Seguin leaving Kauffman Foundation, returning to Dynamit full-time

Nick Seguin is leaving his role as manager of entrepreneurship at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation later this month. He made that decision public today in a blog post. Seguin has served in his current position at the Kansas City, Mo.-based foundation since November of 2010 but is returning to Dynamit on a full-time basis.…

Nick Seguin spoke on behalf of the Kauffman Foundation on Friday at Big Omaha. 

Nick Seguin is leaving his role as manager of entrepreneurship at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation later this month. He made that decision public today in a blog post

Seguin has served in his current position at the Kansas City, Mo.-based foundation since November of 2010 but is returning to Dynamit on a full-time basis. Seguin helped found Dynamit, a Columbus, Ohio-based digital agency, with two co-founders in 2004 and has remained involved with the company on a part-time basis during his time at the Kauffman Foundation.

In his blog post, Seguin shared some thoughts on his time at the organization: 

‘I’ve learned a lot’ is the understatement of the year. We, collectively, have accomplished much in recent years, but there’s still a long way to go. I hope that I’ve added some value and helped communities and entrepreneurs. I’m grateful to have had the opportunity to work with amazing colleagues and partners.

But, Seguin said, he’s an entrepreneur at heart, and it’s time for him to return to the trenches of his own entrepreneurial battle on a full-time basis. 

“I’m really excited that I’m going to go back and work with my team,” he said by phone this afternoon. “I’m ready to go back and do this, and it’s the right time for so many reasons.”

Seguin has worked closely with Silicon Prairie News in his role at the Kauffman Foundation, which has served as the premier sponsor of both Big Omaha and Thinc Iowa. He said no definitive timeline or process has been established for filling his vacancy at the foundation.

“We’ve got a really good team put together from an entrepreneurship side here,” Seguin said. “Thom Ruhe is leading it as the vice president, and I know that he’ll continue to build it out.”

“I’m really excited that I’m going to go back and work with my team. I’m ready to go back and do this, and it’s the right time for so many reasons.” – Nick Seguin

During our visit today, I asked Seguin to share some of his main takeaways from the 18 months he’s spent at the Kauffman Foundation. His thoughts: 

“I think, in short … the national and global entrepreneurship ecosystems have matured a lot over the last 10 years. We know a lot more about them, about companies, about communities, about the way things happen. But we also have a really long way to go.

“I think the other thing that I’ve learned is that all sides mater. And by that I mean everything from policy to research kind of at the high end, the macro end, to grassroots and communities at the micro end.

“And then the last thing I would say is that entrepreneurs are really … the ones that matter. And by that I mean, you know, everybody always thinks about capital, and people think about politicians passing stuff, think about venture capitalists — they think about all these different types of things. And at the end of the day, entrepreneurs will persevere, will find a way. They always do; that’s why they’re entrepreneurs. And so whether it’s leading a community or leading a company or really figuring out how to make things better, we need to help our entrepreneurs more, we need to listen to them more and we need to make things easier for them.”

 

Credits: Photo by Malone & Company / Big Omaha

This story is part of the AIM Archive

This story is part of the AIM Institute Archive on Silicon Prairie News. AIM gifted SPN to the Nebraska Journalism Trust in January 2023. Learn more about SPN’s origin »

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