Waco businessman Jim Sirbasku, the Profiles International CEO who, along with his wife, had a horse farm in China Spring, died Tuesday.

Sirbasku, 70, was a hard worker and a self-made man, Greater Waco Chamber of Commerce Executive Committee Chairman Terry Stevens said.

“He’s employed a lot of people over there, and he didn’t have a darn thing to start with,” said Stevens, who moved to the Waco area around the same time as Sirbasku, about four decades ago.

Jim Sirbasku, who was 70, was described as a hard worker and a self-made man.

Sirbasku came to Waco after working as a butcher in a meatpacking plant in his hometown, South St. Paul, Minn. He met his wife, Judy, while in high school there.

Moving to Waco

After eight years at the meatpacking plant, Sirbasku left to join Waco-based Success Motivation International. His job at SMI led him to move to Waco in 1968 to work at the organization’s home office.

He later co-founded Profiles International with friend Bud Haney in 1991. The firm specialized in products designed to help companies improve performance and make better hiring decisions.

A sign of its success was an overture from officials in Nashville, Tenn., trying to lure Profiles executives to move their headquarters to that city in 2005.

Instead, Profiles remained in Waco and increased its hiring.

Sirbasku also owned and operated Arabians Ltd., the world’s largest Egyptian-Arabian horse farm.

Sirbasku and his wife, along with Martha and Tom Salome, who own another Waco-area Arabian farm, jointly owned the horse Thee Desperado, which took second place at the Arabian National Championship in Louisville, Ky., in 1994.

“It is like winning the Super Bowl,” Jim Sirbasku said at the time.

Thee Desperado sired some of the most accomplished horses belonging to Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Abdullah.

Funeral Mass

Funeral Mass for Sirbasku will be at 11 a.m. Saturday at St. Louis Catholic Church, 2001 N. 25th St. in Waco.

Visitation will be from 5 to 8 p.m. today at the Wilkirson-Hatch-Bailey Garden Room.

Sirbasku is survived by his wife; his son, David; his daughter, Susan Priest, and her husband, Mike; granddaughters, Zoe, Sara and Anna; and his father, Jim Sirbasku Sr., all of Waco.

He also is survived by a brother, David Andrew, of Flower Mound; niece, Jill O’Rourke, of Minnesota; nephew, Todd Nelson, of Florida; and other nieces and nephews.

mshapiro@wacotrib.com

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