MINNEAPOLIS, Minn.- For Geoff Martha, it has always been about making an impact. During the Coronavirus pandemic, that has only escalated.
After spending the last five months as the president of Medtronic, a global medical device company, Martha took over as the CEO on April 27. Since taking over, things have been crazy for Martha as his company tries to keep up with the increasing need for medical devices to help combat Coronavirus.
Recently, Medtronic partnered with Elon Musk and Tesla to provide ventilators to thousands of hospitals around the world. Martha said his company typically produces 100 ventilators per week. That number is up to 500 and he hopes they can reach 1,000 ventilators produced per week by June. In addition, Medtronic is helping other companies around the globe produce the ventilators.
"This is a very valuable product for us," Martha said. "We put it on the internet and granted a royalty free license to manufacture and sell this during the Covid crisis."
To get to this point, Martha has made a tremendous journey. He spent four seasons with Penn State's club hockey team, the Icers, and graduated from Penn State in 1992. With Penn State, Martha won the ICHL Championship his freshman year and followed that up with a national championship as a sophomore. He was voted team captain as a senior and from that point on, Martha always had a knack to be a leader.
To root his success with Penn State, you have to dig even further, to his coach at the time, Joe Battista. Battista coached Martha for both his club hockey team in Pittsburgh, in addition to leading the hockey team at Culver Military Academy. It was that connection that helped bring Martha to Penn State.
He spent his first college semester at small Colby College in Waterville, Maine. Itching for the opportunity to play at a bigger school, Martha searched for opportunities outside of Maine. He cited his dad and uncle playing Division I college football as motivation for him to move to a bigger school. That's where Battista came in. His high school coach reached out and said he should come play at Penn State.
While Penn State was only a club team at the time, Martha jumped at the opportunity. Another factor that motivated him to choose Penn State was its University Scholars Program, which is now the school's Schreyer Honors College.
"The University Scholars program was like going to private school classes in a big school setting," Martha said.
Martha knew he would never play hockey at a professional level. He played with several future NHL players at Culver and acknowledged that he didn't stack up with their talent levels. But the desire was still there to play hockey and that is what he did at Penn State.
"It was a part of my identity," Martha said. "I didn't feel fulfilled unless I was playing hockey."
Over his four years, Martha and his teammates had massive success. But it seemed his time playing hockey was preparing him for life after college. Martha learned how to be a leader, and he learned how to work in teams. Not a day goes by that those experiences don't apply and during the current pandemic those skills are so much more necessary.
He cites the biggest difference between business as normal and what is going on now is the increased emphasis on communication. There is little doubt that those lessons being applied by Martha now can be directly cited to his time on the rink at Penn State.
In his final year with the Nittany Lions, Martha was nominated for, and won, the Oswald Award. The award was named after the university's former president, John W. Oswald, who led Penn State from 1970-1983. The award recognizes 10 students who stood out for their academic work, in addition to participating in an extracurricular activity. Of everything Martha accomplished over his years at Penn State, this was the one that stood out.
"That type of award really defined me up until that point in my life," Martha said. "For the university to recognize me for that, it means the world to me."
It represented everything Martha wanted to be in life and he still aspires to be just like that. No amount of success or advancement in his career will force Martha to stray from the values that got him to where he is.
Those values are clarity of thought, sense of purpose and humility. Martha wasn't able to tie the first value to hockey, but the last two connected as clearly as two puzzle pieces. He talked about sense of purpose and how you should always do something because you like the work that you do. There should always be a deeper meaning than just making money or getting a promotion.
"If you're doing something because you want to make money then you don't have a sense of purpose," Martha said. "Sense of purpose is about impact. If you have a sense of purpose, then work is not work."
Humility may have been the easiest one to explain for Martha. He said it is as simple as no matter how good you think you are, there is always going to be someone better than you. Everyone on a team would know the guy on a team who was about themselves and not about the team.
Those values are something that Martha has held, and always will hold, close to his heart.
Following his graduation from Penn State, Martha has taken on a prestigious career path in the professional world. He spent 19 years at GE prior to making the move to Medtronic in 2011.
No matter where his career has taken him, Martha always stays close to his roots. He has been a staple at Penn State over the years and his impact on the university has continued far beyond his graduation. Martha was inducted into the Penn State hockey hall of fame in 1998 and received a distinguished alumni award from the program in 2016. His daughter currently attends Penn State and Martha is a constant presence at Penn State's annual alumni weekend.
Martha also continues to follow Penn State hockey and frequents Penn State games with his son, who is currently a student at NYU. He had high hopes for the team this year and, like many others, was crushed when the Nittany Lions didn't have an opportunity to see how far they could have gone in this year's NCAA Tournament.
"I promised my son whenever Penn State goes to the Frozen Four, we were going to go no matter what," Martha said. "We were looking forward to hopefully going this year."
A part of Penn State's success since becoming a varsity program in 2012 can be owed to Martha, as well as many other alums of the program. He had a huge helping hand in raising money to help Penn State make the jump from club team to Division I.
They helped spearhead fundraising efforts, with the hope of raising $25 million and having the university match it. There were many obstacles along the way, but thanks to a generous $104 million donation from Terry and Kim Pegula, the school was able to clear those obstacles and from there, Penn State hockey took the next step.
Current Penn State head coach Guy Gadowsky has done a tremendous job in keeping the alumni involved and building strong connections between the old chapter of Penn State hockey to the new chapter.
"Not only do you not feel like a second-class citizen, you feel like a founding father," Martha said.
He says his relationship with the program is stronger now than it has ever been and has even offered internships and jobs to Penn State hockey alumni. Martha and his wife sponsor a scholarship for the team and Gadowsky is always sure to introduce him to players whenever he is in town for games.
Now Martha is on a bigger mission. He is working every day to help combat the Coronavirus and save thousands of lives. He is in constant communication with The White House, governors and many other heads of states across the globe. As Martha says, what is good for the patients, is what is good for Medtronic.
Penn State ranks No. 2 nationally in CEOs produced, according to LinkedIn. Martha is one of the many impressive examples of the thousands of Nittany Lion alums who continue to make the school proud with their impacts.
"I'm confident in Penn State in continuing to produce high quality people," Martha said. "The number of CEOs is just one metric of the quality of people Penn State produces. I'm very proud of that."
When Martha looks back one day and measures what he considers to be success, he'll measure it tangibly. Martha will look at how he helped Penn State hockey build a great program and also at how he built great people and helped many others in need of medical help.
"I want to have an impact that is easy to find and well recognized," Martha said. "If I do that, I'll feel really good."
And when he thinks of Penn State hockey, what comes to Martha's mind?
"When I think of Penn State hockey, I think of the great legacy it has," Martha said. "The great support it has from the university, the coaching staff and the players who are really good at what they do. It's only a matter of time until they make the frozen four and win a national championship."
So, for Geoff Martha, the question he always asks is: Am I making an impact?
The answer, very clearly, is yes.
