About Us
About Us
ABOUT THE ADIDAS FOUNDATION
The adidas Foundation has been established as a non-profit limited liability company (gGmbH) under German law, with our headquarters in Germany. As an independent entity that continues to foster a strong relationship with our founding company, we operate completely autonomously and are not owned or governed by adidas AG. The adidas Stiftung, which was also established in 2023 as an independent non-profit entity, is the sole shareholder of the adidas Foundation. Find out more about our governance structure here.
With our work, we want to strengthen adidas' efforts in the areas of fighting discrimination, sport for development and access to sport while engaging people in the challenges of tackling climate change and its implications for the places we play. By deepening and broadening the three focus areas of adidas’ community work - people, planet, and relief - we work towards our core mission and vision: uniting communities and ensuring that as many people as possible around the world can benefit from the transformative power of sport.
The primary source of our funding is currently adidas AG. While grateful for this initial funding, we will continue to seek the support of other donors and co-funders to ensure long term financial stability and enhance our ability to support a broader range of initiatives which will ultimately create even greater impact. All financial resources received will be used to enable the Foundation's work as outlined in our activities.
Learn more about the adidas Foundation by visiting our archive.
Our values guide every step forward
Team
The adidas Foundation is led by Managing Director Melissa Kaar. Under her leadership, the Foundation’s team is organized in four departments:
MEAL:
making sure our work incorporates robust monitoring, evaluation, accountability, and learning practices.
Operations:
the backbone of our organization, ensuring that our business processes and support functions are designed in the best way to deliver impact.
Programs:
managing our partnerships, overseeing implementation of our own initiatives and, designing our programs and impact strategy.
Stakeholder Engagement:
leading our communications and advocacy efforts, our approach to community and partner engagement and managing donor relations.
Katharina Schumacher
Head of Operations
Timothy Butterworth
Finance Manager
Hussein Zheri
MEAL Advisor
David Hoffmann
Head of MEAL
Andreas Schlichting
Program Manager
Philipp Lieser
Program Manager
Marisa Schlenker
Program Manager
Jessica Zewe
Program Manager
Angela Mantilla
Head of Programs
Luísa Bonin
Community Engagement Advisor
Sara König
Community Engagement Advisor
Dr. Julian Rössler
Head of Stakeholder Engagement
Interested in joining the team?
We are uniting communities through sport. Would you like to join our team? We greatly value diversity in our team and strongly encourage applicants from all backgrounds to apply, especially those whose unique perspectives and experiences can help us achieve our mission. Discover opportunities that match your skills and passions and take the next step by applying online.
You will be forwarded to our external career site, hosted by the recruitment platform Personio. As an organization dedicated to fostering a more equitable world, please note that we also ensure fairness and a level playing field for all interested individuals by only accepting applications through our career site, not engaging in individual conversations with candidates outside of our standard hiring processes.
governance
The adidas Foundation has been established as an independent non-profit limited liability company (gGmbH) under German law. The sole shareholder of the adidas Foundation is the adidas Stiftung, which is also an independent non-profit entity. The primary source of funding for the adidas Foundation is currently adidas AG.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
The sole shareholder of the adidas Foundation is the adidas Stiftung, which is represented by a Board of Directors who together provide governance and strategic oversight as we carry out our operations. The Board of Directors brings together passionate leaders in sport, philanthropy, and social and environmental impact. The Directors are as follows:
POLICIES & GUIDELINES
Our policies and guidelines help ensure we maintain integrity and professionalism in all our actions. Here you can find a collection of policies and guidelines which we follow along our journey of uniting communities through sport.
ETHICS & SAFEGUARDING
We are guided by our values and deeply committed to integrity and responsibility. This is why we prioritize safeguarding, the protection of children's rights, and respecting the rights of everyone we interact with..
archive
Repository capturing the organization's transformative journey, housing carefully curated past projects, impactful stories, open letters, and news