Joe Heinen, Chief Financial Officer
Places lived: United States (Boston, MA, Chicago, IL, Milwaukee, WI, Newport Beach, CA, and New York City,NY)
Education: Joe received his MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management, and his BSME from the University of Wisconsin.
Experience: Joe's previous experience includes CFO at Pepper Computer, Inc.; fixed income products sales with Goldman Sachs in New York; electronic components sales and marketing at Molex, ITT Industries, and Berg Electronics.
Focus: Designing, building, and improving financial performance management systems for small to mid-size growth businesses.
Intellectual influences: Engineering and the sciences, space exploration, financial and economic history, and Ayn Rand.
Turning points: "Not pursuing a career in engineering, changing course and going to Kellogg, leaving Goldman."
Like many of his colleagues at Tapestry, Joe decided to leave jobs where he was successful because there was something missing or nothing more to be done. Before deciding to go to Kellogg for his MBA, Joe had built a very strong track record in sales and marketing of electronic components, a highly technical sale requiring a strong background in engineering.
“I studied engineering because I excelled at science and mathematics and because trusted advisors, including my engineer father, told me I would be good at it. Engineering taught me how to think rigorously and it taught me a systematic and disciplined approach to solving difficult problems,” Joe recalls. “I eventually discovered that a career in engineering was not what I wanted in life, but those intellectual tools I developed along the way still serve me today.”
Joe’s interests shifted to finance and he decided that the best way for him to make that career change was through an MBA. He did well at Kellogg, graduating among the top of his class. After graduation, Joe joined Goldman Sachs in New York where he leveraged his technical background and his Kellogg experience to work successfully with a variety of institutional investors on highly complex, fixed-income, structured products and derivatives.
After three years Joe decided it was time to move on. “Goldman was a heady experience for me. I still have great friends there. You can’t work in a more professional and demanding environment. But frankly, I didn’t enjoy New York and the work became a bit mundane. I looked down the road and decided to make a change. So I took some time for myself, travelling around the country for a couple months and competing in some triathlons.”
Then fate intervened, for Joe and for Tapestry. Joe’s sister and brother-in-law had just launched Pepper Computer, a high-tech start-up created to develop a new tablet computer. Joe moved to Boston to join them as CFO. Unbeknownst to Joe at the time, just across the street from Joe’s sister lived George Goldsmith, one of the founders of Tapestry.
George and Joe got to know each other over the years and after Pepper closed its doors, Joe joined Tapestry. “I have now been at Tapestry significantly longer than any other place I’ve worked. It’s a great fit. Here, I have the freedom and flexibility to take manageable risks and to be hands-on. I’ve always liked building things and Tapestry has tremendous growth potential. It’s great to be part of a dynamic, growing company with such talented and dedicated people and to deal with all of the challenges that growth brings. Engineering, Kellogg, Goldman – those were all the right moves because they led me here.”
Joe lives with his wife and two children in Andover, MA.
Download Joe Heinen's Formal Biography
