Meet John Groover, long-time Partner and Leader at Strawn Arnold. John’s medical device career spans over four decades, providing an ideal foundation for his transition into executive retained search.
John began his medtech career in 1982 with Ethicon Endosurgery. “There were 25 of us in their first sales training class, all white, one woman,” John shares. “This one woman trainee ended up running all of Ethicon Endosurgery.” Indeed, John has made diversity a priority, identifying and recruiting the next up-and-coming diversity superstars in medtech. “One of my proudest achievements is placing perhaps the highest-ranking female executive in large cap medtech to be recruited from outside of the organization. We all talk about how important diversity is, but to make an impact with key diversity placements takes more than just talk.”
After five years at J&J, John spent equal time at GE Medical, Edwards Lifesciences, and Sulzer Carbomedics, where he served as President. In 2002, after the sale of Carbomedics, John considered two CEO offers but chose not to relocate his family. He joined Strawn Arnold in 2003 to start their medical device practice. Initially, he placed key executives at Medtronic, J&J, Boston Scientific, and Abbott, before focusing on the venture community. Over the past five years, John has placed dozens of C-level executives with smaller, mostly privately-held medtech entities, primarily as CEOs.
John credits his 20 years in industry leadership roles for his success in retained search. “To perform like a partner for clients, you need to have sat in their chair. Companies succeed or fail based on the successful outcome of the search. You need to take full ownership of that to be successful.”
We at Strawn Arnold celebrate John’s dedication, which has placed us at the forefront of medtech retained search for two decades.
