The University of Denver’s startup community has a new CEO.
John Sebesta has been named director of Entrepreneurship@DU, picking up where Joshua Ross left off. Ross, an associate teaching professor in the Department of Management, stepped down this month, though he will continue to stay involved in E@DU programming.
He’s sporting a new title, but Sebesta is no stranger to E@DU. He joined the Daniels College of Business as an adjunct faculty member in 2020 and has been heavily involved in all of E@DU’s programming—from teaching sections of the infamous Fourth Industrial Business course to mentoring budding entrepreneurs in the BASE Camp summer accelerator. He continues to hold the positions of Koch Endowed Chair of Entrepreneurship and professor of the practice.
Bold innovation is a core pillar of the Elevate 2035 strategic plan, which calls for the construction of a dynamic, inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystem. In his role, Sebesta will oversee an expanded focus on entrepreneurship, in Daniels, across the DU campus and in the community. He answered some questions from the Daniels Newsroom about his background and vision for the future.
Your career started at NASA and Lockheed Martin and wound through a few other industries. When was the first time you considered yourself an “entrepreneur?”
Entrepreneurship is really about building something new amid uncertainty. While at Lockheed, I found my niche in in commercial contracts where we had the flexibility to really build an agreement from scratch to meet the customer’s needs while protecting our interests. I loved that work and the joy of creating something to solve a customers need stuck with me through my years teaching social entrepreneurship throughout Central America. However, I wouldn’t say that I considered myself an entrepreneur until I worked with co-founders to raise funds and launch businesses in Costa Rica and Puerto Rico. That was the first time I had the pressure of truly creating something from nothing and doing it with the pressure of stewarding other people’s investments.
What are some of your favorite things from the past six years at DU/Daniels/E@DU?
I’ve loved my time at DU ever since I stepped into my first BUS 1440 class in fall 2020, navigating the pandemic. It’s been great to be part of a small team innovating within the curriculum and building out co-curricular opportunities. Watching our students prepare for and compete in the 4impact Challenge is always a highlight. They consistently blow me away with their ideas and incredible presentations.
Mentoring students through the BASE Camp accelerator stands out as another highlight because students are investing their time over summer to develop and build businesses which may truly shape their futures. While not all businesses from BASE Camp ultimately prove successful, the growth that students achieve over the short six weeks is astonishing. Getting to watch and support the entrepreneurs who do continue with their businesses is always so rewarding.
Finally, I’ve had the opportunity to engage in some really meaningful research with entrepreneurs, funders, and other ecosystem actors over the last few years, and finding opportunities leverage the power of research to address practical challenges in our society continues to motivate and inspire me. Denver, and Colorado in general, has such a supportive and vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem, and I love being able to play a small role in it.
What should the DU community expect from E@DU in the near- and longer-term future?
Over the last few years Joshua has done a great job building the E@DU program and bringing some incredible opportunities for our students. In the near term, I look to continue the great work already underway. I plan to continue exploring ways that our incredible centers can support students in more integrated ways. I want to ensure that students all across campus—not just in the Daniels College of Business—know that they are invited to engage and discover what entrepreneurship can look like for them. Additionally, I’d like to find ways to continue supporting our student entrepreneurs as their businesses advance through fundraising support and additional capacity building. As the faculty sponsor for the Pioneer Venture Group, along with Conrad Ciccotello, I’d also like to build out our programming around early stage private capital.
Finally, one of the Daniels differentiators is our market connectivity, and I look forward to building additional bridges into the market, providing opportunities for experiential learning, engaged research, and support for our local ecosystem.
Why is an “entrepreneurial mindset” so important for students, even if they’re not interested in entrepreneurship?
We can all feel the pace of change accelerating and I’d be surprised if any of our students perceived the future as more certain that they would have just a few years ago. Entrepreneurship is all about creating value while navigating uncertainty. Doing this requires curiosity, adaptability and persistence. Uncertainty abounds and the pressure to create value at an individual level continues to rise. Developing an entrepreneurial mindset will increasingly differentiate students no matter what career they decide to pursue.
You are also a DU alum—you earned your executive PhD in 2023. Why did you pursue the degree and how did the experience change you?
I believe that business is one of—if not the most—powerful tools humans have developed to create value and positively shape society. Short-term thinking, power imbalances and greed (to name a few) often distort business and limit its potential. When done well, business can be an incredible power for positive impact. I had the honor of getting to work with some incredible entrepreneurs who proved that. Completing my EPhD opened the doors for me to teach that philosophy of business, research it and practice it at a greater scale than I could otherwise.
While I knew the objective, I had no idea how much the degree would change me. Getting a PhD shapes your thinking in a way that is difficult to explain and impossible to revert back from. It shapes the questions I ask, the way I think about challenges and the underlying systemic issues that create the challenges in the first place, and it stirs in me an insatiable curiosity. Thankfully, it also gave me the tools to pursue answers to the questions the drive me.