Former Sparta player and cybersecurity

His hockey career may have ended a little too soon for him, but he returned to his favorite sport while studying computer science at university. Sport plays an absolutely key role in Ivan Štefek's life. In doing so, he dispels the myth that programmers are locked in a basement in front of a computer all day. What is it like working in cybersecurity and how much does it have to do with hockey?

How did your sport career look like?

‍Sports are definitely intertwined with my whole life. In my youth, I played hockey, but I stopped playing quite early, before the youth, when I started the eight-year high school in Senica. My teammates at the time went to a sports school, where it was still relatively possible to combine them, but with my choice, it was not so possible anymore, it was too complicated. So I chose the path of education. Fortunately, I returned to sports in a roundabout way later at university.

How did you manage this?

‍I studied at the University of Economics in Prague and along with that I started playing hockey again right from my freshman year, restarting my career. I had a lot of like-minded people around me, we had a great group and I must say that sports, along with education, really gave me a lot.

What are the main benefits of sport in your life?

‍When I select people for my team in my current job, I always ask about their sports background. It is important to me that they have played some sport in the past. To put it bluntly, sports have given me a lot in terms of upbringing and my current qualities. I work in the field of cybersecurity, I am currently responsible for the cybersecurity of ČEPS, which is essentially a critical infrastructure of the state. We do not produce electricity, but we transmit it and I am responsible for ensuring that electricity basically gets to where it is needed. Even though there are not a lot of athletes in this area, if I meet one, he definitely has an advantage with me.

What additional qualities do you think an athlete in your field can have?

It's definitely teamwork. It's something that's not taught at all in Czech and Slovak schools, yet it's so important. Cooperation, cohesion, substituting for others, and discipline towards the fact that we all have common goals in a given team. These are things that, in my opinion, even parents can't teach you properly, but you have to hone it by working in a team. I see sports in youth as the first market that a person encounters. They have to learn to break through as an individual, but also to work within the team, to fulfill their role, which doesn't necessarily have to be the best striker. Experience from team sports is then very valuable in work teams and is also very well appreciated abroad.

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Do you notice any specific differences between the members of your team who have played a team sport in the past and those who are doing it for the first time?Yes, the difference is noticeable. During my career, I have met former athletes who fully understood their specific role in the work team and did not play for their own success, but for a common team goal. Such people are then better able to solve problems in a group, better cooperate with others. I am not saying that they are necessarily better or worse, I rather notice that in every team there are positions where you need a true team player, and then there are positions where it is not needed so much.

What about discipline, how do you think it blends from sports into professional life?

It's definitely visible. In my opinion, this sport gives a person a completely comprehensive skillset. I don't let that happen and I try to guide children to sports exactly accordingly. Discipline is definitely one of the qualities that a person refines through sports. Even as a little hockey player, you have to get up early in the morning, go to training, so you have to go to bed earlier and that already requires a certain discipline.

One of the sports topics is certainly the topic of defeats, which everyone encounters in everyday life. Whether it's breaking up with a partner, getting fired from a job, or being rejected by a customer. How did you learn to lose?
Even though we played matches in the student league that I was probably looking forward to, losing is not something that I have completely embedded in sports, it would probably come later. But what immediately flashed through my mind was that I really don't like it when someone doesn't care that they lost. It's like a team member like that doesn't give a hundred percent. Losing is part of sports and life, but if someone just waves it off and doesn't bother them, I think it's wrong. I still feel that way at work and in hockey, when we go out to play and lose, it can really turn me off (laughs).

What was it like for you to return to hockey when you started playing again in college?

It was great, I went back to my childhood there. The hockey booth is a very specific environment, my favorite. Over the few years at the university, the team became so close to our hearts that after graduating, after about two years, we founded a team with a similar composition and we still play games for fun to this day. We just had to get back to it. It really suited me back then, we were all from the same background there. To this day, these guys are my closest friends.

Why did you choose the Faculty of Mathematics and Statistics after high school?

My dad works in IT, so everyone had been telling me for a long time that I would definitely go to IT. I never wanted to study it, or rather, I never wanted to program. Today, many people still think that an IT person is a programmer who is locked in a basement and plays with zeros and ones. In my last year of high school, I found out that there is something between economics and computer science, and that it is taught at the University of Economics. It is more analytical, communicating between the accounting department and IT. This interested me, and in addition, older friends from Senica studied this field in Prague, so I chose this field. In my first year, I worked as a part-time employee in the IT security department at ING Insurance Company, where security caught my eye and I never let it go.

What were your steps after graduation?

There weren't that many differences there, because I had been working three-quarters of the time since my second year. So after graduating, the only thing that changed was that I could no longer disguise my late arrivals as school attendance (laughs). I moved from the insurance company to KKCG, Mr. Komárek's investment group. There I was in charge of cybersecurity, I spent basically about five years there. Other stints followed, and I have currently been leading two teams at ČEPS for the last two years.

You also worked for Mr. Komárek, did you already have your own team there?

I was still alone there, working as the chief cybersecurity consultant for the individual companies of the holding. In other words, I recommended to them how they should do cybersecurity and then brought them together.

What was it like for you later, moving from the role where you operated as an individual to the role of team leader?

I have to say that I'm not exactly a micromanager. I'm used to trusting people in life, maybe from hockey, so I take it that when given tasks and they're divided among the individuals on the team, they'll be completed by the given deadline. So I don't take it that I have to sit face to face with each individual and slowly dictate to me what needs to be done. I think that the transformation into the role of team leader came naturally to me. I may not have been among the best in hockey, but I've always tried to be a leader, to hold the team together and motivate them.

We have mentioned many spheres that intersect from sports to your working life. Is there anything else you would like to mention in this context?

Sports really play a key role in my life. I don't know what my life would be like without them. Whether it's leading children to sports or some activities for the regeneration of the body and mind. During the Covid period and the war in Ukraine, there was a huge increase in cyber attacks. It was a very challenging period. Even today, it can be dealt with thanks to sports. Everyone has to find their own way in it.