From Rural South Carolina to Olympic Torchbearer: The Unlikely Journey of a Project Management Maverick

What happens when a small-town boy from South Carolina ends up running the Olympic torch in France? The answer reveals profound truths about career pivots, human connection, and why AI might never replace the art of truly understanding people.

In a world obsessed with carefully planned career trajectories and LinkedIn-perfect professional journeys, Clint Padgett's story stands as a refreshing reminder that sometimes the best paths are the ones we never saw coming. The CEO of Project Success recently sat down with James Garner and Yoshi Soornack on the Project Flux podcast to share a tale that's equal parts inspiring career pivot, Olympic adventure, and thought-provoking meditation on what makes us irreplaceably human in an age of artificial intelligence.

The Map That Changed Everything

Picture this: a presentation slide showing a small dot in rural South Carolina connected by a dotted line to Angoulême, France. The title? "Boy Did I Get Lucky?" It's not your typical corporate success story opening, but then again, Clint Padgett isn't your typical CEO.

"I didn't choose this path," Padgett reflects with characteristic humility. "It chose me." That path began in Orangeburg, South Carolina, took him through six years in the Navy (including a stint in the UK), across the street from Georgia Tech to Coca-Cola's headquarters, and eventually to one of the most extraordinary moments of his career: carrying the Olympic torch through the streets of France in preparation for the 2024 Paris Olympics.

But here's where the story gets really interesting. That torch-carrying moment wasn't a one-off publicity stunt—it was the culmination of three decades of Olympic project management expertise that began with a career decision that seemed almost reckless at the time.

The $100 Million Gamble on Following Your Gut

In 1994, fresh out of Georgia Tech with an electrical engineering degree and a comfortable job at Coca-Cola, Padgett made a decision that would define the next 30 years of his life. When Atlanta was awarded the 1996 Olympics, he knew he wanted to be part of that project. The problem? The work was being done by an external consulting firm called Project Success.

So he did what any sensible person would do: he quit his secure corporate job to join a consulting company, with the plan to return to Coca-Cola after the Olympics ended. Thirty years later, he's still there—now as CEO of the very company he joined for what was supposed to be a two-year stint.

"I was going to do that for a couple of years, and when the Olympics were over, I was going to go back to Coke," Padgett explains. "I ended up liking this job so much that it's been 30 years and I'm still doing it."

That decision has led to involvement in every Olympic event for Coca-Cola since 1996, plus European Championships and FIFA World Cups. It's a reminder that sometimes the most transformative career moves are the ones that feel like temporary detours.

Redefining Success: When Killing Projects Is a Win

One of the most fascinating aspects of Padgett's approach to project management is his contrarian view on what constitutes success. In an industry obsessed with completion rates and delivery metrics, he argues that sometimes the biggest win is knowing when to stop.

"I've certainly worked on projects where we killed it in the middle of the project, and we consider that to be a successful project," he explains. "The business environment or business climate changed, and that project was no longer a viable option."

This philosophy challenges the conventional wisdom that project success equals project completion. Padgett's definition is refreshingly pragmatic: deliver on time, within budget, and according to quality specifications. If the business environment changes and the project no longer makes sense, killing it isn't failure—it's intelligent resource allocation.

He shares a compelling example of a plant rationalisation project that was paused for a year. When they returned to it, the business landscape had shifted so dramatically that the original justification no longer existed. Rather than pushing forward with the sunk cost fallacy, they pivoted the entire approach. "If we're going to end up renting space and hiring people, let's do it here and it'd be less to move," he reasoned.

It's a masterclass in the kind of strategic thinking that separates good project managers from great ones.

The Human Element: Why AI Can't Hold Your Hand When Your Dog Dies

Perhaps the most thought-provoking segment of the podcast centres on the role of artificial intelligence in project management and human connection. Padgett shares insights from his interview with Dr. Sherry Turkle, a clinical psychologist at MIT and New York Times bestselling author, who offers a visceral perspective on the limitations of AI empathy.

"I don't care how smart the bot is," Turkle told Padgett, "it cannot hold my hand and truly understand how it feels to have your dog die. There's nothing it can say that can make me feel better... it has not lived that experience so it can't empathise with me."

But the conversation doesn't stop at AI-bashing. Garner introduces a fascinating counterpoint: a story of someone who used ChatGPT to write a poem about their deceased dog, then used AI music generation to create a song that genuinely helped them through the grieving process. It's a perfect encapsulation of the nuanced reality we're living in—where AI can be both profoundly limited and surprisingly helpful, sometimes simultaneously.

Padgett's take is refreshingly balanced: "I'm perfectly OK with AI helping with analytics and with data analysis and all these things. And if there's any grunt work it could take off my plate, I would love that. But at the end of the day, until it takes the place of Jane, Joe, and Bob, then I don't think you could take the people out of the equation."

The Science of Human Connection

The discussion takes an unexpected turn into neuroscience when Padgett explains why he invested in a teleprompter for virtual meetings. It turns out there's actual brain chemistry at work when humans make eye contact—a chemical connection that forms bonds between people. This scientific backing for the importance of human connection adds weight to his argument about AI's limitations.

Yet he acknowledges the complexity: "People wrote letters and they fell in love through letters in the early 19th or 20th century. So with zero physical photos or physical contact." It's this kind of nuanced thinking that makes the conversation so compelling—refusing to fall into simple either/or thinking about technology and human connection.

Olympic-Sized Lessons in Project Management

The Olympic connection isn't just a colourful backdrop to Padgett's story—it's a masterclass in high-stakes project management. When sponsors spend hundreds of millions of dollars on Olympic partnerships, there's no room for error. The date isn't changing, regardless of whether you're ready.

"If I'm Coca-Cola and we don't have product ready, they don't care. They're going to go ahead and go with the games without us," Padgett explains. "And you'll just have wasted that money."

This creates a fascinating dynamic where traditional project management constraints (time, budget, quality) take on life-or-death importance. It's project management with the ultimate immovable deadline, where failure isn't just disappointing—it's financially catastrophic.

The Paradox of Working Yourself Out of a Job

Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of Project Success's business model is their motto: "We work ourselves out of a job." It sounds like business suicide, but Padgett argues it's actually what clients appreciate most. They teach project management courses, then help implement and roll out the methodology within the client's organisation until the client no longer needs them.

"It's maybe a bit bad business model, but it's worked for us for 40 years, so I'm thinking it's still working," he says with a laugh. It's a philosophy that prioritises long-term relationships and genuine value creation over short-term revenue maximisation—increasingly rare in today's business landscape.

Why This Conversation Matters Now

In an era where career advice often focuses on personal branding, strategic networking, and carefully curated professional personas, Padgett's story offers something different: the power of saying yes to opportunities that don't fit the plan, the wisdom to know when to quit, and the courage to build a business model around making yourself unnecessary.

His perspective on AI and human connection couldn't be more timely. As organisations grapple with how to integrate artificial intelligence into their workflows, Padgett's balanced approach—embracing AI for what it does well while recognising the irreplaceable value of human empathy and connection—offers a roadmap for thoughtful adoption.

The full podcast conversation delves deeper into these themes, exploring everything from the practical challenges of Olympic project management to the philosophical implications of AI in human-centred work. It's a masterclass in strategic thinking, career pivoting, and the art of staying human in an increasingly digital world.

For anyone interested in project management, career development, or the future of work, this conversation offers insights that go far beyond typical business advice. Sometimes the most profound lessons come from the most unexpected journeys—from small-town South Carolina to Olympic torchbearer, with 30 years of project management wisdom gained along the way.

Listen to the full Project Flux podcast episode to hear Clint Padgett's complete story, including more details about his Olympic experiences, specific project management strategies, and his thoughts on the future of human-AI collaboration in the workplace.