Rick McDonald from Clorox - The $7B Cyber Attack That Exposed Real Leadership

Rick McDonald spent decades inside one of the most complex parts of business, the part most people only notice when something breaks. At Clorox, that break came in the form of a cyber attack that forced the company to operate without normal systems for months. Suddenly, procurement, payments, planning, manufacturing, and supplier communication became a test of trust, speed, and judgment.

His story is not just about surviving a crisis. It is about what years of supplier relationships can do when the playbook stops working. Rick explains why the company kept plants running, how business continuity plans helped but also exposed gaps, and why suppliers continued showing up even when payments were delayed. That kind of support does not happen by accident. It is built through years of consistent treatment and credibility.

This conversation also moves into the bigger shifts happening across supply chain, cybersecurity, AI, and sustainability. Rick shares why cyber risk now belongs to everyone in the company, why AI makes fraud more believable, and why the next generation of supply chain tools must prove value faster. He also digs into supplier visibility, sustainability claims, consumer behavior, refill packaging, and why some ideas fail not because they are bad, but because the timing or execution was not ready yet.

Key Topics:

-How Clorox operated during a months-long cyber disruption
-Why supplier relationships became critical when payments stalled
-What business continuity plans get right and where they break down
-Why cybersecurity cannot sit only with IT
-How AI is making impersonation and fraud harder to spot
-Why sustainability still struggles when cost becomes the deciding factor


Timestamps:

00:28 Knowing When It Was Time to Step Away
02:19 From Manufacturing Plants to Supply Chain Leadership
04:19 The Procurement Lesson Behind Kingsford Charcoal
05:23 When Supplier Trust Becomes the Real Safety Net
06:30 Building a War Room Without Systems Access
07:09 The Decision to Keep Plants Running
08:29 How Retailers and Suppliers Responded
09:18 Managing Supplier Payments During a Crisis
12:21 Why BCPs Must Be Tested Beyond Short Outages
13:45 What Strong Continuity Planning Actually Requires
16:11 Why Cyber Threats Are More Convincing Now
18:17 Cybersecurity Is No Longer Just an IT Problem
20:48 The AI Image Story That Felt Too Real
22:52 Advising the Next Wave of Supply Chain Startups
23:46 Why Speed to Value Matters in Software
26:41 The Procurement Tool Rick Wants to See Built
28:47 Why Deeper Supplier Visibility Is So Hard
30:14 The Cost Problem Behind Sustainability
34:54 What Burt’s Bees Shows About Customer Alignment
35:32 Why Refill Models Still Struggle With Shoppers
38:57 Lightweight Products and Smarter Packaging
40:27 Why Good Ideas Deserve Another Shot

Connect with - Rick McDonald
LinkedIn - linkedin.com/in/rickmcdonald82

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