History of Race

Dave St. Peter Reaction Paper

Sam Boegeman

SMGT 1701

         The Minnesota Twins President Dave St. Peter visited our Sports Management class as a guest speaker. He came in to talk about the topic of how he landed a job in sports and what we can do to increase our chances. The purpose of this paper is to write about how Dave St. Peter answered my three questions and to summarize what I learned from him. Dave St. Peter is from Bismark, North Dakota and attended the University of North Dakota. He graduated with a degree in Communication from the University of North Dakota. Dave started with an internship for the North Stars Public Relations Department. He joined The Twins organization in 1990 and has been working for them the past 26 years. I had three questions that I wanted Jamie Spencer to answer, they were as follows: “Did you always know that you wanted to be in the career position you are in? What is the favorite part of your job and why is it your favorite? Are you satisfied with the position you are in or would you like to explore other career opportunities?” Although I didn’t get the opportunity to directly ask him these questions because we ran out of time, I was able to get a good feel of what the answers would be from his lecture to the class.

                       My first question was, “Did you always know you wanted to be in the career position you are in?” Dave answered my question when he said that he had zero idea what he wanted to do when he got out of college. Out of college he showed up at the North Dakota Public Relations Department and said he wanted a job. He worked his way from there all the way to being the President of the Minnesota Twins. So no Dave St. Peter didn’t always know that he wanted to have a career in Sports Management, but once he made the decision to go for it he worked very hard and took all the necessary steps to have a successful career. I was surprised that he made the decision so late in his life to have a career in this field. It just goes to show that if you know the right people, create a solid network, and work tirelessly at what you do you can achieve what you want without a degree.

                       My second question was, “What is the favorite part of your job and why is it your favorite?” Dave St. Peter never specifically said what his favorite part of the job was. It seemed to me that he really liked going to the ballpark every day and meeting all the new people that comes with the job. He talked about how its pretty unreal to have your job be about a game that you love. The other thing that he seemed to really like about his job is his ability to inspire and help people through it. He talked about how important his family and kids are to him and he loves giving back to the community. It was really cool to see such a successful guy who still cares so much about helping others and the love of his family.