On March 24, Olympics organizers announced that the 2020 Tokyo Games would be postponed until 2021 due to the global public health crisis. In an instant, a dreaded scenario became reality: Massive broadcast and sponsorship deals need to be reworked, hundreds of qualifying events have to be rescheduled, hours of commercial footage must be reshot — and there are just a few months to do it all. Much of that rapid-fire decision-making falls on the shoulders of the 77 individuals recognized here who already have difficult jobs in the best of times.
International Olympic Committee leadership negotiates and manages billions of dollars in broadcast and sponsorship deals. Executives at the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee oversee domestic sponsor deals as well as 50 national governing bodies, which are in turn tasked with the oversight of thousands of athletes and monthslong Olympic qualifying procedures. And that is to say nothing of the broadcasters, sponsors and agents negotiating dozens of deals, the leaders at LA28 tasked with bringing the Games stateside or the athletes who have spent years striving to become the very face of the global competition.
The leaders highlighted in the following pages are among the most important and influential figures in the Olympics movement. And though many are used to working behind the scenes, they will feel the heat of the spotlight as they navigate uncharted waters with the world’s biggest sporting event hanging in the balance.
International Olympic Committee
Anita DeFrantz
Kikkan Randall
David Haggerty
Christophe De Kepper
Christophe Dubi
Mark Adams
LA28 / U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Properties
Zaileen Janmohamed
Dave Mingey
Chris Pepe
U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee
National Governing Bodies
Brands and Sponsors
Broadcasting and Media
Molly Solomon
Rebecca Chatman
Joe Gesue
David Zaslav
JB Perrette
Andrew Georgiou
David Schafer
Agencies and Consultants
Sead Dizdarevic
Alan Dizdarevic
