GREEN BAY, Wis. \u2014 Ed Policy got a keen understanding about the realities of his dream occupation while growing up in a football family.<\/p>\n
Now that he\u2019s about to take over as the president\/CEO of the Green Bay Packers, Policy gets to put into practice the lessons he learned as the son of former San Francisco 49ers and Cleveland Browns president Carmen Policy.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was an incredible education,\u201d Policy said. \u201cWe talked about the NFL and the business of the NFL and pro football every night at the dinner table.\u201d<\/p>\n
Policy experienced the joy of Super Bowl championships and the adversity that came when his father made difficult decisions such as trading Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Montana. The training continued as Policy spent the past 13 years in Green Bay while the Packers continued succeeding after the 2023 trade of four-time MVP quarterback Aaron Rodgers.<\/p>\n
Now it\u2019s his turn to make the tough calls.<\/p>\n
Policy, 54, assumes his new role July 25 when the Packers hold their annual shareholders meeting. He was recommended by a search committee and unanimously selected by the Packers\u2019 board of directors to take over for Mark Murphy, who reaches the mandatory retirement age of 70 next month. Murphy had held this position since 2008.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t expect this transition to result in major changes.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe both approach the importance of this job and especially the stewardship nature of this job \u2014 we take that very importantly \u2014 so I think you\u2019ll see a lot more similarities than differences,\u201d Policy said. \u201cObviously we\u2019re slightly different generations, different communication styles. We\u2019re different people. But I don\u2019t think there are going to be any real glaring differences.\u201d<\/p>\n
Policy, a former Arena Football League commissioner, president and CEO, joined the Packers as vice president and general counsel in August 2012 and was promoted to chief operating officer in January 2018.<\/p>\n
In Policy\u2019s new role, Packers coach Matt LaFleur, general manager Brian Gutekunst and executive vice president\/director of football operations Russ Ball will report to him. Policy says all three of them have multiple years left in their contracts, though he wouldn\u2019t specify beyond that.<\/p>\n
Policy said there are no plans to extend those contracts before this season, but he praised LaFleur, Gutekunst and Ball as \u201cthree exceptional people doing an exceptional job right now and working well together.\u201d <\/p>\n
Policy was part of the panel that hired Gutekunst and LaFleur. He has a longer relationship with Ball through their Arena Football backgrounds.<\/p>\n
Although he wants more meetings among top Packers officials to foster better communication, Policy said he has no plans to meddle.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would communicate very frequently and openly and directly with them on all things, but certainly no team needs two head coaches or two GMs,\u201d Policy said.<\/p>\n
This is the type of opportunity Policy always wanted. Policy said he started thinking about a career in football as far back as high school.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had two dream jobs in mind,\u201d Policy said. \u201cRunning a team or commissioner of the league were the two.\u201d<\/p>\n
Policy remembers riding in a passenger\u2019s seat and listening to his dad negotiate Hall of Fame quarterback Steve Young\u2019s contract on a car phone. He also recalls the hate mail his father received after making controversial decisions.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think my dad just always had thick skin,\u201d Policy said. \u201cAnd I think I inherited that, so I\u2019m grateful for that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Policy says he still calls his dad a couple of times a week and often seeks his advice.<\/p>\n
But he also realizes his new job has its own set of challenges based on the Packers\u2019 unique ownership structure.<\/p>\n
He expects his years working alongside Murphy to help in that regard, because it taught him how to become more collaborative. Policy calls Murphy \u201cprobably the strongest consensus-building leader I\u2019ve met.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn my opinion, every NFL team is a community asset, and every president is a steward of that assets,\u201d Policy said. \u201cHere, it\u2019s literal. I think it\u2019s more figurative everywhere else. Here it\u2019s literal, and it\u2019s more important.\u201d<\/p>\n
Policy said the Packers\u2019 status as a publicly owned franchise provides advantages and disadvantages.<\/p>\n
The benefit is that the Packers can invest any money they make right back into their team, and there are no worries about family squabbles interfering with anything. But he also noted that other teams can bring in limited partners and make revenue way beyond anything the Packers gain through their occasional stock sales.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom an organizational and operational standpoint, it\u2019s a competitive advantage,\u201d Policy said. \u201cFrom a raising capital standpoint, it\u2019s probably not an advantage.\u201d<\/p>\n
That requires the Packers to make smart decisions in order to remain competitive. Policy looks forward to that challenge, while continuing to utilize the guidance he received from his dad at the dinner table.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo this day, I will tell you I rely on the lessons I\u2019ve learned from him,\u201d Policy said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"GREEN BAY, Wis. \u2014 Ed Policy got a keen understanding about the realities of his dream occupation while…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":139068,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2072],"tags":[11963,54,7,41,345,2514,2513,6,428,252,2309],"class_list":{"0":"post-139067","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-green-bay-packers","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-cleveland-browns","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-green-bay","12":"tag-green-bay-packers","13":"tag-greenbay","14":"tag-greenbaypackers","15":"tag-nfl","16":"tag-packers","17":"tag-san-francisco-49ers","18":"tag-wires-bot"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114703246760606968","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139067","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139067"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139067\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}