RONALD “RJ” MITCHELLETTE FOUNDER, AUTHOR, ADJUNCT PROFESSOR, FORMER NAVEL ACADEMY SAILING SQUADRON, PAST COMMODORE OF THE BAREFOOT SAILING CLUB AND U.S. ARMY VETERAN (CAPTAIN RON) Ron Mitchellette is “the” quintessential entrepreneur having logged over forty years of his own early career small business launches, including his first venture, which he took public(IPO) and his second startup that became the Marine industry’s largest canvas cover supplier to OEM boat manufacturers. He then sold his canvas company to an investment group and made a major mid-career change by joining the banking/finance industry, where he spent twenty years lending money to mid-sized companies for growth capital and M & A’s including revitalizing a fair amount of turn-around situations.
He then resigned his mid-career world of finance to start his third company, which became an Investment Firm dedicated to purchasing troubled financial institutions, including the purchase of a Bank and several Mutual Fund management contracts, before he sold his investment firm to a larger regional bank five years later, after he and his team rebuilt the bank’s capital position.
He then spent a year sailing the San Francisco Bay and re-started his teaching journey, where he left off when he was an Adjunct Professor at the University of St Thomas from 1975 to 1987 while building his companies referenced above, by teaching his SIGNATURE COURSE on Entrepreneurship at the Universities of San Francisco and Santa Clara.
It is interesting to note that Ron is considered the unofficial co-founder of the graduate program in entrepreneurship at UST and the present Morrison School of Entrepreneurship. He also has released his book on entrepreneurship, titled “Entrepreneurial Decision Making,” which is featured on this website.
He started his business consulting firm in 1995 in San Francisco and continued and grew it in Atlanta Georgia before relocating to San Diego and finally back to his adopted state, Minneapolis, MN