On Dec. 6, 2013, the University of Wyoming Board of Trustees appointed Dick McGinity interim president. McGinity came to UW with an impressive history as a businessman and naval aviator. From 2007 to September 2013, he held the Bill Daniels Chair of Business Ethics in UW’s College of Business before being named interim vice president for academic affairs.
McGinity attended Princeton on a Navy ROTC scholarship and then served as a naval aviator. He earned his wings in 1967 and served three deployments in Vietnam, where he flew patrol missions and received two air medals.
This issue of UWyo Magazine celebrates our veterans, and McGinity believes his time in the military taught him several invaluable lessons. One was Murphy’s Law—if it can go wrong, it will go wrong—a lesson that was driven home when a plane he was flying lost an outboard engine on takeoff. It was a close call that he’ll always remember. “You need to be prepared for the unexpected,” McGinity says.
“Number two, you only succeed as an individual if you work well with others as a team. … People don’t trust you because of your rank. They trust you because they see how you operate and they know you have some level of concern for their own safety and well-being, which is part of the job of being an officer.”
The third lesson he learned was about managing a large organization effectively. “The larger the organization, the more difficult it is to manage it effectively,” he explains. “You have to start with a clear understanding of what the mission is and then all the things that need to be done to accomplish it.”
The fourth and final lesson he emphasizes is learning how to perform under pressure. “If you aspire to do something significant in the course of your career or lifetime, you are inevitably going to experience stress, and how you deal with it is very, very important,” he says.
As a professor, McGinity encouraged his students to put themselves in new situations and learn from them. Many of the lessons he learned in the Navy will no doubt come into play as interim president of UW. He also brings a wealth of business experience.
After leaving the Navy, McGinity earned his master’s and doctorate of business administration from Harvard. He also worked on the research faculty there, where he wrote numerous case studies and co-wrote a book about economic development and agribusiness. He then pursued a career in venture capital and private equity—first as a partner in a venture capital fund and then as founder of an investment banking firm.
McGinity has served on the boards of numerous companies, most recently Canada Southern Petroleum Ltd. where, as chairman, he led that company’s successful defense against a hostile takeover attempt by Petro-Canada. His public service includes more than seven years as a member of the Wyoming Business Council board of directors.
McGinity maintains a home in Crowheart and loves being in the wilderness on horseback. He is also a licensed professional guide.
Of his plans as interim president, he says: “The university has opportunities to make significant advancements, both in the short term and long term. I aim to work collaboratively with our excellent faculty and staff, and with the university’s supporters across the state and beyond, to identify the biggest opportunities and then move ahead to capitalize on them.”