Roz Brewer, Chief Executive Officer and Director, Walgreens Boots Alliance


Most Powerful Women 2022 - Breaking Barriers

Ladies, please welcome back fortunes Mahala, I'm back. Alright. This time it's gonna be very short. Can I have your attention? Hello ladies. Hi. Okay, so our conversation this evening is without question with one of the most influential women in corporate America no pressure Rosalind brewer rose through the ranks from her early days in management at Kimberly Clark to taking the reins as chief executive at Walgreens Boots Alliance in the middle of the Covid 19 pandemic, a move. She herself described as pretty gutsy and I think that's probably true. She was recently quoted as saying she's in the most rewarding moment of her career right now, we want to hear from her on that and also about her leadership toolbox and so much more. We're also happy to note that she is # seven on this year's list of most powerful women. So please welcome Rod to the stage along with my dear colleague and fellow coach, er Beth Cohen ross welcome um It has been five years since you have been with us on the M. P. W. Stage and we've missed you. So thank you for thank you for being back. Um What's happened since then you at the time you were Ceo sam's club, then you went to Starbucks. Now you are Ceo, That's a very abbreviated a lot of other things. Right, But in that time I'm sure you've got a lot of calls about Ceo job. Why did you take this one? Well, you know, actually best um timing is everything and um I was loving Starbucks. Um you couldn't tell me anything. Um I thought that that was like the best job ever. I mean it was fun, right? It's coffee, it's flat, you know, um you know, it was just, it was everything and um, I enjoyed a lot about it, but as things were happening around me, um, there was, you know, that growing activist in me and it wasn't enough, it, you know, when things happened and this moment came and the opportunity met the moment and um I sort of snapped in a good way, you know, and this was something that just pulled me in um and made me change my mind about a lot of things, tell me more about that house. So, so, you know, um, I think everyone knows, you know, this pandemic was just horrific and um, I joined in March of 21, it was 30 days before vaccines were being administered. So the death toll was very high. Um, I had been seeing and experiencing through friends and family, the, you know, the health inequities that were happening and um, I knew I had been part of healthcare years ago, so ran tons of retail pharmacies through my time at walmart and at Sam's club and then I had a health care role at Kimberly clark. So healthcare has always been right for disruption. So I saw this as a um, problem, ready to burst, right? And so executing vaccines while people were dying at this high rate, um, and affecting everything around us on the backs of social unrest, Our communities were not ready for this. Um, and so I just felt like it was time for me to take everything I've learned and put it against one of the biggest problems I thought I was gonna ever face in my life. So as we all said, you know, it was a gutsy move as you've acknowledged, um, how has that shaped your ambition for Walgreens taking over in the middle of a pandemic? How's that shaped your thinking? So, you know, um, you learn a lot in a crisis and usually, you know, a lot of innovation happens. Um, that's in fact what happened to us if I just isolate just vaccine administration alone, um, just creating the technology around the scheduling tool, right? And so you come into an environment that is a pharmacy led environment. I learned quickly on day two that they had not done, You know, um, a lot of opportunity was there for digital and technology. And so we had 30 days to build a system. And um, all my friends from tech called me and said, Hey, you know, come over our right to program for you in two seconds, you know, and so I called on every friend we had and the team was actually raring to go, but you know, having done, um, a lot of digital work in my career. Um, this reminded me of, you know, the time in retail when we had to figure out how to become a digital entity and look at all the different channels of access for retail and that was the same thing. We needed access to vaccines and people needed a place and know how to get in and they needed knowledge and they need education. And so, um, you know, it's such a flashback to the retail transformation and so we just we put all that to bear, but it's it's what it has done for me is to say you likely do your best work when your challenge and the timeline is shortened and the resources look limited. And that's when you see that young engineer just step up and blow it out, right? And you know, they never would have gotten that opportunity. And so I've learned that, you know, I have talent in the bowels of the company. Um, I also learned that, you know, having, um, a one single objective, you know, our objective was shots in arms and that we, you know, we had t shirts that said that just very simply right? And so we ended up putting 70 million shots in arms. So, um, you know, so I quickly got a chance to see the company from the inside out, um, through the crisis. And um, I'll tell you, I've actually fallen in love with the company. I mean it has so much opportunity for growth and in an industry that's just right for change. So I want to talk about your own ambition for a second. Okay. At what point in your career did you know you were going to be a ceo Oh shoot, I never really knew that, you know, it just kind of came, I think that's really, you know um I think all of us can say this, we've seen we've had good leaders and we've had bad leaders and I've always tried to wedge myself in between those and so I never will do that. Um Or I like that, right? And so um you know I've had those opportunities but then it really came to me that um in many cases um you know I had more skills than I knew or believed, right? And and that's the closest the closer I got to C. E. O. S, you know being chief operating officer at Starbucks um really taught me, you know the importance of execution and planning and um then setting vision and bold ideas and so I quickly, you know, learned that it was probably time, right? I was bumping up a little bit more than I probably should have been or you know, maybe you know the ceo maybe thought but you know it's um you know and I don't mean in a bad way I'm just saying you know we were we were good partners. Um but I saw my potential at that point, I like that, I like that. So how have you thought about your career, have you said yes to everything? How is that? Thinking evolved over time? No, no, I got really clear, you know, I had, I had, there was a point in my career where I had so many, um, what I would call grunt jobs that it was making me sick to my stomach, I was like, okay, one more time, okay, I'll go do the worst job ever and make the best of it, right? And so after a while it was like over that, right? And so I, um after a while I started being very critical about, I don't want to, you know, like, I didn't say I want to be a ceo of a healthcare entity. I said I don't want to do that, that doesn't interest me, but I got very, very clear and said, no, titles never impressed me. Money never impressed me. I really wanted to be in the place where it was happening, right? You know, I know that there's this little tiny thing in me that feels like change is always got to happen and if it's not happening, I want to push it and make it happen and you can't do that sometimes from the back row, you've got to be, you know, up there, but then you can't do it without the skills. And so I quickly knew I've got to build in order to get where I can do my best work and when I feel my best self and that's when I'm right on the edge of where it's happening. So that's um you did not start out on a traditional ceo path though. I mean you started as a bench chemist. I did, I did. So how did you make that transition in turn? Yeah, so, you know, I was probably one of those, you know, loud nagging bench chemist that was like, you know, dang it, I gotta, you know, do you know, stuck in the lab on Saturdays, you know, you start because I was actually, I'm an organic chemist. And so I started off really just doing wet chemistry and it's kind of isolating right? There's like nobody in the lab but you and a couple other scientists and then, you know, you're on the end of research and development that gets, you know, gets cut, you know, that's where cost cutting happens. And so you get so excited about developing and creating something and, you know, the budget shifts. And so I got a little frustrated with that. So I eventually moved over to um, you know, actually I went into m and a at that point with Kimberly clark and I was on the side with the um, you know, valuing uh patent estates and things like that. So part of the business team, but on the periphery of it, but then I just came inside through that way and did you ask for that? No, actually I didn't know what was going on, I didn't understand them and a I was like, what's going on? They're like, well, you know, we're like a paper company and we want to be in, you know, consumer products, you know, we want to be like PNG. I was like, okay, whatever, I don't really understand what I was doing, they were like just go out with the lawyers and the finance team, we're gonna think about this company, you know, kind of, you know, value their patent status, you know, So I was like, okay, the next thing and I was like, oh, this is M and A okay, you know? Really? I mean, I just wasn't, I mean, I was five or six years into my career, I did not know what I was doing, I don't have an M. B. A. I didn't have a financial background, but I was there to bring the expertise on the technology side. So you are the youngest of five, I am first generation in your family to go to college and you were the yeah. And and you were the first correctness around the first of the five kids to leave the state to go to. That's right, that's right. How has that shaped you? I mean, clearly you were already cutting your own path that at that point, yeah, yeah. You know, my family thought I was like totally like crazy, like why would you leave michigan, there's like you have them there, Michigan state, wayne state, you know, wonderful community colleges, all that I loved, right? And but I, you know, I didn't like the cold weather and then I saw this, I saw this brochure on the south and Spelman College, I was like oh I like that, right? So I was looking for um fun and frolic, you know, like Like anybody else, I was 18 years old and it happened to be outside of Michigan. So right, but I mean you you talked about this before, it was hard for your family know it was hard, you know, because while I was in school my dad was my sophomore year, my dad was diagnosed with colon cancer and he was 49 and then by six weeks before I graduated from college he passed away. And so for him he was the one was just like education, I mean he was just like plowing it into me, you know, I could get a C and he'd be like, you know, that's great. And so for him not to be, there was really hard, so you know, I broke away but you know, it was I grew up really fast because by the time I finished school um you know, and then there was a point in there where there were four of us in college and my dad worked three jobs and my mom worked, you know, I was a latchkey child at three years old because I was the youngest of five and everybody was off doing their thing. My oldest sister is nine years older than me. And so they would prop me in the window. Um, at about 2 30 my mom would go work the afternoon shift And I'd be sitting in the window like this and all the neighbors would be walking down the street because you know, that's when, you know, your neighbors raised you in addition to your parents, that's when we lived in villages, right? And everybody took care of each other. And um, I'd be sitting in the window until the older siblings got home from school and I did that until I was five years old from 3-5. I have to ask you more about spelman because I know this is so important to you. Um, you said that There you really learned the importance of seeing yourself and other people tell me more about that. Yeah. So, you know, Spelman is a unique place and it is very special to me. I've been working with the college ever since I graduated and chairing the board for the last 10 years, but you know, going to school with, um, you know, all black women, you know, I came from a pretty diverse school, but predominantly white high school. And so to be shoulder to shoulder with women who had experiences similar to mine and some not because, you know, there's a broad socioeconomic um, student based at Spelman, you know, the positions and lawyers, kids and you know, and then my parents being auto workers, right? And so I saw really the diversity within the diversity and I never thought there was diversity within diversity. I never thought that until I got to that school. And so it's taught me a lot about, you know, race relations in a way that it is very specific and particular about that person's lived experiences is not about their exterior at all. Um, and so, but it took that experience for me to learn that. And I, you know, I feel better, um, stronger because of it. So you had a very different experience than when you entered corporate America. Um, Oh yeah. So you and I talked about this before, but you know how your accomplishments are often positioned as the first or the only. Yeah. Tell me, tell us honestly how that makes you feel. You know, it's I, you know, I really mean this seriously, it's never a good feeling because first of all, I'm still like walking in being the only one in the room, right? And then, um, I looked down and, you know, young women and I, and I know what I've been through and I said, you know, I just want to like quit my job and like help, right? Because, you know, I've seen it, right? And I see what's on their faces. And so it doesn't feel good to be the only because, you know, this should be moving, it should be much stronger than what it is right now. We should be moving in tandem with, you know, multitudes of people. Um So it doesn't feel good when when, when I hear that, you know, um because it just shouldn't be and, you know, I hope that I can do as much as I can to change that, but it's gonna take more than me to do that. I realized that yeah. Um I want to end by, you know, we have a group uh from the military community here. And you met some of them earlier. Yeah. And you'll hear a little bit more about them right after this. But what advice would you get them as they think about their own careers? You know, First of all, I mean, I've hired so many people from the military, you know, I'd like to, there's some walmart folks here, I would say I'm just gonna hold walmart out, they do a fantastic job of hiring uh post military. I'm just going to give them their kudos and I learned that when I was there um with them. And um I, you know, to see what um someone with a military background and their level of execution and expertise and focus. Um I mean, I'd hire them, you know, every day of the week because I see a skill set to drive a hunger, the independence. You know, if you've been in the military, that's a very deliberate decision. You wanted to be there, you wanted to make change happen and you were doing something for the greater good, not just for yourself. So wonderful humans dedicated, hard working. So I just say to all of the women in the room that our post military, thank you first for serving our country and um, so proud of you and um, second of all, you know, they've got, they've got the stuff, you know, I'm proud of them every time I've hired when I've been more and more impressed every time. So good advice for everyone here, hire them, hire them rod. Thank you so much for being here. We're so glad you're back. Um, really enjoyed, glad to be here. Thank you.