I started out in the advertising business on Madison Avenue in New York City. No, it wasn’t quite like “Mad Men”. But it was fun, creative and exciting nonetheless. I ended up running the Los Angeles office of an advertising company called BBDO. Our largest account was the global Apple Computer business. I ran that account and introduced the very first PowerBook.
I then worked at an agency in Portland, Oregon called Wieden and Kennedy. We had the global Microsoft account and I lead the team that introduced Windows ’95 with the Rolling Stones. I then went on to run the global Nike account and introduced a young guy by the name of Tiger Woods to the world.
For the next eleven years I worked for George Lucas at Lucasfilm in Marin County California. I was President of LucasArts and Senior Vice President of Marketing, Distribution and Online at Lucasfilm where I was lucky enough to be able to manage the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises. Talk about the best job in the world. At LucasArts, I led the growth of the video game company, making such popular award winning games as Star Wars Battlefront, Star Wars Lego and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. At Lucasfilm, I oversaw the planning, development and execution of the global marketing and distribution programs for all of Lucasfilm’s motion picture, video and television properties. And no, I can’t be held accountable for Jar Jar Binks.
I’m currently a Partner in the Venture Capital firm of Alsop Louie Partners providing the necessary resources and guidance to new companies that have the promise to develop new technologies, create new jobs and support their local economies. (To see my affiliations and honors along the way, please click here.)
My Background
I’ve been the luckiest man on earth. My wife Dawne and I have been married for twenty-five years. Aside from being my partner all of those years, Dawne started out in the banking business, discovered that she loved cooking and worked in catering and the hospitality industry for many years and then got very involved in non-profit organizations from zoos to inner-city charities to schools.
Along the way we were blessed with the opportunity to adopt two baby daughters from China. Elizabeth is now seven and Caroline is four.
Many people tell us that our daughters are lucky we adopted them. They’re wrong. We’re the lucky ones. Click here to know more about our adoption journey. Read about Why I Am Running.
My father James S. Ward is buried in Arlington National Cemetery. He was a WWII veteran and earned a Purple Heart as an Army medic serving on Kwajalein, the Phillipines and Okinawa. My uncle Bill Kiefer fought in the Battle of the Buldge under Patton and earned a Bronze and Silver Star. I graduated from high school in 1977, post-Viet Nam, and the last thing any of us ever wanted to do was to go into the military. I’ve regretted this decision every day since. But my life has taken me elsewhere.
And I woke up one day and wondered how a guy like me from Rockford, Illinois could have had such a fun and exciting career. I’d like to think it was all due to hard work, but there was a lot of luck involved along with living in a country that gives anyone and everyone the opportunity to succeed. But I hadn’t ever done anything for my country. Certainly not making the sacrifice that my father and uncle had made. Was this the time to start? Could I still do something for my country?
In addition, I began to be concerned about the direction the country was taking. Dawne and I had adopted our two little girls with the idea of bringing them to this country where they could have the same opportunities we had when we were growing up. But I began to look around and I realized that our prosperity was decaying, our liberties were being eroded and our overall security was compromised.
Also, I felt that the Republican party had lost its way. But it became more difficult to defend the actions of the party and that disturbed me. Frankly, all politics frustrated me. It was all about the parties. Not about our country.
Finally, everyone seemed to be talking about change. But I know from my business experience that there’s the right kind of change and the wrong kind of change. Take it from me, we’re not making the right kind of change. Unfortunately, what we are seeing is a fundamental transformation of our country away from a free market economy and the mutation of the DNA of our constitution away from its principles.
So I’ve decided that I want to serve my country, help course-correct our nation and rebuild the Republican Party into what it once was. I have a window that will allow me to leave my occupation to do this. In my mind, it’s the least I can do after I have enjoyed the benefits of this great country of ours.
But I’ll be honest with you. I’m not a professional politician. I’m a businessman. And this is the first time I’m doing this. But I feel strongly that it’s time politicians who just want to be politicians got out of the way and let people who have run businesses, created jobs and made decisions they’ve had to live with, go to Washington and straighten out this mess. I’ve got that skill set along with the ability to make the right kind of change. I hope you’ll agree.
I was born a Hoosier in Marion, Indiana. Tragically, my five-year-old brother died of Leukemia when I was just a year old. It tore my family apart and my parents divorced. My mother moved my sister and me to live with our grandparents in Rockford, Ill, which is where I spent a wonderful childhood, balancing the fine art of playing football while not breaking any fingers, with being classically trained on the piano. I had loving grandparents, a sister who protected me and a Mother who went back to college, earned her degree and provided for me very well thank you.
After graduating from high school I attended Hanover College and received a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science. I then came to Arizona for the first time in 1982 to attend the Thunderbird School of Global Management.
One day in French immersion class, a tardy student entered the room and it was love at first sight. Her name was Dawne Cotton and eventually we were married in the backyard of her parents’ home in Paradise Valley by Bishop Harte of the Arizona Episcopal Diocese. We both graduated from Thunderbird with Masters in International Management degrees and I began my career in New York.
