darrell has more than 30 years of experience in business leadership and brand management with global consumer companies.3 Throughout his career, he has led growth and reinvention for brands such as Old Spice, Gillette, Braun, KitchenAid, and Whirlpool.3 His executive management experience includes manufacturing, supply chain, product innovation, consumer services, and marketing in both mature and emerging markets.3 Before Logitech, Darrell held leadership roles at Procter & Gamble as President of Braun, Whirlpool Corporation as President of EMEA, and General Electric.3 Earlier in his career, he worked in brand management at Procter & Gamble and is credited with leading the turnaround of Old Spice.3 He began his career with Arthur Anderson and then PepsiCo.3
Bracken Darrell graduated from Daviess County High School in 1981.1 In 1985, he earned a BA degree in English Literature from Hendrix College, and in 1989, he earned his MBA from Harvard Business School.1 He also holds an honorary Ph.D. from Hendrix College and an Honorary Fellowship from the Royal College of Art.4 He has served on the board of directors for Life Biosciences, an anti-aging startup, and as a trustee for Hendrix College.1 As of December 2024, Darrell's estimated net worth is $21 million.5
Highlights
Team Size: Think Pairs Regardless of Size
I had my new global leadership team together this week for the first time. I’ve always loved teams.
I realized something a few years ago that completely changed my view of teams.
I noticed that small teams outperform big teams every time. I met with startups of two or three and they would move faster and create better product than a team of ten or twenty. It seemed intuitive that small teams are better, but I didn’t think deeper than that for a while.
I started emphasizing that we should try to keep teams small.
But I never stopped thinking about the team size. Why are smaller teams so much more effective?
I started to think I was most effective with one other person a lot of the time. And it made me reflect that actually most everything great ever created was probably done by a pair. Jobs and Wozniak at Apple’s early creation. Jobs and Jony Ive (the legendary designer). I bet every person reading this has had some amazing partners at work or personally that they just gelled with.
It struck me finally one day that it’s just math: teams are just a collection of pairs. The more people you have the more individual relationships you have.
In fact, as I now see it, every team is a collection of pairs: a team of two has one pair, five has ten pairs, and it is nonlinear.
Just casually add a couple of players to a team … add two to your five. You just created 21 pairs! By adding two more people to a five person team, you unwittingly added 11 new pairs.
A team of ten has 45 pairs! More players, on the overall team, a lot more pairs.
So it made me think that rather than focus on teams we ought to focus on pairs.
Here’s what I do with that personally now.
First, I try to minimize team size to minimize the number of pairs. That doesn’t mean shrinking direct report size for me. It means when a team is gathering to solve a problem or create something, i try to keep it small.
Second, and a lot more importantly, i stopped thinking of teams as the total number; I think of teams as collections of pairs. Each pair needs to build trust, communicate well, etc. I am always focused on how to build better pairs.
But I also realize on a team of more than two not every pair necessarily needs to work as well as the others. So I focus on what pairs must work best together (in apple, other powerful pairs were Dan Riccio, hardware leader, and Jony Ive; Dan Riccio and Jobs; and Tim Cook and Jobs). Invest in those.
For me pairs are the most important concept in teams.
And it’s true in all of your life: who are the pairs in your life who you need to really cultivate to have an amazing life?
Invest in those.
I have shared little in my nine months at VF about VF. I prefer “to do and then say” rather than “say and then do”. We quietly have so many great things underway.
This is one of them. The team led by Drieke Leenknegt and supported by current CMO Maisie Willoughby and President Nina Flood (Campo) have won a pair of Webby Awards for this amazing history of the growth of Timeberland alongside Hip Hop.
It’s a self deprecating (a la Mattel in the Barbie movie) but proud depiction of how Hip Hop and other movements in Italy and Europe really created the cultural phenomenon of the Timberland Boot.
No brand owes more to its audience than Timberland. The hard workers, tough streets and Hip Hop world made Timberland what it is in the US and they own this brand.
Thank you Hip Hop world and all the cultural giants and folks who helped make Timberland an icon. While you own the brand, we will continue to work to guide it into authentic as well as sometimes unexpected but appropriate new directions.
And if you have 45 minutes to watch this, you won’t be disappointed. It’s an exceptional documentary.
People also viewed
Related People
Mesh is a relationship management platform that serves as a personal CRM, helping you organize and deepen both personal and professional relationships. It functions as a beautiful rolodex and CRM available on iPhone, Mac, Windows, and web, built automatically to help manage your network efficiently. Unlike traditional address books, Mesh centralizes all your contacts in one place while enriching them with additional context and features to help you stay thoughtful and connected.
Mesh works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Mesh offers several powerful features including:
- Comprehensive Contact Management: Automatically collects contact data and enriches profiles to keep them up-to-date
- Network Strength: Visualizes the strength of your relationships relative to others in your network
- Timeline: Shows your relationship history with each contact
- Smart Search: Allows you to search using natural language like "People I know at the NYT" or "Designers I've met in London"
- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
- Home Feed: Displays updates about your network including job changes, news mentions, and birthdays
- Groups: Organizes contacts into meaningful categories
- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Mesh is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Mesh is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Mesh as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Mesh offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
Mesh takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Mesh encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Mesh work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Mesh is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Mesh is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Mesh is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Mesh offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Mesh offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Mesh for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Mesh accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Mesh offers extensive integration capabilities. Mesh introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Mesh supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Mesh also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
Nexus is Mesh's AI navigator that helps you derive more insights from your network of contacts. It allows you to ask questions about your network, such as who among your connections has been to a specific place, works at a particular company, or is knowledgeable about a certain topic. Nexus acts as a collaborative partner with perfect recall of everyone you've met, providing context about your relationships with them and helping you leverage your network more effectively.
Mesh makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Mesh's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Mesh is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Mesh stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Mesh excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Mesh is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Mesh offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Mesh's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Mesh has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Mesh is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Mesh beneficial.
Mesh offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Mesh offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Mesh's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Mesh offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Mesh focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Mesh also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Mesh offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Mesh isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Mesh instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Mesh is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Mesh can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Mesh is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Mesh's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Mesh has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Mesh a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Mesh's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Mesh's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Mesh has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Mesh's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Mesh as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Mesh eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.
People also viewed
Related People