B. Kevin Turner

Walmart

Turner worked nearly 20 years at Walmart. He began working as a cashier at Walmart in 1985 in his hometown of Ada, Oklahoma. While attending college, he rose through the store ranks, to customer service manager, housewares department manager and head office cashier. After several promotions, Turner found himself in the auditing department, where the reports he wrote caught the eye of founder Sam Walton.^[6] On Walton’s advice, Turner joined the company's information systems division, where he worked his way through a succession of jobs: business analyst, strategy manager, director, Assistant CIO and then CIO.^[7] In 1995, at the age of 29, Turner became the youngest Corporate Vice President and Officer ever named at Walmart.^[8] In February 2000, Turner became the Chief Information Officer of Walmart at the age of 34, when former Walmart CIO Randy Mott departed for Dell.^[9] As the CIO of Walmart, Turner oversaw Walmart's information technology and worldwide data-tracking system. The division consisted of over 2,000 employees in Bentonville, Arkansas. As CIO, Turner led a team that developed retail-specific applications such as (Retail Link) at Walmart to achieve complete inventory and supply chain transparency.^[10]

Sam's Club

In 2002, Turner replaced Tom Grimm as the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Walmart-owned retailer Sam's Club, which had over 46 million members and over $37.1 billion USD in annual sales.^[11] Under Turner, Sam's Club aggressively cut prices to win over small-business customers. In his last fiscal year as CEO, Sam's Club turned in a 5.8 percent sales growth at stores open at least a year, which was nearly double the 2.9 percent sales growth at U.S. Walmart stores.^[12] In addition to his role at Sam's Club, he was also a member of the executive committee at Walmart.^[13] Turner served as the President and CEO of Sam's Club until his departure for Microsoft in 2005.

Microsoft

In 2005, Microsoft hired Kevin Turner to be its Chief Operating Officer (the prior COO, Rick Belluzzo, had left the company in 2002 and no replacement had been hired).^[14] Turner was hired at Microsoft to instill more process and discipline in the company’s operations and salesforce, which at the time did not even have quarterly notes.^[15] Microsoft offered Turner a $7 million up-front payment, and other stock awards to help compensate him for stock-based pay that he lost when he left Walmart. Microsoft also gave Turner 325,000 shares of stock that would vest over a period of many years, beginning in 2008 and running through to retirement. Turner would have been required to forfeit the entire $7 million up-front payment had he left voluntarily or been terminated for cause before completing 12 months of employment. A portion of the hiring bonus would have had to have been repaid had he left voluntarily within three years or been terminated for cause. Turner was also eligible for a bonus of up to the amount of his salary and was enrolled in the company's stock award program, with a target award of 624,000 shares (the actual amount determined by Microsoft's achievement of certain goals). Finally, Turner was offered Microsoft's "executive relocation assistance program," in which the company had arranged for a third party to purchase his current primary residence at its appraised value had it not sold as of a mutually agreed-upon date.^[16] Turner accepted the offer and moved his wife and three children to Washington State where, in September 2005, he became the Chief Operating Officer of Microsoft.

From 2005 to 2016, Turner was responsible for the strategic and operational leadership of Microsoft's worldwide sales, field marketing and services organization (SMSG). He also managed support and partner channels, Microsoft stores, and corporate support functions including information technology, licensing and pricing, and operations.^[17] His organization included over 51,000 employees in more than 190 countries. In 2009, Turner led and spearheaded Microsoft's entry into the Retail Stores business.^[18] Along with Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella and other senior executives, Turner served on the Senior Leadership Team that set the overall strategy and direction for Microsoft.

The company ended the 2015 fiscal year with 8 percent growth and $93.6 billion in revenue through his leadership on the company's transformation.^[19] Turner introduced procedures such as a “conditions of satisfaction” document that details what Microsoft will provide each client.^[15] A screw-up required a “correction of errors” in which employees autopsied the mistake and laid out steps to ensure it did not happen again.^[15] He also created standard scorecards with 30 categories to measure each subsidiary’s performance.^[15] At Microsoft, Turner was known for his speeches at partner and sales events that amped up the rivalry with competitors like Oracle, Google and IBM.^[15]

In July 2016, after eleven years as COO, Turner left Microsoft to join Citadel LLC. From 2005 to 2016, Turner helped increase Microsoft's yearly revenue from $37 billion to over $93 billion.^[20] After his departure, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella stated that in his time as COO, Turner "built the sales force into the strategic asset it is today with incredible talent, while at the same time more than doubling our revenue and driving customer satisfaction scores to the highest in company history."^[21]

Citadel LLC

In July 2016, Turner left Microsoft to become the Vice Chairman of Citadel LLC and the Chief Executive Officer of Citadel Securities.^[22] Citadel Securities is a leading market maker, providing liquidity and trade execution to retail and institutional clients.^[23] It executes trades of more than a billion shares every day in the United States, as well as a fifth of the country’s options transactions. It is also one of the largest traders of interest rate swaps in the world.^[24] Turner's team included Jamil Nazarali, head of Citadel Execution Services, and Paul Hamill, global head of fixed, income, currencies and commodities for Citadel Securities.^[24] His appointment occurred after Citadel Securities purchased the designated market-maker business of KCG Holdings and the Automated Trading Desk, a computer-based market making pioneer owned by Citigroup.^[25] On January 27, 2017, Turner left his position at Citadel Securities.^[26]

Core Scientific

In July 2018, Turner became the President and CEO of Core Scientific, a new blockchain and artificial intelligence start-up.^[27] The company was co-founded by former Myspace CTO and co-founder, Aber Whitcomb. Core Scientific is a leader in Blockchain and Artificial Intelligence hosting, transaction processing and application development.

Boards and Other Roles

In 2010, Turner was elected to the Nordstrom Board of Directors. Turner serves on the technology and finance committees as a part of his board role.^[28] In 2017, Albertsons appointed Turner as Vice Chairman of the Board of Managers of AB Acquisition, its direct parent company. He was also named as the Senior Advisor to Albertsons Chairman and CEO, Bob Miller.^[29] Albertsons operates stores across 35 states and Washington, D.C., under 20 banners, including Safeway Inc., Vons, Jewel-Osco, Shaw's and Star Market, Acme Markets, Randalls, and United Supermarkets.

In 2017, he started Forward Progress Ventures LLC, which focuses on strategic Private Equity and Venture Capital work and investing.^[30] In addition to this, Turner also sits on the boards of other various companies and start-ups, including Clobotics, Liquid I.V., and Stone Canyon Industries.^[31][32]