Domino’s CEO Gives Career Advice to HPU Students

HIGH POINT, N.C., Feb. 6, 2023 – Domino’s CEO Russell Weiner, who serves as High Point University’s Corporate Executive in Residence, recently talked about his unlikely career path to a roomful of business students and stressed that they should pursue their passions after graduation.

“Once you know what you want to do and you love it, you’ll be good at it,” Weiner told several classes from HPU’s Earl N. Phillips School of Business.

Weiner helped kick off HPU’s Spring Family Weekend by giving an hour-long presentation inside Phillips Hall. He offered career advice to students and told them about how he helped turn around Domino’s when the pizza chain’s sales were struggling more than a decade ago.

Weiner has served as Domino’s CEO since May 2022. He shared with students that he initially planned to become a doctor and was a pre-med major in college until he took an organic chemistry class that didn’t go well.

Weiner said he then decided to switch his major to political science, figuring he should become a lawyer if he had no plans to go to medical school.

“I remember sitting in your seats, not as nice at my school as here, wondering what I was going to do one day. And if you don’t know, the only thing I could tell you is just as good as knowing is knowing what you don’t want to do and checking that stuff off the list,” Weiner said. “As someone who was pre-med, pre-law and then was a marketing guy, stuff works out. Just find out what you love.”

After getting accepted into law school and working an internship at a law firm one summer, Weiner discovered he wasn’t wired to be an attorney. He said he realized he had a passion for marketing – despite having never taken a marketing class – after writing a marketing paper for his college roommate.

Weiner eventually joined Domino’s as its chief marketing director. Prior to that, he oversaw marketing for Pepsi’s North American cola business.

Carter Kleinschmidt, a junior finance major from Nashville, Tennessee, was among several students who stayed after Weiner’s presentation to speak one-on-one with the CEO.

“I thought it was interesting the fact that he kind of came out of college having these expectations in life and then kind of transcended to be something else, especially going into marketing but also then becoming CEO of a company,” Kleinschmidt said.

Kleinschmidt said he spoke to Weiner about how he wants to pursue a career in finance, but he knows it’s a hard field to break into without much experience.

“Some advice that he gave me was find a company you love and then build yourself from there, learning from them and then to continue to build from that to really find what you love in the future with your career,” Kleinschmidt said.

Matthew Thornton, a sophomore business administration major from Thomasville, North Carolina, said he appreciated hearing Weiner’s advice about being open to new opportunities and finding ways to transform a business.

Thornton said he wasn’t required to attend Weiner’s presentation for a class, but he decided to come because he wanted to hear HPU’s Corporate Executive in Residence speak. He appreciated that the CEO of a major company came to campus to mentor students.

“I think it’s a great opportunity to get that hands-on experience. I think it goes hand-in-hand with the life skills that High Point University teaches in the class as well,” Thornton said.