On February 24th, 2022, I had the pleasure of working alongside a great team of 14 to help execute an online conference for Shopify. This panel was set to feature Humber alumni Faria Islam, Jonah Zapparoli and Kiran Bajwa. Although Kiran was unable to attend, the event came out as quite a success. With the constant help of my team and the focus I was able to achieve with one of the hosts, Liam, we were able to coordinate an easygoing and light environment for our guests.

As our group members had only known about Kiran’s abscence only slightly before the event, it was up to our group to adjust and be able to make up for the time that would have been dedicated to Kiran. Fortunately for us, Faria and Jonah did a lot of the work on their own. Through such well-spoken and in-depth answers, us as a class was able to receive such beneficial firsthand experiences about Shopify’s work culture. From the unsubtle pairings of employees to the dedicated staff at Humber, it was eye-opening to really grasp what can come from different types of success stories. Faria’s humble takes on what did not seem like an easy road to get to where she is today is an example of someone who may not have been the original choice but ended up being the best choice. Jonah’s hard work beats talent approach shows us as students that a determined mindset will really allow us to reach our maximum potential.

Going into this web conference, I personally was not too sure of what to expect from this experience, but it was definitely an interesting one. With Liam to fall back on, knowing he was going to be the first point of contact for the event, it was inevitable that I try and find different ways to support him. He worked towards easing the process and answered questions I had about the event. Through his confidence in the success of the event and my contribution in the background with question writing, we were able to pull off what I was unsure of at the start. A well-balanced team can always prove successful and that was exactly what happened. Our members on both the front-facing and backend were all able to pull through in order to create a smooth event regardless of last minute abscence. As for the big day, the Shopify conference was a success.