Startups and Starting Lineups: CEO Steve Doswell Talks Football
Steve Doswell, BCom/81, has extensive experience leading teams—from being captain of the Carleton University football team, to leading the teams of four startup companies to success. He said the values he learned through Carleton Football helped him throughout his business career.
“My fondest memories and my most character building memories revolved around the football program. It gave me a lot of confidence and a lot of conviction,” shared Steve about his time at Carleton.
“I took away a lot from the coaching, the discipline and probably the biggest thing of all was the team part of it. I was always a team oriented person. Having the chance to be part of that team, and for a couple years to be captain of that team—everything I’ve done in the future has been about building teams and meeting people.”
After completing his Bachelors of Commerce in four years, Steve took a semester of random interest courses at Carleton so he could play a fifth season of football. Then he entered the workforce with a small consulting company. One of their clients, a large international conglomerate, offered him a position where he could travel. After that he became the business development leader of his first startup, iSTAR Internet, which he helped grow to annual revenues of over $70 million prior to being acquired. Two more startups later, and some time working at AOL and Ericsson, Steve moved to the Middle East to run an information security company.
He returned to Canada three years ago with the intention to retire. Presented with the opportunity to build up another startup, and realizing he did not want to spend his retirement days golfing or fishing, he became CEO of Soundpays.
Throughout all of this time, Steve stayed involved with Carleton and the movement to bring back the football program, which had been disbanded after the 1998 season. He recalled being on the board to bring the football program back, and sitting in on one of their meetings by telephone at 3 a.m. in Dubai.
Steve’s hard work behind the scenes to revive the program paid off. Football returned to Carleton in 2013. He attends as many of the Carleton Ravens football games as he can, both in Ottawa and when the team plays in central Ontario.
His involvement as an alumni mentor is one of his ways of giving back to the Carleton community, but it also has ties to the football program. He said coaches can show potential recruits how executives around the country are helping football players with career planning and getting experience in their fields. One of Steve’s mentees, Nicholas Rhodenizer, is also a Sprott alumnus and former varsity football player.
Steve’s experience leading Carleton’s football team helped shape his leadership style. Being a founding member of four startups, Steve said what he enjoys most is building a cohesive team.
“You need perseverance. You need to develop a thick skin. You need to have a vision,” expressed Steve about being CEO of a startup. “And you need to be able to attract people who will come and engage in that fight with you. It’s a lot easier to get a job with a company or with the government and not have all this extra stress and the ups and downs of it. And all of those things, when I look back, those values and skills were developed through Carleton Football.”