EVAN Carlson
Company: Do North Coworking
Title: Entrepreneur In Residence
Age: 35
Career Highlights: Collaboratively working with community partners and Northern Vermont University to bring Do North Coworking to life. Through the establishment of Do North, I've been given a platform to 
support the growth of the northeastern Vermont entrepreneurial ecosystem. This won't happen tomorrow, but I hope to see our efforts positively transform the region's economy.
Community Involvement: So much of my work in the community spurred from the Vermont Council on Rural Developments Community Visit process which allowed for new ideas to be vocalized to broad segment of Lyndon residents. From this I've had the opportunity to serve on Lyndon's planning commission, chair the Lyndon Economic Development task force and lead an effort to bring high speed internet to every E911 address in Caledonia county.
What motivated you to live and work in Vermont? My family has been in the Lyndon area for 100+ years, so despite living in urban environments for 15 years, Vermont has always been my home and I want to see my neighbors prosper. One of the primary reason I left New York was I didn't feel the work I was doing making an impact and I couldn't break through the noise, that's not the case in Vermont.
Favorite part of your job? I'm a designer at the core, and while I still design some ads, websites and other marketing materials for the coworking space, I don't do visual design work all that often. That said, I'm constantly given opportunities to design solutions to problems, somedays it's reconfiguring the space layout while other days it's finding a partner or resource for a startup business at the space.
What is the best career advice you have received? Embrace your ability to be a jack of all trades, your desire to explore, learn and connect it all together will continue to serve you.
Tell us something fun about yourself that few people know: In my 20's I was a "professional" mountainboarder which gave me an opportunity to travel the world with my friends. A mountainboard is an off road skateboard with pneumatic wheels.
Favorite Vermont escape: The best escape is splitboarding up any of the NEKBC trails on a cold and crisp powder day.
Favorite downtime activity: Reading and playing with my son.
Where do you see yourself professionally in the next 5-10 years? I see myself working from home in Sutton because NEK Community Broadband successfully deployed symmetrical 100mbps internet service to every e911 address in the region.
