Daniel Cherry: Think Like an Engineer When Building Bridges

We know that relationships matter when building our spheres of influence and impact. Daniel Cherry III, Global CMO of Vans, wants leaders to get much more rigorous about the ones we build, treating them like the load-bearing structures they truly are.

Speaking to a recent LEAP Essentials class about Building Bridges, the fifth of the Virtuosi League Six Pillars of Leadership, Daniel challenged participants to think like structural and network reliability engineers: identify the connections that matter, test their strength, find vulnerabilities and reinforce them before pressure arrives.

Careers inevitably encounter pressure in the form of disagreements, reorganizations, transitions, personal challenges and crises, all of which stress-test our relationships. The ultimate question is whether we’ve built our relationships to carry those loads.

The Catalyst

Daniel learned the load-bearing power of relationships during one of the most public and consequential chapters of his career.

While an executive at Adidas, Daniel was directly involved in the company’s separation from a major celebrity, a decision he described as morally clear and commercially enormous. He explained that as the company walked away from a massive revenue stream, Daniel himself became the subject of intense public scrutiny and personal attacks.

Long before the crisis, Daniel intentionally developed relationships with members of the Adidas board, seeking them out for advice and mentorship beyond his day-to-day operations. When the situation escalated, those leaders already knew his values, judgment, and contribution to the business.

Another critical bridge existed outside the company entirely. Throughout his career working with brands, entertainment and celebrity, Daniel had built a relationship with crisis communications expert Judy Smith, the real-life inspiration for Scandal’s Olivia Pope. He had cultivated the relationship before he knew whether he would ever need her expertise. When the crisis arrived, she was ready to help.

Those relationships gave Daniel something nearly impossible to build in the middle of a crisis: trust.

The Approach

Daniel’s challenge to the class was to become the engineer of your own network.

“How strong is your current network inside and outside of your current company?” he asked. “How well do you nurture and strengthen those relationships?”

His relationship map makes this a practical exercise. Identify the people you need relationships with to succeed, then honestly rate each connection from 1-10. A 10 is someone who assumes positive intent, speaks positively about you when you are absent, and brings you into the room when you need to be there. Then decide what a stronger relationship would look like and create a plan to move the relationship forward.

Some of the most important names may sit beyond your immediate team or the obvious concentric circles around your role. Many leaders in the Virtuosi League community, like Fanatics Collectibles CMO Ken Turner, have stressed the importance of establishing and nurturing a “first team” of peers beyond their direct reports.

Daniel urged participants to identify who influences what you do but whom you don’t interact with regularly. Also consider who influences decisions before you enter the room. For Daniel, Finance is an essential bridge for any marketing leader. Marketing appears as a cost on the ledger, making a strong relationship with the CFO especially valuable. He also prioritizes the COO, then maps outward to understand who influences both. The result is a more accurate picture of how decisions actually move through an organization.

Strengthening those relationships requires deliberate choices about time. At an off-site, conference or company event, people naturally gravitate toward colleagues they already know. Daniel encouraged the class to invest instead in the 3s and 4s on their relationship map, and to use strong relationships as bridges to people they need to know.

For leaders who are harder to find common ground with, Daniel starts with business acumen and curiosity. Thoughtful questions about their priorities create credibility and help shape how they perceive you. “The first question I ask of them is a reflection of what I want them to think about me,” he explained.

That curiosity also strengthens the first team. Daniel says he is obsessive about making sure cross-functional leaders share an understanding of the current state of the business. Dashboards, business reviews, and enterprise KPIs create common ground when everyone understands the metrics that matter across functions.

The Takeaway

Building Bridges asks leaders to map and design their relationships with the same intentionality they bring to business strategy.

That extends beyond the company. Daniel described how Virtuosi League gives him connectivity across industries. Combined with LinkedIn and relationships built throughout a deliberately varied career, he is often only one degree away from someone whose experience could help him solve a problem, and vice versa.

Relationships also grow through generosity. Sometimes adding value means showing someone that they are valued. A thoughtful, informed compliment signals curiosity, preparation and genuine appreciation.

The goal is a network built for the full arc of leadership, including the moments we cannot predict. Daniel encouraged participants to see themselves as engineers continually strengthening the relationships that can withstand whatever load comes next.

“Community and networks matter, because they will hold you up when times get tough,” he said. “Build your own strong networks, because you never know when you’ll need them.”

Daniel “DC” Cherry III is Global CMO at Vans. He previously held executive roles at Dickies, Adidas, Activision Blizzard, DC Comics, and Diageo. He is recognized for blending cultural fluency with humility, and building bridges through authentic trust that unites people and strengthens organizations.