Michelle Osborne is a community-focused leader who continues to educate, advocate, and volunteer her time to help increase economic development opportunities for Native Americans.
Osborne retired after a long career with Nike Inc., under North America Marketplace Operations, where she and her team managed in excess of $3 billion in product sales, e-commerce, and reporting analysis. While at Nike, she was involved in sustainable innovation strategies, global supply chain initiatives, new tech-oriented concept stores and Nike-sponsored launch events. She also co-chaired Nike’s Native American Network—a NikeUNITED diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) group; reviewed grants for Nike’s employee-led Community Impact Fund; and was on the inaugural team that brought the Nike N7 fund to fruition (providing access to sport for Native American and Aboriginal communities).
Her resume also includes growing Goodwill Industries’ retail mission-integrated enterprises, as well as managing real estate investment portfolios throughout the Seattle metro area to increase rental and capital value.
She supports the work of the Northwest Native Chamber, Native Americans in Philanthropy, and Our Native American Business Network (ONABEN); was a founding board member at Stand for Courage Foundation, which develops bullying prevention programs; and served on the Native American Youth and Family Center (NAYA)/Many Nations Academy board of directors for 14 years.
A cum laude graduate with a marketing degree from Regis University and a member of Alpha Sigma Nu Jesuit Honor Society, Osborne also holds a master of public administration and a graduate certificate in nonprofit management from Villanova University, sits on the Villanova Office of Intercultural (DEI) Affairs committee, and started the university’s first Native American and Indigenous alumni group.
Osborne (Hum me hum me sh/Turtle Dove) is Colville band from the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation in Washington State. She is proud that her grandmother, Marguerite Arcasa Lentz, graduated from Chemawa Indian School, later earning a four-year college degree. Her great grandfather, Marcel Arcasa, was on the tribe’s first business council. His brother, Alex Arcasa, played football with Jim Thorpe at Carlisle Indian School, where they were both All-Americans.
Her family, and many animals, live in Oregon’s rural Hood River County along with a framed Margaret Mead quote on the wall: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”