Joe Cecala on Building Dream Exchange One Milestone at a Time

Joe Cecala is the founder and CEO of Dream Exchange, a Chicago-based exchange in formation that’s working to give small and emerging companies a real path to public capital while letting everyday investors take part. He arrived at the idea after about 30 years moving through finance from a lot of different angles, first as an accountant and military officer, then as a CPA, a lawyer, and a longtime advisor to entrepreneurs and investors. Over those years, he watched the small and midsize IPO quietly disappear, and with it, one of the few ways growing companies could mature on their own terms. Dream Exchange is his answer to that.

What makes his story worth reading is how he thinks about building something this ambitious. He’s funded the company through private investors who care about the mission, he’s spent time on Capitol Hill helping shape the legislation that would make a new exchange possible, and he’s done it all with a kind of patience that’s rare in a world that rewards speed.

If you’re building something big that takes years to explain before anyone believes in it, Cecala has a lot to offer. His thoughts on staying disciplined, picking the right people to build with, and knowing the difference between someone who wants to help you and someone who wants to take from you are useful for any founder, no matter what they’re building.

Tell us about yourself and your business.

I sometimes joke that I “Forrest Gumped” my way through life because the different lanes of my career all ended up converging into the real purpose of what I am doing now.

I started as an accountant by trade and a military officer first. I then worked at a Fortune 100 company doing securities reporting and SEC compliance work. I went to law school at night, became a lawyer, and passed the Uniform CPA Examination to become a licensed Certified Public Accountant (CPA). Thereafter, I spent the better part of 30 years working with entrepreneurs, company owners, venture capital people, and investors.

A lot of that work taught me something very simple: the best ideas are not always born of the best pedigree. They come from everywhere. They come from small communities, from creators, from people who are building something with a lot of hard work behind it. Over time, I became less interested in just documenting transactions and more interested in how to help people build, grow, and prepare for bigger opportunities.

Today, I am the founder and CEO of Dream Exchange, a stock exchange in formation based in the Chicago area. What we are building is meant to serve entrepreneurs and smaller and emerging companies to access capital while allowing the broader public to invest in these entities. We are doing this in a way that I do not think the current environment has done well for a very long time. We are preparing to create a marketplace for these entities, an “exchange business,” but we are also building around the idea that creators need a fair pathway, real preparation, and the ability to grow without being forced into the wrong kind of relationship too early.

My longtime friend and business partner, Dwain Kyles, has been instrumental in that journey, and we have brought together people who care deeply about building something that will endure the test of time.

How does your business make money?

Right now, we position ourselves to make money by building the business in stages. A big part of what we do is to create business relationships, develop our platform and brand, and prepare companies and audiences for what we are building. That includes digital tools, education, webinars, outreach, and business development around the “exchange model” itself. We are also building products and services that help companies prepare, communicate what they are building, and position themselves for growth.

The broader business is designed around a long-term exchange model, but in the immediate sense, we are creating value through preparation, connectivity, and engagement. I have always looked at it as building an ecosystem, not just a single product.

What was your inspiration for starting the business?

The inspiration really came out of watching something disappear that used to matter, the small to midsize initial public offerings or IPOs. Earlier in my career, there were real pathways for smaller companies to grow, but over time, I watched those pathways narrow. I had spent years working with entrepreneurs, investors, and company owners, and the same problem kept coming back: good people with valuable ideas were working hard, building real businesses, and yet they were still struggling to find the right environment to grow on the right terms.

At some point, I realized I did not just want to talk about the problem anymore. I wanted to build a solution. That is where Dream Exchange came from. It came from years of experience, a lot of frustration with the current environment, and a deep belief that creators need a better path. I have always believed that imagination is where money is born, and if you want more people building companies that endure, you have to create a place where that can happen.

How and when did you launch the business?

I founded the business in 2019, but the birth of Dream Exchange was years in the making. I had been working on the underlying problem for a long time, looking at what had happened to smaller companies and why the path for them had become so difficult. When it became clear to me that this was not going to solve itself, I decided to stop treating it like a research project and start building an operating business around the solution.

So, the launch was not a single day where everything suddenly appeared. It was the beginning of putting structure around the idea, assembling the right people, developing the model, and starting the long process of building a real company around it. That is how I tend to look at launching anything meaningful. You set the vessel on the path, and then you keep building it with discipline.

How is the business funded?

The business has been funded through private capital from people who believe in what we are building. A lot of that support has come from individual investors who understand the long-term nature of the opportunity and want to be part of creating something meaningful. I have always felt that the people who support something like this are not just funding a company. They are backing a vision and a piece of business infrastructure they believe should exist.

What matters to me is that the funding has come from people who are aligned with our purpose. This has never been about chasing the quickest money. It has been about finding the right people who understand that building something real takes time, discipline, and a willingness to stay on the path.

How did you find your first few clients or customers?

In the beginning, finding investors, who we view as our clients, was really relationship-driven. A lot of the first people who came into the business were people who knew my background, knew the work I had done over the years, and understood that this was not some idea I came up with on a weekend. They knew I had spent decades around entrepreneurs, investors, and capital formation, so there was already a base level of trust.

From there, it grew through communication, webinars, public appearances, and simply talking to people about the problem we were trying to solve. I have found that when you are building something that people immediately recognize as real, the early support tends to come from those who understand the need and want to help build it. That is really how it started for us.

What was your first year in business like?

The first year was a lot of work, and I mean a lot of work. When you are building something from the ground up, especially something this ambitious, there is no such thing as a neat little launch where everything is already in place. The first year was about putting structure around the idea, refining the business model, building relationships, and doing the heavy lifting of turning a concept into an actual company. I was working constantly because there were so many moving parts, and a lot of the work was not glamorous. It was foundational. Between meetings with investors or talking with members of Congress on Capitol Hill to create legislation, there just was not enough time in the day.

What I was really working on was credibility, architecture, and direction. I was trying to make sure that what we were building was not only a strong idea, but a real business with a real path forward. In the early stages of any company, especially one built around a large idea, you spend a lot of time explaining what it is, why it matters, and how it can actually be done. That takes discipline, patience, and an enormous amount of repetition.

What helped me is that I never looked at the first year as something that was supposed to feel easy or finished. I looked at it as the period where you set the vessel on the right path.

What strategies did you use to grow the business?

One of the main strategies was patience paired with repetition. When you are building something new, especially something people are not used to seeing, you have to explain it over and over again in a way that people can understand and trust. A lot of our growth came from simply staying in front of people, communicating clearly, doing webinars, speaking publicly, building relationships, and helping people see that this was not just an interesting idea, but a real business with a real path.

Another strategy was to think in terms of building an ecosystem, not just a company. I have always believed that if you are going to build something durable, you have to create the lanes around it. As a result, we focused on audience-building, education, connectivity, and preparation. We were not just trying to get attention. We were trying to attract the right people, the right supporters, and the right future participants who understood what we were building and wanted to grow with it.

I also think one of the most important growth strategies is discipline around planning. A lot of people try to grow by chasing whatever is in front of them that day. I have always approached growth more like setting the vessel on the correct path. You make a plan, you identify the milestones, and then you keep moving toward them. That helped us stay focused and not get distracted by noise.

What was the biggest challenge you had to overcome?

The biggest challenge was taking something that was very big in concept and turning it into something people could see as real, practical, and buildable. When you are doing something that has not been done before, a lot of the early work is overcoming skepticism—not because the idea is wrong, but because people are not used to thinking about the problem the way you are thinking about it. Thus, a great deal of the challenge was staying disciplined enough to keep building, keep explaining, and keep moving the business forward without getting worn down by the fact that large ideas take time for other people to absorb.

I also think any time you are building something important, the challenge is staying on the path long enough for the pieces to come together. I have always believed that the people who finally own something are often just the people who did not quit. So, for me, the challenge was not only building the company itself, but keeping the vision clear, keeping the right people around it, and continuing to execute while the business matured.

What have been the most significant keys to your business’ success?

I would say the most significant keys have been persistence, clarity, and credibility. When you are building something new, especially something this ambitious, people have to believe not only in the idea but also in your willingness to stay on the path long enough to make it real. I have always believed that a lot of success belongs to the people who simply do not quit. That has mattered a great deal for us.

The other key has been being very deliberate about how we build. We have tried to create not just a company, but the surrounding ecosystem that gives the company real strength. That means planning carefully, communicating consistently, attracting people who are aligned with the purpose, and staying transparent about what we are doing. In my experience, when people see that the work is real and the discipline is real, support tends to grow around that.

Tell us about your team.

We have built a lean team of roughly 50 people around a very large objective, and that has been intentional. It is a mix of executives, advisors, specialists, and outside support, with people working across operations, products, marketing, legal, communications, and business development. Some are local, some are remote, but the work is done in a very collaborative way because when you are building something this significant, you need people who are comfortable working across lanes.

What is the most important lesson you’ve learned growing the business?

The most important lesson I have learned is that you have to stay on the path long enough for the business to become real in other people’s minds, not just your own. A lot of people can see the beginning of something. Far fewer have the patience and discipline to keep building when the work is repetitive, when the explanation has to be given again, and when the milestones take longer than people would like. If you are building something meaningful, there is always a period where the outside world has not caught up to what you already know.

I have also learned that the right people matter more than the fast people. The wrong partner, the wrong supporter, or the wrong relationship can pull a company off its path. One of the great lessons for me has been to pay very close attention to alignment. Are these people building with you, or are they trying to take something from the process? When you get the right people around a real plan, and you keep doing the work without quitting, that is when the business begins to take on a life of its own.

What advice do you have for other entrepreneurs?

My advice would be to get very clear about what you are building and why it matters before you start chasing support. A lot of entrepreneurs spend too much time trying to sound impressive and not enough time understanding the actual shape of what they are trying to create. If you cannot explain the opportunity in a clear way, if you cannot explain the obstacles, and if you cannot explain the next milestone, then you haven’t invested the effort to truly comprehend your core mission and its global context.  If you are at that point, you are essentially asking others to advocate for a concept you haven’t fully mastered yourself.

I would also say be very careful who you let into the business. Not everyone who offers help is there to build with you. Some people are there to control, some are there to negotiate you down, and some are there because they only understand the world through their own advantage. You have to know the difference. The entrepreneur’s job is not merely to get money or attention. The job is to keep the business on a path where it can actually become what it is supposed to become.

And finally, do not let difficulty convince you that you are on the wrong road. Hard work, delays, confusion, and repeated explanations are part of building. That is normal. What matters is whether you are learning, adjusting, and continuing to move.

What are your future plans for the business?

The future plans are to keep building the business into what it was intended to become. A team of exchanges under the Dream Exchange brand is working to improve access to capital for small and midsize businesses. We are still in a stage where a lot of the work is about architecture, readiness, and putting more of the pieces into place, but the direction is very clear. I want the company to continue expanding its capabilities, deepen its relationships, and keep developing the surrounding ecosystem so that what we are building is not just an idea people talk about, but an operating business people can actually participate in.

I also want us to keep growing in a way that is disciplined. I am not interested in growth for its own sake. I am interested in building something lasting, something that has real utility and real staying power. So, the future is about continuing to move from formation into fuller operation, adding more products, more engagement, more participation, and making sure that the company is strong enough to fulfill the larger purpose behind why it was started in the first place.