Ryan Donovan knew that he was really good at a number of things in college, including running. When he realized he could incorporate sport into his career, he was off to the races. But other things he was good at , which he fit into his life with just as much guh-sto, didn’t end up serving him so well. Find out how realizing what you love becomes healthier when differentiating that which is good for you from that which isn’t.
Guest Ryan Donovan, Dartmouth ’96, felt as though his priorities were running, drinking, and studying in that order. But a guest speaker in a course on Sport and Society opened his eyes to how a government major might be able to marry his love of sport and a career. Dick Dunham ’53 talked about his career working with the U.S. Olympic Committee and Ryan reached out for some mentoring and a recommendation letter to an Olympic Committee internship. He didn’t get that internship but did land something in sport, which kicked off a career in the sport world that he loved. After his MBA and an experiencing at a creative agency that helped him realize he was a marketer of heart, he has had a string of interesting jobs in the industry, culminating in his dream of being a senior executive at a sport company.
A pivotal moment in his journey came in the last two years when he decided to stop drinking. In this episode, find out from Ryan realizing what you love becomes healthier when differentiating that which is good for you from that which isn’t…on ROADS TAKEN...with Leslie Jennings Rowley.
About This Episode's Guest
Ryan Donovan is a life-long sports marketer who has served in leadership positions at NBC Sports and other organizations and is currently Senior Vice President of Marketing at Fanatics, Inc. After a few years' hiatus, he is running again.
Executive Producer/Host: Leslie Jennings Rowley
Music: Brian Burrows
Find more episodes at https://roadstakenshow.com
Email the show at RoadsTakenShow@gmail.com
Ryan Donovan: I told her, I think I'm an alcoholic. She said, well, you got to stop drinking. And I said, no, that's why I'm going to college. Isn't that the whole point is to go to college and drink like, that was my mindset. And I certainly followed through with it.
Leslie Jennings Rowley: Ryan Donovan knew that he was really good at a number of things, including running. When he realized he could incorporate sport into his career, he was off to the races. But other things he was good at in college, which he incorporated into his life with just as much gusto, didn’t end up serving him so well. Find out how realizing what you love becomes healthier when differentiating that which is good for you from that which isn’t…on today’s Roads Taken…with me, Leslie Jennings Rowley.
Today, I'm here with Ryan Donovan and we're going to talk about learning who you are and what's important, and it's just a pleasure to have you here.
Ryan Donovan: I'm psyched to be here. I've listened to a number of the other interviews and a super flattered that you have made today.
LJR: Excellent. Well, then you will know that I ask the same questions every time and they are, when we were in college. Who were you? And when we were getting ready to leave, who did you think you would become?
RD: When I showed up to Dartmouth in 92 I was a young, naive sheltered in many ways, kid. That really wasn't ready for college. To be honest, I didn't have my priorities straight. You know, my priorities were running, drinking, studying in that order. And that reflected itself in my grades freshman and sophomore year.
I was pre-med, that was a joke, you know, I couldn't cut chemistry or, or any of the other requirements to be pre-med. I got mono freshman year and I was kind of a mess. My freshmen and sophomore year I came back my junior year kind of burning off a lot of that immaturity and I took a class called sport in society. It was affectionately known as a gut to many of us., it was definitely an easy a there were a lot of athletes in the class and there was a great speaker one day, a Dartmouth grad named Dick Dunham. He was class of 53 and he talked about his career in the Olympics working for the U.S. Olympic committee and it sort of lit the bulb for me. I thought, wow, I'm a government major. I run track. Can I bring those two things together and potentially find a career either with the Olympic Committee or in sports? So I took Dick Dunham out to dinner. I took him to Five Olde Nugget Alley. I don't think it's there anymore, but I have very fond memories of the Olde Nugget Alley and used that as an opportunity to build a relationship with him, you know, over the course of a couple of weeks. And he was so kind as to write a recommendation letter for me, as I was applying for an internship to the Olympic Committee out in Colorado Springs.
As fate would have it, I didn't get the internship. I remember I got the rejection letter and crumpled it up and put it aside. I still have the crumpled up note Just for pride. But I did end up getting an internship with the National Football League in New York and was super, super lucky. So by the time I was ready to leave Dartmouth, I knew what I wanted to do.
I wanted to work in sports and I knew what I didn't want to do. You know, I had no interest in consulting, no interest in corporate recruiting. And. I remember my senior year, I'm sitting in Collis, literally at a type of writer, which I'm assuming Collis no longer has, addressing envelopes and sending out resumes sending out resumes to all of the leagues, you know, the NBA, major league baseball, all the sports networks, ESPN and Fox sports, Nike, Gatorade.
And it was really kind of a cold call situation on my part. But I left knowing what I wanted to do and I left knowing what I didn't want to do.
LJR: It's always great to know what you don't want to do even better to know what you want to do. But you didn't initially go right into sport per se. Or did you?
RD: No, I didn't. I tried, I tried. It's really hard to break in. I sort of settled. I took a job with the city of New York working for the parks department and it was pseudo sports. You know, I was responsible for revenue generating businesses on Parkland. A lot of people don't realize that if there's a business that's on Parkland, whether it's Yankee Stadium or Tavern on the Green the City of New York actually leases those locations out to a vendor and collects rent and they do that for Tavern on the Green; they do it for the hot dog carts and everything in between. My job was working with special events at Yankee Stadium, Shea Stadium and Downing Stadium, which is the stadium that's on Randall's Island, really leasing out those stadiums to international soccer events and a Lollapalooza and, you know, the Guinness Fla which was a Lollapalooza-like Irish festival. So no, I was kind of cheating my way into sports.
It wasn't until I left there, I was only there for 10 months. I went to a company called Street Ball Partners and Street Ball Partners was a really interesting grassroots arm of NBC Sports. They teamed up with the NBA and Nike and launched something called the hoop it up Tournament which was a three-on-three basketball tournament that traveled the country. And that was, that was sort of my first break in sports.
LJR: Yeah. And really launched your niche in sports, too, because that whole kind of event activation was really a marketing tool, right? And so you found yourself with a career in marketing and we don't teach marketing at Dartmouth. So how does a government major who likes to run kind of figure all this stuff out and build a real career around it?
RD: Yeah. So I took that events experience and transitioned to a real marketing role at Fox Sports Net, which was a regional sports network up in Boston. I had a boss who sometimes liked to show up, sometimes not like to show up to work, which was great for me because. I was thrown into the fire and learned everything from media buying to you know, public relations to you know, creative and learn TV in the meantime and learn a lot of tactical stuff.
I learned a lot of marketing tactics over the course of my time there. That was my first, you know, run-in with marketing and right around that same time put myself through the MBA program at Boston College with a marketing concentration and realized Yeah. This is for me, Government may have been a mistake. I'm a marketer, you know, this is what I love.
LJR: Yeah. Yeah. And that definitely played out in your other experiences back at NBC and other organizations you want to talk about where you've landed now?
RD: Yeah I'm with a company called Fanatics. We are an e-commerce company based out of San Mateo and I started here about eight years ago. Basically, the best way to explain Fanatics is it's the largest collection of officially licensed sports gear from all the leagues teams and players you love, right?
That's how we communicate the company. So whether you're looking for a Yankees jersey or a Red Sox hat, or you know, a Warriors jacket we sell it all. We run fanatics.com, NFLshop.com. NBAstore dot. Dozens, if not hundreds of colleges and we're just now expanding from e-commerce into other businesses, like a sports book and ticketing and media. It's actually a really exciting time.
LJR: Yeah, and I kind of blew by NBC, but the grounding that you needed for this very high-level job you have at fanatics really came from your time at NBC. Do you want to talk about that?
RD: Yeah, it actually was my time at a small agency called SS&K. After my time at Fox Sports Net I finished up my MBA. I got married and I was looking to sort of use the MBA to transition to another role. And there was a Dartmouth grad named Russell Stevens. He was a class of 88 hired me at SS&K. And that's where I learned everything. I know. And it was sort of an MBA on steroids. I was with this really eclectic group of, they called themselves agency refugees. And I was working with a literal rocket scientist, a guy who was a very famous drag queen in New York city at the time, creatives and writers and politicians and mathematicians.
And it was, it was an amazing experience. You know, the smartest people I ever worked with to this day. But it was there that, you know, that sheltered kid that showed up to Dartmouth in 1992 was really exposed to diversity in every meaning of the word diversity in thinking diversity in people, diversity in politics, diversity in clients, you know. I worked on Time Warner cable, which wasn't the most exciting client, but I also worked on the Lance Armstrong Foundation right around the same time that those yellow LiveStrong bracelets blew up, right? So a non-profit and a for-profit. And it was really SS&K that transitioned me from tactical marketer to strategic marketer. And then I ended up at NBC.
LJR: Got it. And we can weave stories all day long. But a pivotal part of your adulthood really has come since. And I think it will be wonderful for you to share this if you're feeling up to it
RD: Yeah, absolutely. I stopped drinking two and a half years ago. And it's one of the best decisions I ever made. The party was over. I've found myself looking forward to smaller things. You know, the things I was taking for granted for a long time running for one, I started running again mornings have been great. Coffee has been great. Dessert. And that's been a big pivot in my life the last two years, two and a half years have been, been really good and I've tried yoga and I've tried meditation. I've tried therapy, that's still doing therapy. And it's, it's great. You know, it's, it's the first time in my life that I feel like I've focused on me and really done something for me and set my life on a path that's much healthier.
So yeah, it's, it's been a good two and a half years.
LJR: Yeah. But before that it was a good 45 years of not living that life. And probably a good 20 something years of a very different view. So how does one make that decision?
RD: It was, you know, everyone has a different journey and a different point at which they decide not to drink. And for me, it was time. It was getting in the way it was all consuming at times. You know, the first thing I would do when I would walk into a, a work event was look for the bar. You know, I wasn't comfortable in a social environment, even though it was work-related without having a drink in my hand and I'm still not, you know, I still work through that, but it was getting in the way. It was, drinking was just kind of consuming all of my thoughts, both at work and at home. And it was just time to stop and best decision I ever made. So I, and I did it all: went to AA, have been in meetings ever since started therapy and feeling a lot better.
LJR: Yeah, well, congratulations. And that just takes a lot of mental fortitude, physical fortitude, all of that. So I wish you well on that journey, continued as I'm sure it will be. You put drinking on your list of things that you were good at at Dartmouth. [RD: Really good.] Yeah. Could there have been a time earlier where someone could have helped you make that decision or did you…?
RD: Yeah, I mean well, yes and no. And I would say I was a really good drinker, but it was a honed craft at Dartmouth, you know, freshman year didn't go so well. And I got really good at it you know, sophomore and junior year. I actually had a girlfriend in high school tell me, and I told her, I think I'm an alcoholic. She said, well, you got to stop drinking. And I said, no, that's why I'm going to college. Isn't that the whole point is to go to college and drink like, that was my mindset. And I certainly followed through with it. So it was on my mind, even back then Could she have helped? No, I mean, she helped point it out, but I had to help myself. There was no one really who could help me. I had to figure it out and, you know go through what I went through to decide it was time to stop.
LJR: Yeah. Yeah. Well, and when you decide something, it seems to work out. So you had decided you were going to go into sports and although you had some stumbles or like had to corner yourself in, you got there and you've been living this life. So what are those decision points that you look back at and you're either really proud or the younger version of you would be like, yeah, I did that. What's your reflection now?
RD: Really proud that I didn't settle early in my career. Fanatics is the only place I've been at for longer than five years, you know, and I equate it a little bit to having grown up in a family that moved a lot. You know, I went to a lot of different schools as a young kid and moved around you know, basically getting bounced back and forth between Boston and New York. And for me, I took a lot from that. You know, I, I experienced a lot of different schools. I met a lot of different people and was able to see different, you know, different parts of the Northeast. And I think I sort of approach my career in the same way. I wanna see it all and experience it all.
So I'd say one of the decisions has been not to settle, you know, always be ready for the next thing. And don't be afraid to, you know, to move from one job to another. And then, you know, there's certain points along the way where I've made some really smart decisions. Getting married to my wife was certainly one of those decisions. Finishing up my MBA. Taking marketing classes. You know, as a marketer you sort of want to learn marketing. I still use a lot of what I learned in the MBA program at BC I'm proud that I put myself through. Yeah. Those are probably the big ones
LJR: Yeah. And you don't strike me as someone who has regrets. Talk to me though about when you look back at those four years, which were on one hand formative, on the other hand, you were still being formed as a true human being, as we all were at that young age. Could you imagine then where you are now in all aspects—career, life decision—or are you kind of a foreign person the old Ryan?
RD: No, I think I, I sorta met every goal I've set in terms of career. You know, when I was sitting in Collis banging out envelopes and sending out resumes, I sort of had this vision that I was gonna, you know, be a senior executive within a sports company and that's what I'm doing. So I've sort of accomplished it. I don't really regret much. I do regret having missed the opportunity to really take away from Dartmouth what I think a lot of people take from Dartmouth, which is studying and classes.That wasn't a focus of mine, you know? I've actually toyed with the idea of going back, maybe doing it all over again. You know, I've had this idea of writing a book where on one page, you know, the book is open a one page. It's sort of the perspective of me at Dartmouth when I was in my twenties. And the other side is the perspective of me at 47. And I don't know. I'd love to go back. I think I could prove to myself that I could do really well. If I went back that's probably the only regret, I guess. It's not a regret. I guess it's another goal
LJR: Yeah. Well...
RD: Bucket list for sure.
LJR: It sounds like that bucket list will just see a lot of crossed off things. Cause you've been able to do it thus far. So Ryan, thanks so much for sharing all of your path and your story with us. It's been a delight to talk to you.
RD: Awesome. Thank you. so much.
LJR: That was Ryan Donovan, a lifetime sports marketer who has served in leadership positions at NBC Sports and other organizations and is currently Senior Vice President of Marketing at Fanatics, Inc. After a few years' hiatus, he is running again. So if you have a trail for him to hit, reach out. And as always, you can reach out to us at RoadsTakenShow.com or simply find us on your favorite podcasting platform. We'd love to hear your review or suggestion and hope you'll travel more paths with me, Leslie Jennings Rowley, on future episodes of Roads Taken.