It's been nothing short of a banner year for Nike CEO Mark Parker. Here's a quick recap to bring you up to speed: in May, he pulled a presidential stunt on the POTUS himself during Obama's visit to Nike HQ. A month later, Parker topped Glassdoor's CEO approval ratings list, effectively making him the coolest boss in the U.S. More recently, at Nike's 2015 Investor's Day event, Parker had the chance to share some of the brand's latest accomplishments and plans for the future.
Now, he can add Fortune's 2015 Businessperson of the Year to his laundry list of accolades. In an extensive profile, Fortune mentions that Parker's success is especially noteworthy because he's a "rare successor of a celebrated founder who has taken his company to new heights."
In other words, the things that Parker has been able to do for Nike since taking Phil Knight's spot as CEO (technically, Parker took over for William D. Perez, who briefly served as CEO from late 2004 to early 2006) are rarely achieved in any field, much less the sneaker industry.
Speaking of Phil Knight, the Nike co-founder says that sometimes he and Parker can go months without talking and still manage to be on the same exact page. "I usually know what he's thinking and vice versa,” Knight said. However, Knight admits that there are rare occasions when he has to ask Parker, "Why the hell did you do that?"
Judging by the way things have been going for Parker lately, those instances are few and far between. Head over to Fortune now to read the full profile.
