If you’ve ever had a “friend” or colleague allow you to proceed first, while uttering the wisecrack “age before beauty,” you understand that even business is sometimes considered a young person’s game. Yet organizations that don’t value maturity will eventually pay a price, maybe a substantial one.
This month, we introduce the “7 over 70,” a new and hopefully permanent feature honoring a group of geriatric juggernauts who insist on remaining active when most of their contemporaries are enjoying a life of leisure. The seven people recognized in our inaugural 7 over 70 presentation are longtime business executives who have something in common – they are as active, or nearly as active, as they were at the peak of their business careers.
Their lifetime of business knowledge and their commitment to philanthropy have yet to walk out the door or head south, which is a gift to their respective organizations and communities. We are delighted to share a slice of their histories, their epiphanies, and their lessons learned.
Robert Dahlk, 76
Owner/President
Capitol Lawn Sprinkler, Inc.
Email: capitollawn@tds.net
Born: Middleton, Wis.
Spouse/Partner: Joan Dahlk
As you drive around Greater Madison this spring and summer, watching an active, sports-crazy community enjoy baseball diamonds and soccer fields, you probably won’t think about the people who designed and installed their irrigation systems. But the life’s work of Robert Dahlk and his staff at Capitol Lawn Sprinkler is somewhat hidden in those spaces, and in more prominent spots like the Capitol grounds and points of interest outside of Madison. Dahlk, a 1953 graduate of Middleton High School, was raised as a farmer and outdoorsman, and naturally gravitated to the business of keeping things green, while giving back to the community by supporting youth sports and community events like Verona Hometown Day. Now he’s hoping to carry his irrigation contracting business to the next generation, perhaps also passing along a lesson he learned as a young man in the Army: “To think for yourself, yet get along with others.”
George Gialamas, 73
President and CEO
The Gialamas Company, Inc.
Email: george@gialamas.com
Born: Chicago, Ill.
Spouse/Partner: Candy Gialamas
When thinking of commercial community-building, the first Madisonian who comes to mind is George Gialamas, longtime chief executive of the Gialamas Co. Sauk Trails Park, his primary business legacy, remains a professional focus, but overall the firm has designed, built, leased, and now manages 2.5 million square feet of office and retail property. His proudest achievement is changing Madison’s landscape in the course of building “communities within the community,” but the Marquette University alum also can point to enormous civic contributions on the board of the UW Carbone Cancer Center and support of nonprofits like the Madison Symphony Orchestra and the Clean Lakes Alliance. Gialamas’ many gifts have earned him prestigious recognition like the Ellis Island Medal of Honor award and the Madison All-Century list, a salute to 50 people who shaped Madison, but his philosophy of “a rising tide lifts all ships” helped him raise the business bar.
Bill Howard, 76
Owner and CEO
Imagesetter
Email: imageset@imagesetterinc.com
Born: Chicago, Ill.
Spouse/Partner: Mary Howard
What kind of people juggle two careers in their mid 70s? People who are still in demand, like Bill Howard of Imagesetter. In addition to printing and publishing, he’s taking on an immense challenge as he develops a new business consultancy to help government agencies run more efficiently. To his business counterparts, that’s comparable to Sisyphus pushing the boulder uphill, but Howard plans to put his experience in teaching engineering economics into practice. While teaching this discipline at UW-Madison, he gained an understanding of how complex organizations work, and how that affects their cost structure. He’s mindful that government does not run like a business, but it must be run with more business sense. The alternative is higher taxes and falling behind other societies that understand the link between efficient government, business vitality, and higher living standards. “Too many decisions are made based on uninformed ideologies,” he lamented.
Iain Macfarlane, 72
Founder/Executive business coach
ActionCOACH
Email: iainmacfarlane@actioncoach.com
Born: Sydney, Australia
Spouse/Partner: Madge Macfarlane
It’s not that Iain Macfarlane thought that CEOs needed a Vince Lombardi type to drive them, but in advancing the concept of executive business coaching, he certainly wanted to help them reach the next level of business and financial performance. Along the way, there were countless workshops and seminars and articles and radio programs, but his clients knew they were being schooled by someone who had been there, not to mention done that. Working with two partners, Macfarlane helped build the H.J. Heinz Company into one of the fastest-growing advertising agencies in Australia, and he turned around five struggling companies he was recruited to lead. His building blocks included scrapping a past-present mindset and replacing it with a present-future one, embracing change as a constant element of life, and a keen understanding that continuous learning and exercise to stimulate the brain and body are prerequisites for high performance in business and life.
John Montzingo, 78
President
Montzingo & Gustin Advertising
Email: jzingoad@gmail.com
Born: Butte, Nebraska
Spouse/Partner: Betsy Montzingo
For the high-flying John Motzingo, the Golden Rule (doing unto others) translates into being fair, being on time and on budget, and having a good time doing it. But only part of his legacy involves the fun he had in developing marketing and advertising strategies with Montzingo & Gustin; another is his love affair with the aviation industry, in which he launched a consulting firm and served in the Air Force and Air National Guard as a fighter pilot, eventually retiring as a colonel. Montzingo also designed industrial airparks to buffer residential areas from airport activities, with the two most notable in Reno, Nev. and Springfield, Mo. As a member of the creative class, he played a role in promoting divergent organizations like Anchor Savings, which garnered his agency Ad Fed awards, and the National Home Health Care Exposition, but it was the production of a coffee table book for House on the Rock that allowed him to bask in international recognition.
Jackie Scott, 70
President
Scott’s Pastry Shoppe, Inc.
Email: scottspastry@tds.net
Born: Beloit, Wis.
Spouse/Partner: Russel Scott
For Jackie Scott, a self-described graduate of the School of Hard Knocks, a career in retail bakery has not been a piece of cake. She’s hired, fired, trained, sold, and decorated – most of it a labor of love, except for cleaning restrooms when she could not find someone to do it. Overall, however, the experience has been a treat because Scott’s Pastry Shoppe is one of the ways she’s been able to serve the Almighty – not by providing sweets but by taking pride in being a preferred place in Middleton for teenagers to land their first job, and by donating food to Middleton Outreach Ministry. Eventually partnering with daughter Dawn Westhoff, Scott has been in the same University Avenue location for 30 years, garnering enough peer respect to become the first woman president of the Wisconsin Bakers Association and serve on the board of the Middleton Chamber of Commerce.
John Suby, 70
President
The Suby Group
Email: jsuby@jfsuby.com
Born: Nunda, South Dakota
Spouse/Partner: Donna Suby
John Suby has always been the “go-to” guy for client and community. The Suby Group, which encompasses three new companies, offers a combination of accounting and wealth management services, keeping entrepreneurs one step ahead of changing business and economic conditions. Raised by a caring father who taught him to put the needs of others before his own, Suby also serves as president of Advent Lutheran Church, as chairman of Lutheran Services Foundation of Wisconsin and Upper Michigan, and he worked on initial fundraising for the local Hospice facility. Suby lists his age as “over 70,” and his educational background included a long-ago stint at Spencerian College in Milwaukee, where he earned a bachelor’s of business administration in accounting. His sense of empathy was influenced by his work for the Internal Revenue Service, where he learned a lot about government and where it became apparent that he’d rather be an advocate for people and businesses.
