One-on-One with Waneta Tuttle

When she was all of about 8 years old, Waneta Tuttle’s mother signed her up for a ceramics class.

“To improve my eye-hand coordination,” Tuttle, whose interests veered toward science, recalls with a laugh. “I hated it.”

Maybe because her hands just couldn’t keep up with her brain.

	THE BASICS: Born Waneta Kay Coester on Oct. 28, 1946, in Deming; bachelor’s of science, master’s of science, Ph.D. in biology and master’s of business, all from University of New Mexico; married to David Tuttle since Oct. 27, 1973; children: Mark, 37; Anna Indahl, 35; cat named Scooter. POSITION: President of Southwest Medical Ventures since 1992; former vice president and chief operating officer at Lovelace Medical Foundation; member of the executive committee and immediate past president of the UNM Alumni Association; member of the Corporation for Charles Stark Draper Laboratories of Cambridge, Mass.; director, Health Care Service Corp. of Chicago, Ill.; regional adviser to Tullis Health Investors of Stamford, Conn.; former director, MGI Pharma Inc., Minneapolis. WHAT YOU DIDN’T KNOW: Tuttle met her husband of 39 years through his younger sister, who set the pair up on a blind date.

Tuttle, president of Southwest Medical Ventures, admits that her mind is generally occupied by about five simultaneous trains of thought.

That’s one reason why her career gravitated away from the laboratory.

Despite a Ph.D. in biology and a professional start as a research scientist with Lovelace Medical Foundation, Tuttle started to discover her true calling when Lovelace promoted her to management. She oversaw the organization’s research and development team and soon recognized how well the job suited her multi-tasking mentality.

“I found out I didn’t mind at all giving up being a scientist who was working at a bench and following some pretty tightly defined path,” she says. “There are people who are terrific at that, but I think I learned – and it was quite happenstance – that I really liked the variety. I really liked working with people in those roles. I liked the challenges. There was a challenge in that role to grow something.”

And she grew, too.

Encouraged by her Lovelace superiors to complement her science background with business acumen, she went back to University of New Mexico to pursue an MBA.

Those studies stoked an entrepreneurial spirit she believes was already lurking and, in 1992, she went out on her own to form Southwest Medical Ventures. It was a particularly bold move, considering it meant giving up a steady, well-paying job at a time when she had two teen-age children on the brink of expensive college educations.

She now wonders if she and husband David “were out of our minds,” but doesn’t remember fretting much about the jump at the time.

“It just seemed like it was going to work,” she says.

And it has.

Through Southwest Medical Ventures, Tuttle identifies marketable ideas (mostly involving life sciences and health care technologies), finds the leadership teams to move them forward, helps develop business models and locates investors. She’s currently working with five different start-ups. In her 20 years with SMV, she has served as founding CEO for three different companies, including Indigo Medical, which was later acquired by Johnson & Johnson’s Ethicon Endosurgery.

Entrepreneurship comes naturally to her.

“I think I must’ve been born that way,” says Tuttle, who has been inducted into the Anderson Schools of Management Hall of Fame. “I just love new ideas. Ultimately, you hope that a company makes some money, certainly for the investors. The entrepreneur has that goal, but it’s something deeper. It’s more the excitement of doing something new, moving a new idea forward.”

The oldest child of a high school principal and homemaker, Tuttle has been forging her own path since childhood. Growing up in rural Mesilla Valley in an era when most of her peers were on the fast track to marriage and family, she prepared to travel a different route.

“Partly, I think, because I was so young and didn’t date a lot, I thought ‘I’m never going to get married, and I’m going to have to take care of myself,’” says Tuttle, who graduated from high school at age 16.

She arrived at UNM still a few months shy of her 17th birthday and began to study a little bit of everything. Science had always piqued her interest and she ultimately majored in biology, but her various interests led to enough coursework in Spanish and political science that she finished with minors in each.

Her wide-ranging curiosity has never abated. She and David – who she met as she was finishing her doctorate – travel widely. They’ve made multiple trips to Europe and often make dinner together on the weekends using lessons they learned from a cooking school in Italy.

They’ve also taken up golf, a sport Tuttle appreciates because it forces her to focus. When she’s swinging the club, she attempts to quiet her mind and stop thinking about five things at once.

“But you know what? I’m probably still thinking about three (things),” she says.

Work is often at the forefront of her mind – she once took part in a conference call from an empty hallway at Chateau de Versailles near Paris – and it will remain a significant part of her life for the time being. There’s no retirement plans in her immediate future.

“It’s hard for me to see that,” Tuttle says with a laugh.

And when the time comes she’s no longer running her own company, she figures she’ll just pursue something else. Maybe writing, she says, because it would be fun to detail her professional experiences in a book.

But …

“The thing I wonder about writing,” she says, “is whether or not I can sit still enough.”

Q: What about your job keeps you awake at night?

A: Financing (the start-up companies). I think anybody in this field would tell you the same thing.

Q: What’s the key to success in your job?

A: It’s like threading a needle. There are just so many things that have to go right and so many things that can go wrong. But I don’t think it’s (about) technology. Around here and everywhere, there are brilliant people creating new ideas and new technologies. I guess if I had to point to one thing, it’s finding the right people (to work with the company). The people will drive the investment. Ultimately, you have to have enough capital, but I think the key ingredient is finding the right people.

Q: Is there a career accomplishment you’re most proud of?

A: You know my gut answer to that? Keeping on. I can’t point to one. They’ve all been great adventures, and the mistakes I’ve made, I don’t have enough toes and fingers to count them all. I guess I’m most excited that I’m still excited about it. I don’t know if you can count that as an accomplishment but they’ve all been terrific in their own way.

Q: What else could you see yourself doing for a living?

A: That’s a good question. I’ve been doing this for so long, but if I look back on what I’ve done, I’ve had three different careers: scientist, research management and this. I think I’d enjoy learning more about the finance world. I learn more about that all the time and find it very intriguing.

Q: What did you like to do as a kid?

A: I loved to swim. There was a little Anthony (N.M.) Country Club swim team I was on. We probably played outside more than kids ever do today. I played the clarinet in high school, and I was real active in student council. I think I was determined not to be a nerd even though I loved the sciences.