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Griggs’ focus centers on Lightning’s next level

“I’m in the human capital business now. It’s about growing people,
and finding those next great leaders.”

STEVE GRIGGS
CEO, Tampa Bay Lightning

Photo by: NOLA LALEYE (2)
On an early August evening in 2010, Steve Griggs’ commute was interrupted by a phone call.

The then-42-year-old Griggs, on his way home from the Orlando Magic’s headquarters, pulled over at a rest stop along Interstate 4. Jeff Vinik, the Boston billionaire who had recently purchased the Tampa Bay Lightning, was on the line.

It wasn’t Griggs’ first time speaking to Vinik, but it was their first one-on-one conversation. Vinik had already recruited Griggs’ former boss and longtime mentor Tod Leiweke to turn around his hockey team, and he wanted Griggs on board, too.

“He talked about wanting to build a world-class organization, like the Green Bay Packers — why couldn’t we do that here in Tampa?” Griggs said.

The Lightning was in bad shape, financially and on the ice, and Griggs knew it. He was an executive vice president for the Magic and had been watching the team’s downward spiral from 75 miles away.

But Vinik’s pitch was convincing, and Griggs trusted Leiweke. On Aug. 30, the Lightning announced that Griggs had joined its front office as chief operating officer.

Six years later, the Lightning has gone through a complete transformation, on and off the ice, as well as a leadership transition. Leiweke resigned in 2015 to become chief operating officer of the NFL; Griggs was named his immediate replacement.

Leiweke, with a natural charisma, is a tough act to follow. Griggs, who’s friendly with a puckish sense of humor, takes a more understated approach. But those who work closely with Griggs say that the transition has been as seamless as possible, and that Griggs has become a leader in his own right. Headed into his second season as CEO, Griggs is faced with a charge almost as momentous as the initial turnaround: Continue to elevate every facet of the franchise while developing the talent that will become the next generation of sports executives.

“I don’t think Steve was tapped to be the new Tod,” said Bob Rohrlack, CEO of the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce. “He accomplishes everything that his predecessor did, but he does it Steve’s way, not trying to be someone else. And that’s what’s made him successful.”

Becoming cheerleader in chief

Griggs doesn’t want to take credit for the Lightning’s success.

Sitting in his office in Amalie Arena, he’s careful to answer questions with “we” and “this organization.”

Pressed for specifics, though, he’ll admit: He was the architect of many of the initiatives that led the team to this point.

“Be the Thunder,” one of the team’s biggest marketing campaigns since Vinik bought the team, was Griggs’ brainchild.

“That really was a tribal call,” Griggs said. “It’s created tribalism. People want to be a part of the thunder.”

Early on, Griggs set benchmarks for success, with a big focus on ticket sales. He created training and professional development programs for employees, knowing that happy workers would mean a better fan experience.

Griggs prepares to hand out a service award at the Puck Drop Rally this month for part-time employees at Amalie Arena.
“I think where I came in was organizational strategy,” Griggs said. “Tod was the pied piper, but I would put in all the systems.”

Since Leiweke’s departure, Griggs is fulfilling both roles, said Rohrlack, becoming the cheerleader in chief while maintaining his focus on accountability.

“Tod really liked being out there doing things,” Rohrlack said, “and Steve’s comfortable doing it, but he’s very much about getting it done. And he’s blended those two styles.”

That’s the consensus inside Amalie Arena as well.

Lightning general manager Steve Yzerman sees a parallel between Leiweke’s mentorship of Griggs and his own relationships with leaders from the Detroit Red Wings, Jim Devellano and Ken Holland.

“He is able to take a lot of Tod’s ideas and his own ideas and merge the two to come to the decisions he makes,” Yzerman said. “We’re influenced by the people we grew up with.”

The transition was also a smooth one to Griggs’ peers outside the arena.

“I don’t feel like Steve really skipped a beat,” said Brian Auld, president of the Tampa Bay Rays. “He’s been a tremendous leader in the community for some time.”

Jac Sperling, an adviser to Vinik who represented him when he bought the Lightning, may be the least surprised of anyone by the Bolts’ success.

Seated in Vinik’s private suite at Amalie Arena, Sperling calls Leiweke and Griggs a “rare pair.”

“I think the day that I left, the Lightning got a little better. Steve got his due and his chance, and I think one of the proudest things for me is that they’ve clicked to a higher level since I left.”

TOD LEIWEKE
Former Lightning CEO and
current NFL chief operating officer

“Each one has different talents,” Sperling says, “and they knew what the goal was and they both pursued it relentlessly.”

Sperling had watched a similar trajectory unfold several times over the last decade and a half. He was CEO of the Minnesota Wild when it launched as an expansion team in 1997. Leiweke was team president from 1999 to 2003; he hired Griggs as vice president of ticket sales in 2000.

While Minnesota has a long-standing hockey tradition, the state’s only NHL franchise had moved to Dallas in 1993. But even as an expansion team, the Wild sold out its first 409 games, the third longest sellout streak in NHL history.
Leiweke led the turnaround of the Seattle Seahawks between 2003 and 2010; Griggs boosted ticket sales at the Magic in his time there.

“This has been a repetitive thing,” Sperling said. “There’s a common theme here of pleasing the fans, and giving the fans what they want — excellence.”

This year, the team has 14,600 season-ticket holders, between suites and full-season equivalents. The arena has a capacity of 19,092 for hockey games.

Overall revenue is up 67 percent since Vinik bought the team, and Vinik said the team finished its last fiscal year at a “roughly break even” point.

“I think the day that I left, the Lightning got a little better,” Leiweke says. “Steve got his due and his chance, and I think one of the proudest things for me is that they’ve clicked to a higher level since I left.”

Vinik’s pleased with the progress but expects Griggs to keep raising the bar.

“There are always higher levels,” Vinik said. ”Our hockey team has to play better; our business can be better; we can serve the customers better.”

‘No one will outwork me’

Griggs, it’s safe to say, is up for the challenge.

Vinik says he took to Griggs immediately, when Leiweke introduced them over dinner at the Loews Don CeSar, the resort on St. Pete Beach.

“I just liked Steve right off the bat,” Vinik says. “He’s a normal, good guy, which is probably 80 percent of the battle when you’re hiring.”

But underneath the easygoing facade is a competitor who wants to win. Griggs can’t sit still when the Lightning plays; he’s usually pacing around the building.

A passion for hockey is Griggs’ birthright. He grew up in Canada, playing the sport in college. He still skates; a foot injury sidelined him for awhile, but he’s back in the game, hitting the ice with Lightning employees before work.
Entrepreneurship is also in his blood. His late father owned multiple businesses, including a doughnut shop that was sold to Tim Horton and became the first location of the Canadian coffee chain by the same name. Griggs spent summers as a teenager working in a factory, another of his dad’s businesses.

“No one will outwork me,” he says. “That’s how I started, working in ticket sales. And I was relentless.”
For Griggs, the next relentless pursuit is his employees’ professional development. He instituted programs when he came to the Lightning but has made it a bigger focus since becoming CEO.

The initiatives include a 10-week leadership program that Griggs started last year. Employees must apply to participate, and the group meets once a week to tackle a project — one of them was how to grow the Tampa Bay Storm, the arena football team that Vinik also owns. At the end, the group presents its plan to Griggs and Vinik.

“I’m in the human capital business now,” Griggs says. “It’s about growing people, and finding those next great leaders for our organization.”

Griggs had that same focus at the Orlando Magic, said Alex Martins, team CEO.

“Everybody that worked for him, I would say, would die on the sword for him,” Martins said, “because he was a great motivational leader and helped his employees grow.”

In one way, the Lightning is a victim of its own success. Employee turnover is low, which means it’s difficult to promote from within. Griggs recognizes some may eventually move on in order to move up.

“If they do go, I want people to say they were Lightning made,” he said. “So they are strategic, analytical, accountable, high performing and at the end of the day, that they’re nice.”

Griggs says he’s a bit surprised by where the team is today. He’d thought success was possible but didn’t anticipate that it would be “as deep and as passionate” as it is.

In some ways, he says, it all goes back to that phone call along I-4, when Vinik pitched him on the idea of building a “world-class” hockey organization in the heart of the Sunbelt.

Did Griggs envision, on that evening in early August six years ago, a sold-out hockey arena, multiple playoff runs and a die-hard fan base?

“I guess I didn’t look that far out,” he says, grinning. “I was worried about if I was going to merge back onto I-4 without getting sideswiped.”

Ashley Gurbal Kritzer is senior reporter at the Tampa Bay Business Journal, an affiliated publication.

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