Jim Sweeney (left) with Dr. Daryl Mitton
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Alumni Spotlight:
Jim Sweeney
Starting one’s own business is a dream for many Americans, but few actually have the ability to become entrepreneurs and even fewer have the ability to be successful at it.
SDSU business administration graduate, Jim Sweeney (B.S. ’69) is one of those few that can say he’s started a successful business – and he’s done it eight times!
Sweeney’s first job was with a local hospital when he was a teenager. During his time there, he saw an inefficient system, but he also found his calling. “I found hospitals to be fascinating places. They seemed very disorganized and confused because the doctors’ agenda often conflicted with administration,” recalled Sweeney. “ I saw lots of opportunities to fix things that seemed broken.”
To get the education he needed to get his endeavors off the ground, Sweeney chose to attend SDSU “because of the reputation of the business school.”
It was during Sweeney’s years at SDSU that he met Dr. Daryl Mitton, a professor of management, who served as an inspiration to him. Mitton brought his experience running a business to the world of academics and he was an early advocate of entrepreneurship education. It was also Mitton who founded SDSU’s now renown Entrepreneurial Management Center.
With encouragement from Mitton, Sweeney forged ahead in the health care business by becoming an executive at Baxter Travenol Laboratories, but by 1979, he struck out on his own to form Home Health Care of America in Newport Beach, Calif.
Home Heath Care specialized in providing care to seriously ill patients in their homes. In 1985, the company changed its name to Caremark and it was around this same period that the company became the first to offer at-home infusion therapy. By 1987, when Caremark had grown to around $250 million in revenues, it was sold to Sweeney’s old company, Baxter, who paid for Caremark in a stock swap valued at an estimated $528 million.
Flush with success, Sweeney went on to found seven more companies, all of which are in the field of health care and all of which have achieved varying degrees of success. “None have failed,” said Sweeney. “Some have been grand slam homers and others have been bunts to first base.” Sweeney recently retired as executive chairman of CardioNet, an organization he founded in 2000.
Sweeney's advice to young entrepreneurs: "The secret to becoming a successful entrepreneur is to burn all of your bridges so that quitting is never an option." |
