Goal CEO Brian Cornell is stepping down after 10 years.
The retailer has chosen chief working officer Michael Fiddelke as Cornell’s alternative, introduced throughout Goal’s Q2 earnings name. Fiddelke will take the reins on Feb. 1, 2026, and Cornell will transfer into the function of government chairman.
The change comes amid continued gross sales declines—this marks its eleventh quarter reporting flat or falling gross sales—and repeated shopper boycotts over the previous two years.
Goal has confronted backlash from each ends of the political spectrum, beginning when anti-LGBTQ activists criticized its 2023 Pleasure assortment, main the retailer to cut back Pleasure-related advertising and marketing and merchandise, and extra just lately when it dropped its provider and workforce variety packages.
“Our efficiency over the previous few years has not been acceptable,” Fiddelke informed buyers.
Fiddelke has spent greater than 20 years on the firm, beginning as a finance intern in 2003, based on LinkedIn. Previous to his function as COO, he was chief monetary officer from 2019-2024.
In the course of the earnings name, Fiddelke outlined a imaginative and prescient for his tenure that focuses on fashion and design, buyer expertise, and technological funding.
“We have to transfer quicker, a lot quicker,” he mentioned. “Over the previous few months, we’ve been urgently adjusting our method to assortment planning amidst a quickly evolving exterior tariff and shopper panorama.
“The sort of velocity and agility is precisely how we have to lead throughout all features of our enterprise, serving as a textbook mannequin for our new enterprise acceleration workplace.”
