t's not too often these days you find people whose tenure with one company spans nearly two decades. In the payments industry, where it seems people and organizations come and go as quickly as the wind, it's especially rare indeed when one man's career includes more than 19 years with one employer.

Maybe it has to do with being lucky enough to find the right place in which to excel. It might also have something to do with an individual's talent and abilities.

Doug McNary's path to senior management with First Data Corp. has been a sure and steady one, providing him with varied experience and a broad perspective. Beginning in 2002, he has served as the executive in charge of First Data's Third-party Sales Channels, overseeing the full spectrum of relationship programs offered by Cardservice International (CSI), TASQ Technology and First Data Merchant Processing (FDMP).

His career track has followed a well-plotted course, but not one that's been entirely predictable: McNary, an executive currently overseeing 2,000 people, has, in the past, taken time away from work to live in a dorm at Harvard University while attending an intensive version of the institution's famous Business School.

And when the weather is right, his mode of transportation, and relaxation, is often a Harley-Davidson.

McNary has been a busy man and deserves some R & R.

His unpretentious and quiet-spoken manner belies what he's accomplished in his life. McNary credits the reason for his success to the people he works with and to the leadership philosophy behind one of the largest companies in financial services in the world. He says First Data is a place where hard work is rewarded, people are respected, and the opportunities for success are there for the taking.

"If you look at the leadership team across First Data, there's a tremendous amount of experience," McNary said. "It's a good company to work for, and Charlie [Fote, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer] is leading all of that." Fote has been with the company for nearly 30 years, McNary said.

"A good number of the 19 years I've been at First Data I've spent working directly with Charlie and have learned a lot from him. When it comes to honesty, integrity and doing the right thing, Charlie's one of the very best of the best. He sets a standard of ethics that's hard to match in the business world today.

"He's also extremely demanding of his people and extremely fair. He has a tremendous ability to challenge us all to think creatively and aggressively on how to best serve our clients and the industry."

McNary said Fote's passion for excellence and personal work ethic are felt throughout the company; when the bar is set high enough, people often reach further than they thought they could.

Since joining First Data in 1985, McNary's career has touched on a number of segments in payments, but his roles have always included focusing on developing relationships, with ISOs, agents, merchants and third-party providers.

His contributions include drawing on his expertise to design and implement innovative revenue-sharing programs and assembling executive teams committed to the same types of goals he has worked for throughout his career.

"It's safe to say I've been in an entrepreneurial role within First Data for many years, and responsible for managing with a focus on growth," McNary said. "All the businesses that First Data has been and is involved in within the payments industry all surround transaction processing, recurring revenue streams and most importantly, client relationships and partnerships."

You get the impression that McNary doesn't like to brag about himself and his professional accomplishments and would rather talk about what's important for the company as a whole and for the industry in general.

It's hard to keep track of exact dates and numbers of years, but the experience and expertise gained in his field are no less impressive. Working his way backward from the present, he gives the thumbnail recap of his career and his various roles within First Data.

He said prior to his current position, he was responsible for mergers and acquisitions, or "what we used to call Strategic Business Development," partnerships, joint ventures, new products, product enhancements and other revenue-building models.

During this two-year time frame, he oversaw First Data's acquisitions of TASQ, CSI, the NYCE debit network and several smaller acquisitions.

Before that, he "ran Western Union North America;" the almost nonchalant way he mentions this makes it sound as if anyone could do the same thing. Not likely, though.

His responsibilities as President included all sales, agent management, marketing, customer service and business development in the United States, Canada and Mexico.

Prior to that, he served as President of Western Union's competitor, American Express' Money Order (for retail merchant locations) and MoneyGram (sold through banks and credit unions to its customers).

In between these two jobs is an experience that has proven to be invaluable to McNary on many levels; it's one that he describes with enthusiasm. In 1995, he took three months off and lived on campus to attend Harvard Business School's Advanced Management Program for International Senior Managers.

"Basically they take the first year of Harvard Business School and condense it into a 12 week program," he said. "It's serious boot camp; you go to school six days a week."

The program is offered twice a year. McNary attended in the fall and lived in a dorm room and ate cafeteria food with all the other students; there was no special cuisine offered the participating executives.

"There were 120 people in my class. Only about 30 of them were Americans; the rest were all from outside the United States. You live with them and go to school with them for three months.

"It was certainly beneficial not only for the contacts and relationships established, but the program is designed to give a senior manager the opportunity to step back and get a bigger picture, to broaden the scope of your thinking when you're thinking about managing a business," McNary said.

"What's fun about it is that I have friends in just about every corner of the world now."

Other roles at the company include a small stint in Omaha, Neb. managing a First Data business focused on issuing debit cards and working in the division now known as GovOne, running tax collection programs for the federal government and several states; McNary explained that all federal tax liabilities of more than $100,000 have to be paid electronically and this division settles those transactions.

McNary learned to develop his entrepreneurial interests at an early age working at the retail business his father owned in the small town in which he was born and raised. Atlantic, Iowa, population 4,500, got its name with the flip of a coin. (The town's founding fathers thought they were smack dab in the middle of the country when they settled there and the Atlantic Ocean won the toss.)

Eventually, he earned a bachelor's degree in management information systems from Iowa State University. Before joining First Data in 1985, McNary worked for Xerox Corp., also in Omaha.

He didn't stay rooted in the Midwest, though; his shifting job responsibilities at First Data took him to Colorado and then to California, where he now lives.

The other key element in his life has been his family. McNary said he and his wife have been blessed with five children, now ages 16 to 24.

He said one of the most rewarding things for him is watching them go out on their own to start their own lives and relationships.

One reason for McNary's success has been his ability to blend all the important aspects of his varied career to create a balanced perspective.

"My career has touched on many areas within payments," he said. "Incorporating all that experience into what I do now helps me keep a big picture view of what our role is in the business, where we can add value and where we can't.

"It helps me understand the overall value chain of our relationships with our ISO clients and merchants. It helps me think about where we can really make a difference and have an impact."

His experience gives him a good sense of what it takes to run a company that builds its success on good client relationships and partnerships, and through growing recurring revenue streams and partnerships with other third parties. It also gives him a good sense of what's ahead for the transaction processing business.

"It's time for the ISO industry to mature and take it upon itself to develop a standard of excellence in honesty and integrity to do the right thing in order to preserve our opportunities to be successful over the long term," McNary said.

"We need to make sure that our sales methods and our honesty and integrity with our merchant customers is at the highest level.

"If we don't discipline ourselves, somebody else will.

"I have a good understanding of our opportunities within the industry. I have a real passion for taking what was previously a fairly disjointed strategy and bringing it into focus and seeing that common strategy through and doing some great things over the next couple of years.

"I've got close to 20 years with First Data. I'm very loyal to the company and committed to its success. It's treated me well, and I've tried to do my job to return on its commitment to me."

Like the winding roads he rides on his Harley, through the mountains of Colorado and California and along Pacific Coast Highway, McNary said, "That's what I'm focused on right now. We'll see how it goes."