Ivey is hosting an exciting Social Impact and Technology Innovation Fair on Thursday January 21, 2016 from 1:00pm to 5:30pm. This will be a two part event packed with exceptional industry professionals. Find out more about our guests below.
Jillian Rodak
Jillian graduated from Ivey Business School with an interest and passion for using business and innovation to create impact. After Ivey, Jillian spent a year with Ashoka Canada, working in the social finance and entrepreneurship space while independently consulting for social entrepreneurs. After leaving Ashoka, Jillian spent three years with corporate social responsibility consulting firm Better The World, before working for a social innovation accelerator in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Since her return to Toronto in fall of 2014, Jillian began as Program Officer at Innoweave, an initiative of the J.W. McConnell Family Foundation. Her role involves engaging with hundreds of organizations around Collective Impact, an emergent approach to social innovation.
Jillian is concurrently working toward a Masters of Environment and Business at the University of Waterloo. She serves as the Chair of Toronto’s Holocaust Education Week Legacy Committee, as well as the Treasurer for Shoresh, a Toronto-based environmental non-profit organization. In 2015, Jillian was named a Corporate Knights' Top 30 Under 30 Sustainability Leader.
Jen Eldridge
Jen Eldridge is a practical idealist who believes in the powerful, positive role business can play in making the world a better place. Jen spent her summer between her two years at Ivey on an internship in Oyugis, Kenya with Western Heads East, supporting local stakeholders to launch a probiotic yogurt business, simultaneously addressing community health as well as women’s economic empowerment.
After graduation, Jen started working with Managerial Design, a small consulting company focused on designing and facilitating meetings to help teams achieve alignment and increase team effectiveness. After being acquired by Deloitte, she was a part of the Deloitte Human Capital Consulting team for 4 years. Jen is now working at a Corporate Social Responsibility consulting firm, SiMPACT Strategy Group, focused on helping organizations demonstrate the value of their community investment programs.
Jen volunteers as a Crew Captain and Lead Trainer for Future Possibilities for Kids, and as a blogger for Toronto+Acumen. She is passionate about adventure travel, cottage life, outdoor adventures, fitness and food.
Amanda Armstrong
Amanda currently works at Textbooks for Change, a social enterprise start-up and B Corporation that provides affordable and accessible educational materials to students around the world. As the Community Engagement Lead, she is responsible for partnership development, community engagement, marketing, and championing the company’s social impact.
Amanda graduated from The Richard Ivey School of Business at Western University in 2010. Combining her passion for business and social good, she has been working in international development and social entrepreneurship for the past 7 years with extensive experience in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean. Amanda has experience launching and managing several entrepreneurial projects and programs, including a community-based micro-enterprise in Kenya, a national youth HIV/AIDS program in Canada, a women’s entrepreneurship project in Guyana, and a design hub feasibility study in East Africa.
She has worked with hundreds of entrepreneurs and youth in Canada, Africa and the Caribbean through the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), Youth Challenge International (YCI), and many other organizations and social enterprises.
Amanda is enthusiastic and passionate about using social entrepreneurship, technology, and innovation for social good, economic development, job creation, women’s empowerment, and poverty alleviation. She is also an avid soccer player, snowboarding enthusiast, career coach and mentor, and an MC. She has the desire to inspire others and make a difference in the world.
Chris Stefanyk
Chris Stefanyk is currently the Business Operations and Strategy Lead at Wattpad, the world's largest community of storytellers and readers. At Wattpad Chris wears a ton of hats (which is the norm for all of those thinking about pursuing a career at a tech startup), the most prominent hat at the moment is leading the strategy and execution of Wattpad's Brand Stories business. Prior to Wattpad, Chris worked at Torstar Digital in their Strategy and New Ventures group, where he was able to support Toronto's tech community by evaluating early stage tech investment opportunities for Torstar Digital. Chris also worked internationally in Malaysia for an e-commerce start up, Zalora (via Rocket Internet) and he started his career as a Management Consultant at Accenture.
Ben Harris
After Ivey, Ben did 2 years of management consulting at Satov Consultants. Deciding that Consulting was not for him, Ben gave 4 months notice and travelled to Asia. In 2012, Ben joined Uber Canada and hasn't looked back. He is the Senior Operations Manager at Uber Canada, running the companies high capacity vehicle products (uberPOOL, uberHOP, uberACCESS).