Cover Story
The Cornwell File
Smart Business St. Louis | July 2009
St. Louis
Cover Story
DRS Sustainment Systems Inc.
Technology
Born: St. Louis
Education: St. Louis College of Pharmacy, bachelor of science in pharmacy; Southern Illinois University, MBA
What was your very first job?
I’m a registered pharmacist. I made the decision in high school, and the idea was that I wanted to go into a profession that helps people, but then also one that had a program I graduated from and could be licensed in.
To me, medicine was a natural. I certainly enjoyed math and chemistry, and I did very well there. I actually worked a number of opportunities while in school. I worked in retail pharmacy, a hospital pharmacy, and I worked in a lab.
Ironically I worked as an office boy for this company at 17 years of age through college. When I graduated, I was offered an opportunity to stay with this business or pursue my pharmacy career and I elected to pursue this business and work part-time as a pharmacist.
What is the best business advice you ever received?
Find a job that you like and never work a day in your life.
Whom do you admire most in business and why?
I look at our current chairman, Mark Newman, as one of the best businessmen for having taken a family business and grown it into a $3 billion company and having sold it to be part of a $22 billion company (DRS was sold to an Italian company, Finmeccanica S.p.A., in 2008.) Having watched for a very limited time from my vantage point, Mark is probably one of the best I’ve seen.
