Mike McCarthy ’73 Chairman McCarthy Group If you had told Mike McCarthy when he arrived in Collegeville during the late ’60s that he would eventually invest hundreds of millions of dollars in the Omaha economy, the farm kid from Iowa, second of ten children in a devout Catholic family, would have shaken his head. He was going to be a priest. But his studies as an English major and interactions with monks such as Alberic Culhane, OSB, Hilary Thimmesh, OSB, and Louis Blenkner, OSB, convinced him otherwise. “Saint John’s helps all of its students become aware of their skills, interests and talents, and of where they might be most productive and happy,” McCarthy says. “It became clear to me that my calling was probably not to the priesthood but to some other community engagement.” He returned to Iowa after graduation, married and started a construction company. In 1986, he and his wife, Nancy, moved to Omaha so their four children could be educated in Catholic schools, and Mike started an investment firm (McCarthy Group is the holding company; McCarthy Capital is the operating company). Over the past 25 years, that firm has been hugely successful,
with a large return to Omaha on its investments. For instance, McCarthy Group invested in 1987 in Election Systems & Software, a company run out of an Omaha garage. That company has grown into the largest electionservices provider in the nation, counting over 60 percent of America’s vote last November. And McCarthy Group joined the employees of HDR, a local architectural and engineering company, in building a $155 million business in 1996 to a nearly $2 billion enterprise that has become the world leader in hospital design. In the process, McCarthy’s firm helped HDR employees gain control of the business from a foreign owner. The company’s mission is “to preserve, create and share wealth and success with our partners, each other and our community.” That means McCarthy, who obviously wants to show a profit, is in it for more than the money. He wants to see the community benefit from his investment. “We have no interest in the simple trading of assets where no value is added,” he says. “We look for companies that we’re proud to own. Those are companies that would share the values and the ethics that we think are the foundation for good business and provide good value to customers and clients. They treat their employees with respect, pay them a fair wage and they generate profits that can be used to expand the business and support the risk-takers who provide the capital to make it possible.” He sits on five boards, including two of the city’s Fortune 500 companies, Union Pacific Corporation and Peter Kiewit Sons; has chaired the United Way campaign; headed the Chamber of Commerce; steered the Omaha Community Foundation and the Joslyn Art Museum; and donated his own money to philanthropic causes.
“We have no interest in the simple trading of assets where no value is added.”
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