Career Executive

John W. Thompson has been a career employee and executive. While many employees have transferred from one company to another in search of higher rank and compensation, Thompson was a dedicated employee of IBM for 30 years.  It was a fruitful career. He started as a storage sales representative and worked his way up the ladder.  He held many executive positions until he became the general manager of IBM Americas and a member of IBM’s Worldwide Management Council.

This was not the end of Thompson’s corporate career. In 1999 he joined the growing company Symantec Corporation as CEO and Chairman.  The company was already making $600 million in sales revenue when he came on board. Under his 10 year leadership he guided the company to more growth.  The company became one of the top providers of security, storage and systems management solutions in the world. Its products cater to all segments in the market from individuals to the world’s largest corporations. When he relinquished his CEO post in 2009, company sales totaled over $6 billion. He held on to the chairmanship until October 2011.

His top level position has made him wealthy affording him to make investments in promising startup companies.  Yet again he has taken on the role of CEO this time for Virtual Instruments, in 2010. Thompson has been a board of director for the company since 2009. He also serves on the board of UPS, the huge logistic provider.  Recently Microsoft announced his joining of their board.

Aside from his business undertakings Thompson has also served on the National Infrastructure Advisory Committee (NAIC).  This committee makes recommendations concerning the critical infrastructure of the U.S.  He served on the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission to look into the cause of the 2008 financial crisis and make recommendations to Congress on how this can be avoided or mitigated in the future.  He once served on the national board of Teach America. This group is focused on removing educational inequities among children.

Thompson is not known for having started a company, but he has made a significant impact by vastly improving companies or entities he has been a part of.