2018 SPEAKERS (More to come!)
Confirmed Speakers/Facilitators
BE (barbara) Alink is the inventor of the Alinker, vehicle for social change and manifestation of her “Reverse-Design” way of approaching the world. She is a paradigm-shifter, edge-walker and developed the "Reverse-Design" life's practice.
BE has gained appreciation of the power of community as a result of her work in Afghanistan, Kenya, the Sudan, Ethiopia, Kosovo, and Indonesia. The theme behind her work is connecting people with each other by creating meaningful social contexts through which people can actively engage based on who we are as humans. BE is the Founder and CEO of the Alinker Inventions Ltd and community is built into every customer experience with the company that is a certified BCorp and lives and breathes the values of equality and inclusion which they converted into a revolutionary business proposition.
Lisa Campbell became a true cannabis expert by working extensively in international drug policy with Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy and is currently the Chair of the Ontario Cannabis Consumer & Retail Alliance. Lisa is founder and CEO of Lifford Cannabis Solutions, helping cannabis companies come to market across all ten provinces, leveraging Lifford’s national salesforce and longstanding partnerships with provincial control boards. Lisa holds a Master of Environmental Studies from York University and is as a Canadian Institutes for Health Research (CIHR) Universities Without Walls alumnus.
Jane Clapp is one of the world’s leading embodiment teachers. She is an embodiment resilience coach, trauma recovery specialist, and founder of the Recover Your Warrior online training program. Jane guides people to uncover and integrate their physical and emotional strength and access deeper human connection through the intelligence of their bodies. She brings two decades worth of experience guiding people back into nourishing relationship with their bodies for more freedom and joy in their lives.
Michelle Cliffe began her career two decades ago in communications with a passion for building brands and communication strategies that tell a story, strengthen relationships and inspire action. She had a diverse career, but entrepreneurship called her back time and time again. Not afraid to take risks or pivot when things shifted, Michelle has successfully followed her dreams, finding help and luck when needed. Michelle started her career in fashion, beauty and lifestyle, and after doing a brief stint for an agency a mentor helped her to launch her own public relations and communications firm in that industry. She built a successful boutique agency over nearly five years, and left the fashion world after being called to another purpose – helping animals. For nearly a decade she worked in the non-profit sector inspiring people to be advocates and donors. After being laid off, she was left asking, now what? A series of events led her to pivot into the wedding industry where she started Love Collective, a wedding planning company founded on feminist ideals and smashing traditions.
In 2016, Michelle discovered the benefits of cannabis, which changed her life and sparked a passion for the plant that has led her down a new career path, founding Stashie which is in development stage and focused on helping others – particularly women -- to explore and learn about cannabis' benefits. Michelle has made a commitment, in both her personal and professional life, to people, organizations and initiatives that strive to create positive social change. She believes that, “we’re in this together, and we’re better when we act like it.”
Kelly Diels is a feminist marketing consultant and writer who helps feminist entrepreneurs and organizations sell without selling out their audience or their principles. Kelly is best known for her feminist marketing approaches to online platform-building and for identifying and rallying against a marketing and cultural narrative she calls The Female Lifestyle Empowerment Brand.
Kelly has provided marketing training and guidance to hundreds of online entrepreneurs and organizations in workshops, masterminds, consulting projects and 1:1 coaching. She leads an annual 9-month Feminist Marketing Mastermind composed of feminist authors, founders, professors, artists, activists, coaches, and healers who want to get visible and rise without leveraging the tactics of The Female Lifestyle Empowerment Brand. Starting in September 2019, Kelly will be writing a monthly column in Liisbeth. She has also written for Salon and Jezebel. Kelly is currently working on her own book as well as ghost-writing a non-fiction book for a well-known feminist educator/activist (forthcoming 2019).
Madi Fuller is a Brock University alumni in Political Science and Labour Studies and the manager of Niagara College’s entrepreneurship and innovation centre, ncTakeOff where she provides a diverse student body with programming, funding opportunities, and resources to help them reach their entrepreneurial goals. She also is an event facilitator for the Canada’s first Commercial Cannabis Production post-secondary program at Niagara College.
Dr. CV Harquail, Co-Founder of Feminists at Work, is a feminist management professor and consultant whose work weaves together organizational change, social justice, and entrepreneurship. CV has developed a suite of tools, including the Feminist Business Model Canvas, to blend feminist practice and Lean Startup processes. She has worked with over 100 teams of entrepreneurs to bring business ideas forward and adopt new technologies. CV also helps business leaders incorporate feminist values and goals into their companies, changing the world by transforming business.
In her book on Feminist Interventions in Management Thinking (Routledge, Spring 2019) CV proposes the feminist case for transforming business and the business case for adopting feminism. She offers a business person’s primer on intersectional feminism (ask her for an advance copy of this chapter!) and explains why feminists and companies have struggled to make progress as they aim for gender equality. She demonstrates how feminism has shaped and led conversations about key management topics and projects feminist visions for the future of business. CV draws on cutting edge trends in product development, technology, marketing, organizational design, and governance.
At last year’s EFF, CV helped us build a shared understanding of entrepreneurial feminism with her talk on Foundations of Feminisms. She has presented her research at Harvard Business School, Stern Business School (NYU), Kellogg (Northwestern), Booth (UChicago), and TEDxHoboken. She has published in AMJ and AMR and her essays on feminist business/ product design appear in two major Women’s Studies anthologies. Her work has been published at the Huffington Post, Forbes.com, Women2.0, and the Harvard Business Review. See cvharquail.com for more.
Carol Anne Hilton is CEO and Founder of Indigenomics Institute and a recognized leading First Nation’s business entrepreneur with an international Masters Degree in Business Management (MBA) from the University of Hertfordshire, England. Carol Anne is from the Nuu chah nulth Nation on Vancouver Island and was recently appointed as a senior advisor to the Federal Finance Minister on the Canadian Economic Growth Council. Carol Anne currently serves on the Canadian Community Economic Development Network Board and has recently been appointed to the McGill University Institute of Canadian Studies. She served as Director on the Vancouver Island Investment Fund, the World Fisheries Trust, the Victoria Community Micro Lending Society, Community Social Planning Council, the First Nations Health Authority and served for 9 years on Council of Hesquiaht First Nation.
Carol Anne works to incorporate an Aboriginal worldview while bringing First Nations, industry, and government together to design new approaches for sustainable, inclusive development. She brings project management experience across industries in resource management, governance, and regional development. Carol Anne is currently authoring Indigenomics – a Global Power Shift and has been an instructor at Camosun Business School Leadership Program as well as at Simon Fraser University’s Community Economic Development Program, the University of Winnipeg’s Masters in Community Planning Program and most recently with the Banff Center’s Indigenous Business Program where she is also a faculty lead and a Fleck Fellow.
Savoy "Kapow!" Howe is the head coach and owner Toronto Newsgirls, Canada's first female-owned and Trans positive boxing club. Savoy started boxing in 1992 at the Toronto Newsboys Boxing Club and went onto fight one of Toronto's first sanctioned boxing bouts for women in 1993. In 1996, the Toronto Newsgirls Boxing Club was born. Savoy, originally from New Brunswick, holds a theatre degree from McMaster University and has spent over 30 years pounding the pavement as a performer. Her most recent show, "Newsgirl", a one woman show developed at Soulotheatre, recounted the herstory of the Toronto Newsgirls and of the one woman's journey into the male dominated sport of boxing.
Savoy is the recipient of a Pride Toronto Award of Excellence in Sports, a Canadian Association for the Advancement of Women and Sports and Physical Activity Breakthrough Award (CAAWS), the 2010 Senator Nancy Ruth Award, an Ontario Coaching Excellence Award and the Steinert & Ferreiro award for LGBTQ leadership. Savoy recently won the 2018 Inspire Lifetime Achievement Award, made to an individual who made significant contributions to better the lives of others in the LGBTQ community over an entire career or lifetime.
Cher Jones is a Corporate Social Media Trainer & Personal Branding Coach with the love of technology hardwired into her personality. Whether on a stage, in a training room, or coaching one on one, her passion for teaching professionals how to develop powerful personal brands is both infectious and empowering. Her ability to remove the fear and break down how to use social media to build relationships, improve sales, and grow business have many referring to her as one of Canada's leading social media trainers.
Petra Kassun-Mutch is a serial social purpose entrepreneur, start up, and business growth incubator management consultant, and publisher who is deeply committed to creating a more inclusive, just, human-centered, and generative economy through the power of feminist business practice, pedagogy, theory, innovation, and entrepreneurship. Her enterprise, Eve-volution Inc (2014), a B Corp certified, lean, networked feminist enterprise, advocates for and designs programs that promote equity and inclusion in startup and community-based economic development ecosystems. Her magazine, LiisBeth serves as a convener, capacity-builder and voice for the growing, 10,000+ all gender, entrepreneurial feminist community. Mutch current serves as the Executive Director of Food Starter, a food processing entrepreneur incubator and accelerator program with a 20,000 sq ft processing facility in in Toronto.
Mutch is a certified Feminist Business Model Canvas Master Coach and holds an EMBA from the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management. She is a co-founding, co-producer of the Entrepreneurial Feminist Forum—an educational, collaboration and resilience-crafting conference for entrepreneurial feminists of all genders. Her work was recently recognized in the Canada 150 Women: Conversations with Leaders, Champions and Luminaries book which was published November 2017. Mutch was recognized as one of Canada’s Inspiring 50 women in April 2018.
Rachel Kelly is Founder of Make Lemonade. Her first “real” job was a typical 9-5 desk gig where she spent most days daydreaming how she would redesign the office and where her next adventure would be. When the reality of freelancing with an unstable paycheque hit her hard, she decided to make some lemonade. She spent a year researching coworking, studying the market, searching for an office space, and battling renovation nightmares, 'till she was finally able to open her very own coworking space, Make Lemonade. Now she's on a mission to make sure women-identified entrepreneurs are connected with the resources to make their own lemonade.
Amanda Laird is a feminist nutritionist, writer, and podcast host breaking the curse of menstruation. She is the host of the Heavy Flow Podcast, a weekly podcast about periods, reproductive health, and other health and wellness topics, and author of the forthcoming book Heavy Flow: Breaking the Curse of Menstruation to be published by Dundurn Press in February 2019. Amanda also has more than a dozen years of experience in corporate communications and PR, working with a wide variety of clients in agency, client-side, and freelance capacities.
Chanèle McFarlane is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Do Well Dress Well, a professional development platform that creates content, community, and opportunities for women. With a focus on personal branding, networking, conferences, style and career development, she is passionate about empowering women to bridge the gap between competence and confidence. Chanèle also leads Confidence Through Conferences, an initiative she created to get more diverse women into conferences and networking events by minimizing the financial barrier. She is a frequent speaker, freelance writer, and content strategist, in addition to a member of the Professional Advisory Committee for Humber College’s Content Strategy program. Chanèle has been recognized as one of PR in Canada’s Top 30 Under 30, one of the Top 100 Black Women to Watch in Canada and one of the Top 25 Women of Influence.
Chris Mitchell is the Creative Partnerships and Special Projects Manager at the Gladstone Hotel and a practicing life coach who works with artists and creative entrepreneurs. Her professional experience has evolved over three decades of working in leadership positions in small business and nonprofit arts organizations working side-by-side with entrepreneurs and artists to strategize direction, negotiate collaborations and partnerships, realize creative projects, and implement business plans. She understands the creative mindset, the context, challenges, and possibilities of pursuing life as an entrepreneur and building a business.
Alyson Morris is an energetic and results focused Human Resources Manager with a passion for finding innovative solutions. She is currently the HR Manager at Auxly Cannabis Group Inc. She brings 10 years of HR experience including employee relations, change management, recruitment, total rewards and training and development. Alyson graduated from McGill University with a BA in Psychology, Behavioural Neuroscience and History. She decided to pursue a career in HR and completed a Postgraduate degree in Human Resources Management from George Brown College. She has her Certified Human Resources Leader (CHRL) designation. She worked in various companies in different industries including the Delta Chelsea Hotel, Labatt Breweries and Fleishman Hillard HighRoad.
Dr. Barb Orser - A Full Professor at the University of Ottawa Telfer School of Management, Barb is the lead author of over 100 academic and industry publications on women entrepreneurs, including Feminine Capital. Unlocking the Power of Women Enterprise (Stanford University Press, 2015). An advocate for inclusive policies and program that support women entrepreneurs, she has served an advisor to numerous agencies, such as Status of Women Canada, PSPC, ISED, APEC, OECD and US State Department. In fall 2018, she was a Canadian delegate and keynote speaker to the T20 Think Tank (Argentina pre-W20/G20 senior level consultations). She is the Founding Chair of the Canadian Taskforce for Women's Business Growth (2011) and Co-Chair (with Petra Kassun-Mutch) of the Women Entrepreneurs Ontario Collective (2015/2016), non-partisan consortia of business owners, training agencies, academics, and industry associations. Her research and advocacy has been recognized through various awards, including Women’s Executive Network "100 Most Powerful Women in Canada" (2010), The International Alliance of Women "World of Difference Award" (2010), and "Canada 150 Women" celebrating Canada’s 150th birthday by recognizing feminist leaders, champions, and luminaries.
Karlyn Percil-Mercieca, CEO of KDPM Consulting Group INC. & Founder of SisterTalk Group (as seen on Oprah’s lifeclass), is a Mindset Mentor with a Certificate in Neuroscience Coaching, training in Positive Neuroplasticity with Dr. Rick Hanson and licensed to facilitate Emotional Intelligence Assessment [EQ-i 2.0, EQ 360]. During her extensive career on Bay Street, Karlyn has created Affinity Groups as a means to increase inclusion and belonging at work. With a focus on the science of leadership, well-being, and success for women, especially women of color, in the workplace, she is currently completing a Certificate in Positive Psychology and has a mandate to increase access to mentorship and sponsorship for 1 Million women of color by 2025.
A trusted voice in conversations that matter like #MeToo, Karlyn leads the conversation on the “Elephant In The Room.” In addition to working with the United Nations and the Toronto Police Service to end sexual harassment and assault, she recently shared her story in Globe and Mail’s ROB on sexual harassment in the workplace, something she would like to see eliminated in the near future, through a new initiative she co-founded called Not Here 2025. She also leads the conversation around success, leadership, mentorship and workplace success and wellness, and has been featured four times on the Oprah Winfrey Network, CNN Money, Huffington Post, TV One, CBC, CTV and The Toronto Star. Audiences can regularly see Karlyn give leadership & life advice on the internationally syndicated Cityline - North America's longest-running daytime show for women.
Sabrina Ramkellawan has a nursing background and has worked in clinical research for more than 15 years. During this time she's been involved conducting clinical trials to bring new drugs, treatments, and devices to market. She now also has worked in the cannabis industry for more than three years with a focus on cannabis research and education. She started the Canadian Institute for Medical Advancement to help companies conduct cannabis research (a niche she found that existed in the industry). She is the president of the Clinical Research Association of Canada, which provides a forum for educational events supporting talent and research innovation in Canada. Sabrina is currently the Vice President of Clinical Affairs at TerrAscend where she is responsible for the conduct of clinical research to advance cannabinoid medicine. She is especially interested in women's health and works to ensure that cannabinoid products address the medical needs of women.
Reena Rampersad is a cultural foodie and cannabis connoisseur, originally born in Toronto but of Trinidadian descent. She spent all of her 20s earning a living as a social worker in Detroit, but her interest in food culture would eventually steer her into a permanent career as a Restauranteur. She is currently the owner/operator of two catering and private dinner companies, The Limin Coconut and High Society Supper Club. As an open supporter of Cannabis, Reena has been advocating the benefits for years and uses her culinary skills and influence to help shift the negative perceptions and stigmas that exist regarding it’s use.
As a young girl, Reena witnessed her grandmother using Cannabis in the making of various salves and remedies while her father battled the law and society for his choice to partake. Many of her family members were victims to the War on Drugs so her participation in the industry is both personal and political and she sees it as one of the greatest and most ignored civil rights violations of all time. As a result, both of her companies have strong social justice ties and involvement and Reena is also the Volunteer Coordinator for The Campaign for Cannabis Amnesty, a campaign that is currently drafting legislation and asking the federal government to provide blanket pardons to those with previous non violent cannabis convictions in an effort to promote an equitable industry. Reena has been featured on the CBC’s The Current, Episode “Cooking With Cannabis”, in a Zoomer Media spot on the ONE Network alongside a few other articles in The Globe and Mail, Now Magazine and other smaller publications focused on cannabis and cooking. Reena currently resides in Hamilton, Ontario with her husband, Louic and their cat Buddy.
Pauleanna Reid is the co-founder of New Girl on the Block, a mentorship platform for millennial women, helping them navigate the path between professional success and personal fulfillment. Her passions include advocacy for anti-bullying and mental health. She contributes her time spreading awareness, providing expertise on media platforms, and delivering keynote talks in schools nationwide. When she is not working with young adults, she is growing her brand as a professional writer. She has successfully crafted a business in storytelling as a journalist, two-time author, celebrity ghostwriter, and contributor on forbes.com.
Vicki Saunders is an entrepreneur, award-winning mentor, advisor to the next generation of change makers, and leading advocate for entrepreneurship as a way of creating positive transformation in the world. Vicki is Founder of SheEO and #radicalgenerosity, a global initiative to radically transform how we support finance and celebrate female entrepreneurs. Vicki has co-founded and run ventures in Europe, Toronto, and Silicon Valley and taken a company public on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Vicki was recently named one of the 100 most influential leaders of 2015 from “EBW – Empowering A Billion Women”, In 2001, Vicki was selected as a Global Leader for Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum.
Olga Semenovych leads community development and citizen engagement initiatives at Groundswell Projects, a design thinking consultancy that supports organizations and companies working towards long-term positive change-making. Her profound passion for participatory governance has taken her to Jamaica, Philippines, Ethiopia, Ukraine, and to several of Toronto's inner suburban neighbourhoods to support community-led change through creative participatory processes.
Olga holds a Masters in Design from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design, a Masters in Planning from the University of Waterloo, and a Bachelor in Public Affairs and Policy Management from Carleton University. She teaches citizen engagement, negotiation, and mediation at the University of Waterloo School of Planning.
Madeleine Shaw is a graduate of Queen’s University with a BA in English Literature and Women’s Studies. During her time there, she received the Tricolour Award, the University’s highest non-academic distinction for service to the University community, for her years of work as a campus feminist leader. She started making reusable menstrual pads and period underwear in 1993, in response to allergic reactions she was having to disposable products, and wrote the first business plan for Lunapads in 1994 as a student at the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT).
A graduate of the THNK School of Creative Leadership Madeleine channels her infinite curiosity into exploring how design, social change and gender equality can be reimagined in business. In 2015 Madeleine received the inaugural Vancouver Board of Trade Wendy McDonald Award for Entrepreneurial Innovation. Retired from her operational role at Lunapads as of the end of 2017, she now divides her time between producing G Day, a national event series for tween girls, and Nestworks, a family-friendly workplace concept under development. When she’s not creating innovative ways to change the world, Madeleine can be found tending her vast garden and enjoying time with her husband and teenage daughter.
Suzanne Siemens is a Chartered Accountant (CPA, CA) and graduate of the Sauder School of Business from the University of BC. After a successful career in both public practice and industry, Suzanne began seeking work that aligned with her values around social justice and environmental activism. In 2000 Suzanne joined forces with Madeleine Shaw to co-found Lunapads, an award winning social impact business that specializes in sustainable alternatives to disposable menstrual products.
Suzanne is frequently invited to be a speaker at events across North America for her expertise on the future of retail and e-commerce, sustainability, diversity and inclusion. In addition to her role as CEO at Lunapads, Suzanne is on the Advisory Council of the Georgia Strait Alliance, a local marine conservation not-for-profit organization. She lives in North Vancouver with her husband and 2 sons and spends her weekends, rain or shine (mostly rain!) trail running in the forest.
Samantha Slade is author of Going Horizontal – Creating a Non-hierarchical Organization, One Practice at a Time (Berrett-Koehler Publishers), Samantha believes organizations can be a microcosm of the world we want to live in. For 20+ years, Samantha has been pioneering novel organizational models and practices for a world that makes more sense. Blending the autonomy of freelancing with the benefits of organizations, Samantha co-founded Percolab an international network of co-design organizations, all co-managed, and a co-working coop in Montreal, where she is based. Samantha puts her background in anthropology and education to use in her work be it with the French government or local community organizations. Member of the Quebec Social Innovation network, Samantha is engaged in the lab movement to effect systemic change.
Bianca Sprague (CEO of bebo mia inc and Baby & Me Fitness) is a badass queer entrepreneur. She lives in Toronto and co-parents her daughter, Gray, with her partner, Alana. Bianca feels passionate about creating access to quality pre and postnatal care for marginalized communities. She is an advocate for mental wellness for the entire family, and especially for the birthing parent, after suffering from PPD in silence and losing her father to suicide in 2012. Her goal in business is to create opportunities for women to tap into their intuition and follow their wisdom to create a business and life they love. Her brand bebo mia inc. is a training, mentorship and social justice organization for women* in the maternal health field.
A different culture from both the patriarchal boardroom model and the female-centric multi-level marketing industry, bebo mia offers opportunities for women to work from home while making an income for themselves and their families. They develop inclusive, accessible trainings for women that provide the skills needed to grow and sustain a lucrative business. bebo mia remains fiercely committed to their original mission that was developed in 2008: Connect women to their intrinsic value and power.
*Bianca defines women as women-identified, femme-presenting, two-spirited, genderqueer, trans-inclusive, gender-non-conforming, androgynous, agender, intersex, bigender, gender questioning, gender fluid, butch, non-binary, queer positive or any person that would like to be included in this definition.
Rivera Sun is the author of The Dandelion Insurrection, its sequel The Roots of Resistance, as well as an accompanying study guide to nonviolent change. She trains people nationwide in strategy for nonviolent movements and has co-hosted a weekly radio program on social justice movements since 2011. Her essays have appeared in over 100 publications across the United States. She is a frequent speaker and presenter at universities and colleges on strategic nonviolence and social justice.
Dr. Elizabeth (Dori) Tunstall is a design anthropologist, public intellectual, and design advocate who works at the intersections of critical theory, culture, and design. As Dean of Design at Ontario College of Arts and Design University, she is the first black and black female dean of a faculty of design. She leads the Cultures-Based Innovation Initiative focused on using old ways of knowing to drive innovation processes that directly benefit communities.
With a global career, Dori served as Associate Professor of Design Anthropology and Associate Dean at Swinburne University in Australia. She wrote the biweekly column Un-Design for The Conversation Australia. In the U.S., she taught at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She organized the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative and served as director of Design for Democracy. Industry positions included UX strategist for Sapient Corporation and Arc Worldwide. Dori holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Stanford University and a BA in Anthropology from Bryn Mawr College.
Nancy Wilson is the co-founder and CEO of the Canadian Women’s Chamber of Commerce (CanWCC). CanWCC is a national, not-for-profit organization that advocates for the economic priorities of women-owned businesses. As CEO, Nancy is responsible for achieving CanWCC’s strategic goals with respect to education, services, and advocacy for women-owned businesses in Canada. Nancy is also a Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA, CGA) with over a decade of accounting experience in various corporate
roles.
Theresa Yuan is the host of the weekly podcast, en(gender)ed, which explores the systems, practices, and policies that enable gender-based violence and oppression and the solutions to end it and uses gender as a lens to better understand power and oppression and its impact in the private realm, so as to better recognize and confront it in the public sphere. Teri's journey as an intersectional feminist began in college, where she studied feminist film criticism, post-colonial pedagogy, and cultural criticism. Along the way, she has added to her identity: survivor and survivor advocate. She believes that by developing a cultural literacy around power and abuse of power, we can reclaim how we define liberty in relationships and in civic life and solve many of our most urgent social (justice) challenges.
Christina Zeidler is a filmmaker, artist, and "Lead Alchemist" of The Gladstone Hotel. Wearing the dual hats of developer and entrepreneur, Christina set out in 2003 to renovate and revitalize the historic Victorian building using a community based approach. Her approach to management is distinctly feminist as The Gladstone Hotel upholds a strong anti-oppression framework through its operations. She is the creator of the Gladstone Hotel’s “Artist Designed Room Project” using local artist/designers to implement individually resigned hotel rooms, even creating a room herself entitled “snapshot”. With 37 unique artist designed hotel rooms, a multi-use second floor, a restaurant and two bars, The Gladstone Hotel is more than just a hotel, it is a hub for the arts which fosters the local community while providing instant access to the arts scene for those traveling to Toronto. In her spare time Christina engages in as much community activism as possible.
EFF'S "MADAMES" OF CEREMONY
Dr. Golnaz Golnaraghi, Founder of Divity Group Inc., is a consultant and intersectional feminist management scholar with more than 12 years of leadership and team development experience. She is an accomplished educator, senior facilitator, researcher and author. Prior to starting her own company and entering academia, Golnaz held marketing management roles for 15 years in consulting and professional services firms. Through her passion for innovation in teaching and learning, she led the successful design and delivery of a portfolio learning model for five new Bachelor of Business Administration programs for an Ontario-based college. Golnaz was also co-recipient of a significant research grant through the Ministry of Advanced Education and Skills Development for her work in experiential learning in higher education leadership courses at the same institution.
Golnaz holds a Masters of Business Administration degree from the University of British Columbia. She earned her Doctor of Business Administration from Athabasca University where she studied critical theoretical perspectives, feminism and postcolonial theory. She has presented her work at international conferences including the Academy of Management, CMS and given a TEDx Talk titled From Silence to Voice: Embracing My Hybrid Identity. Golnaz has published her work in books and peer review journals including the International Journal of Cross-Cultural Management, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, and The Oxford Handbook of Diversity in Organizations.
Petra Kassun-Mutch is a serial social purpose entrepreneur, start up and business growth incubator management consultant, and publisher, deeply committed to creating a more inclusive, just, human-centered and generative economy through the power of feminist business practice, pedagogy, theory, innovation and entrepreneurship. Her enterprise, Eve-volution Inc (2014), a B Corp certified, lean, networked feminist enterprise advocates for and designs programs that promote equity and inclusion in startup and community-based economic development ecosystems. Her magazine, LiisBeth serves as a convener, capacity-builder and voice for the growing, 10 000+ all gender, entrepreneurial feminist community. Mutch current serves as the Executive Director of Food Starter, a food processing entrepreneur incubator and accelerator program with a 20 000 sq ft processing facility in in Toronto.
Mutch is a certified Feminist Business Model Canvas Master Coach and holds an EMBA from the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management. She is a co-founding, co-producer of the Entrepreneurial Feminist Forum—an educational, collaboration and resilience-crafting conference for entrepreneurial feminists of all genders. Her work was recently recognized in the Canada 150 Women: Conversations with Leaders, Champions and Luminaries book which was published November 2017. Mutch was recognized as one of Canada’s Inspiring 50 women in April 2018.
Lex Schroeder is a writer/editor, business strategist in the systems thinking community, and Co-Founder of Feminists at Work. As Co-Founder of Feminists at Work, Lex brings a feminist lens to transforming businesses, organizations, and systems. Her focus these days is creating new knowledge at the intersection of gender justice and the future of work. Lex has led strategic initiatives at The Berkana Institute, The Lean Enterprise Institute, and Take The Lead, a U.S. nonprofit dedicated to gender parity in leadership across all sectors by 2025.
Lex has presented workshops or spoken on collective leadership at NYU, Yale, See Jane Do, and the Harvard School of Public Health, among other places. Her views on leadership have been featured in ELLE France, strategy+business, Fast Company, and Boston.com. Lex is trained in the Art of Hosting, a set of participatory leadership methods that allows for emergence and responsive design. She lives in Harlem and tries to get to the Maine coast as often as she can. Her favorite dance troupes are Ballez and STREB Action Lab.
BE (barbara) Alink is the inventor of the Alinker, vehicle for social change and manifestation of her “Reverse-Design” way of approaching the world. She is a paradigm-shifter, edge-walker and developed the "Reverse-Design" life's practice.
BE has gained appreciation of the power of community as a result of her work in Afghanistan, Kenya, the Sudan, Ethiopia, Kosovo, and Indonesia. The theme behind her work is connecting people with each other by creating meaningful social contexts through which people can actively engage based on who we are as humans. BE is the Founder and CEO of the Alinker Inventions Ltd and community is built into every customer experience with the company that is a certified BCorp and lives and breathes the values of equality and inclusion which they converted into a revolutionary business proposition.
Lisa Campbell became a true cannabis expert by working extensively in international drug policy with Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy and is currently the Chair of the Ontario Cannabis Consumer & Retail Alliance. Lisa is founder and CEO of Lifford Cannabis Solutions, helping cannabis companies come to market across all ten provinces, leveraging Lifford’s national salesforce and longstanding partnerships with provincial control boards. Lisa holds a Master of Environmental Studies from York University and is as a Canadian Institutes for Health Research (CIHR) Universities Without Walls alumnus.
Jane Clapp is one of the world’s leading embodiment teachers. She is an embodiment resilience coach, trauma recovery specialist, and founder of the Recover Your Warrior online training program. Jane guides people to uncover and integrate their physical and emotional strength and access deeper human connection through the intelligence of their bodies. She brings two decades worth of experience guiding people back into nourishing relationship with their bodies for more freedom and joy in their lives.
Michelle Cliffe began her career two decades ago in communications with a passion for building brands and communication strategies that tell a story, strengthen relationships and inspire action. She had a diverse career, but entrepreneurship called her back time and time again. Not afraid to take risks or pivot when things shifted, Michelle has successfully followed her dreams, finding help and luck when needed. Michelle started her career in fashion, beauty and lifestyle, and after doing a brief stint for an agency a mentor helped her to launch her own public relations and communications firm in that industry. She built a successful boutique agency over nearly five years, and left the fashion world after being called to another purpose – helping animals. For nearly a decade she worked in the non-profit sector inspiring people to be advocates and donors. After being laid off, she was left asking, now what? A series of events led her to pivot into the wedding industry where she started Love Collective, a wedding planning company founded on feminist ideals and smashing traditions.
In 2016, Michelle discovered the benefits of cannabis, which changed her life and sparked a passion for the plant that has led her down a new career path, founding Stashie which is in development stage and focused on helping others – particularly women -- to explore and learn about cannabis' benefits. Michelle has made a commitment, in both her personal and professional life, to people, organizations and initiatives that strive to create positive social change. She believes that, “we’re in this together, and we’re better when we act like it.”
Kelly Diels is a feminist marketing consultant and writer who helps feminist entrepreneurs and organizations sell without selling out their audience or their principles. Kelly is best known for her feminist marketing approaches to online platform-building and for identifying and rallying against a marketing and cultural narrative she calls The Female Lifestyle Empowerment Brand.
Kelly has provided marketing training and guidance to hundreds of online entrepreneurs and organizations in workshops, masterminds, consulting projects and 1:1 coaching. She leads an annual 9-month Feminist Marketing Mastermind composed of feminist authors, founders, professors, artists, activists, coaches, and healers who want to get visible and rise without leveraging the tactics of The Female Lifestyle Empowerment Brand. Starting in September 2019, Kelly will be writing a monthly column in Liisbeth. She has also written for Salon and Jezebel. Kelly is currently working on her own book as well as ghost-writing a non-fiction book for a well-known feminist educator/activist (forthcoming 2019).
Madi Fuller is a Brock University alumni in Political Science and Labour Studies and the manager of Niagara College’s entrepreneurship and innovation centre, ncTakeOff where she provides a diverse student body with programming, funding opportunities, and resources to help them reach their entrepreneurial goals. She also is an event facilitator for the Canada’s first Commercial Cannabis Production post-secondary program at Niagara College.
Dr. CV Harquail, Co-Founder of Feminists at Work, is a feminist management professor and consultant whose work weaves together organizational change, social justice, and entrepreneurship. CV has developed a suite of tools, including the Feminist Business Model Canvas, to blend feminist practice and Lean Startup processes. She has worked with over 100 teams of entrepreneurs to bring business ideas forward and adopt new technologies. CV also helps business leaders incorporate feminist values and goals into their companies, changing the world by transforming business.
In her book on Feminist Interventions in Management Thinking (Routledge, Spring 2019) CV proposes the feminist case for transforming business and the business case for adopting feminism. She offers a business person’s primer on intersectional feminism (ask her for an advance copy of this chapter!) and explains why feminists and companies have struggled to make progress as they aim for gender equality. She demonstrates how feminism has shaped and led conversations about key management topics and projects feminist visions for the future of business. CV draws on cutting edge trends in product development, technology, marketing, organizational design, and governance.
At last year’s EFF, CV helped us build a shared understanding of entrepreneurial feminism with her talk on Foundations of Feminisms. She has presented her research at Harvard Business School, Stern Business School (NYU), Kellogg (Northwestern), Booth (UChicago), and TEDxHoboken. She has published in AMJ and AMR and her essays on feminist business/ product design appear in two major Women’s Studies anthologies. Her work has been published at the Huffington Post, Forbes.com, Women2.0, and the Harvard Business Review. See cvharquail.com for more.
Carol Anne Hilton is CEO and Founder of Indigenomics Institute and a recognized leading First Nation’s business entrepreneur with an international Masters Degree in Business Management (MBA) from the University of Hertfordshire, England. Carol Anne is from the Nuu chah nulth Nation on Vancouver Island and was recently appointed as a senior advisor to the Federal Finance Minister on the Canadian Economic Growth Council. Carol Anne currently serves on the Canadian Community Economic Development Network Board and has recently been appointed to the McGill University Institute of Canadian Studies. She served as Director on the Vancouver Island Investment Fund, the World Fisheries Trust, the Victoria Community Micro Lending Society, Community Social Planning Council, the First Nations Health Authority and served for 9 years on Council of Hesquiaht First Nation.
Carol Anne works to incorporate an Aboriginal worldview while bringing First Nations, industry, and government together to design new approaches for sustainable, inclusive development. She brings project management experience across industries in resource management, governance, and regional development. Carol Anne is currently authoring Indigenomics – a Global Power Shift and has been an instructor at Camosun Business School Leadership Program as well as at Simon Fraser University’s Community Economic Development Program, the University of Winnipeg’s Masters in Community Planning Program and most recently with the Banff Center’s Indigenous Business Program where she is also a faculty lead and a Fleck Fellow.
Savoy "Kapow!" Howe is the head coach and owner Toronto Newsgirls, Canada's first female-owned and Trans positive boxing club. Savoy started boxing in 1992 at the Toronto Newsboys Boxing Club and went onto fight one of Toronto's first sanctioned boxing bouts for women in 1993. In 1996, the Toronto Newsgirls Boxing Club was born. Savoy, originally from New Brunswick, holds a theatre degree from McMaster University and has spent over 30 years pounding the pavement as a performer. Her most recent show, "Newsgirl", a one woman show developed at Soulotheatre, recounted the herstory of the Toronto Newsgirls and of the one woman's journey into the male dominated sport of boxing.
Savoy is the recipient of a Pride Toronto Award of Excellence in Sports, a Canadian Association for the Advancement of Women and Sports and Physical Activity Breakthrough Award (CAAWS), the 2010 Senator Nancy Ruth Award, an Ontario Coaching Excellence Award and the Steinert & Ferreiro award for LGBTQ leadership. Savoy recently won the 2018 Inspire Lifetime Achievement Award, made to an individual who made significant contributions to better the lives of others in the LGBTQ community over an entire career or lifetime.
Cher Jones is a Corporate Social Media Trainer & Personal Branding Coach with the love of technology hardwired into her personality. Whether on a stage, in a training room, or coaching one on one, her passion for teaching professionals how to develop powerful personal brands is both infectious and empowering. Her ability to remove the fear and break down how to use social media to build relationships, improve sales, and grow business have many referring to her as one of Canada's leading social media trainers.
Petra Kassun-Mutch is a serial social purpose entrepreneur, start up, and business growth incubator management consultant, and publisher who is deeply committed to creating a more inclusive, just, human-centered, and generative economy through the power of feminist business practice, pedagogy, theory, innovation, and entrepreneurship. Her enterprise, Eve-volution Inc (2014), a B Corp certified, lean, networked feminist enterprise, advocates for and designs programs that promote equity and inclusion in startup and community-based economic development ecosystems. Her magazine, LiisBeth serves as a convener, capacity-builder and voice for the growing, 10,000+ all gender, entrepreneurial feminist community. Mutch current serves as the Executive Director of Food Starter, a food processing entrepreneur incubator and accelerator program with a 20,000 sq ft processing facility in in Toronto.
Mutch is a certified Feminist Business Model Canvas Master Coach and holds an EMBA from the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management. She is a co-founding, co-producer of the Entrepreneurial Feminist Forum—an educational, collaboration and resilience-crafting conference for entrepreneurial feminists of all genders. Her work was recently recognized in the Canada 150 Women: Conversations with Leaders, Champions and Luminaries book which was published November 2017. Mutch was recognized as one of Canada’s Inspiring 50 women in April 2018.
Rachel Kelly is Founder of Make Lemonade. Her first “real” job was a typical 9-5 desk gig where she spent most days daydreaming how she would redesign the office and where her next adventure would be. When the reality of freelancing with an unstable paycheque hit her hard, she decided to make some lemonade. She spent a year researching coworking, studying the market, searching for an office space, and battling renovation nightmares, 'till she was finally able to open her very own coworking space, Make Lemonade. Now she's on a mission to make sure women-identified entrepreneurs are connected with the resources to make their own lemonade.
Amanda Laird is a feminist nutritionist, writer, and podcast host breaking the curse of menstruation. She is the host of the Heavy Flow Podcast, a weekly podcast about periods, reproductive health, and other health and wellness topics, and author of the forthcoming book Heavy Flow: Breaking the Curse of Menstruation to be published by Dundurn Press in February 2019. Amanda also has more than a dozen years of experience in corporate communications and PR, working with a wide variety of clients in agency, client-side, and freelance capacities.
Chanèle McFarlane is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Do Well Dress Well, a professional development platform that creates content, community, and opportunities for women. With a focus on personal branding, networking, conferences, style and career development, she is passionate about empowering women to bridge the gap between competence and confidence. Chanèle also leads Confidence Through Conferences, an initiative she created to get more diverse women into conferences and networking events by minimizing the financial barrier. She is a frequent speaker, freelance writer, and content strategist, in addition to a member of the Professional Advisory Committee for Humber College’s Content Strategy program. Chanèle has been recognized as one of PR in Canada’s Top 30 Under 30, one of the Top 100 Black Women to Watch in Canada and one of the Top 25 Women of Influence.
Chris Mitchell is the Creative Partnerships and Special Projects Manager at the Gladstone Hotel and a practicing life coach who works with artists and creative entrepreneurs. Her professional experience has evolved over three decades of working in leadership positions in small business and nonprofit arts organizations working side-by-side with entrepreneurs and artists to strategize direction, negotiate collaborations and partnerships, realize creative projects, and implement business plans. She understands the creative mindset, the context, challenges, and possibilities of pursuing life as an entrepreneur and building a business.
Alyson Morris is an energetic and results focused Human Resources Manager with a passion for finding innovative solutions. She is currently the HR Manager at Auxly Cannabis Group Inc. She brings 10 years of HR experience including employee relations, change management, recruitment, total rewards and training and development. Alyson graduated from McGill University with a BA in Psychology, Behavioural Neuroscience and History. She decided to pursue a career in HR and completed a Postgraduate degree in Human Resources Management from George Brown College. She has her Certified Human Resources Leader (CHRL) designation. She worked in various companies in different industries including the Delta Chelsea Hotel, Labatt Breweries and Fleishman Hillard HighRoad.
Dr. Barb Orser - A Full Professor at the University of Ottawa Telfer School of Management, Barb is the lead author of over 100 academic and industry publications on women entrepreneurs, including Feminine Capital. Unlocking the Power of Women Enterprise (Stanford University Press, 2015). An advocate for inclusive policies and program that support women entrepreneurs, she has served an advisor to numerous agencies, such as Status of Women Canada, PSPC, ISED, APEC, OECD and US State Department. In fall 2018, she was a Canadian delegate and keynote speaker to the T20 Think Tank (Argentina pre-W20/G20 senior level consultations). She is the Founding Chair of the Canadian Taskforce for Women's Business Growth (2011) and Co-Chair (with Petra Kassun-Mutch) of the Women Entrepreneurs Ontario Collective (2015/2016), non-partisan consortia of business owners, training agencies, academics, and industry associations. Her research and advocacy has been recognized through various awards, including Women’s Executive Network "100 Most Powerful Women in Canada" (2010), The International Alliance of Women "World of Difference Award" (2010), and "Canada 150 Women" celebrating Canada’s 150th birthday by recognizing feminist leaders, champions, and luminaries.
Karlyn Percil-Mercieca, CEO of KDPM Consulting Group INC. & Founder of SisterTalk Group (as seen on Oprah’s lifeclass), is a Mindset Mentor with a Certificate in Neuroscience Coaching, training in Positive Neuroplasticity with Dr. Rick Hanson and licensed to facilitate Emotional Intelligence Assessment [EQ-i 2.0, EQ 360]. During her extensive career on Bay Street, Karlyn has created Affinity Groups as a means to increase inclusion and belonging at work. With a focus on the science of leadership, well-being, and success for women, especially women of color, in the workplace, she is currently completing a Certificate in Positive Psychology and has a mandate to increase access to mentorship and sponsorship for 1 Million women of color by 2025.
A trusted voice in conversations that matter like #MeToo, Karlyn leads the conversation on the “Elephant In The Room.” In addition to working with the United Nations and the Toronto Police Service to end sexual harassment and assault, she recently shared her story in Globe and Mail’s ROB on sexual harassment in the workplace, something she would like to see eliminated in the near future, through a new initiative she co-founded called Not Here 2025. She also leads the conversation around success, leadership, mentorship and workplace success and wellness, and has been featured four times on the Oprah Winfrey Network, CNN Money, Huffington Post, TV One, CBC, CTV and The Toronto Star. Audiences can regularly see Karlyn give leadership & life advice on the internationally syndicated Cityline - North America's longest-running daytime show for women.
Sabrina Ramkellawan has a nursing background and has worked in clinical research for more than 15 years. During this time she's been involved conducting clinical trials to bring new drugs, treatments, and devices to market. She now also has worked in the cannabis industry for more than three years with a focus on cannabis research and education. She started the Canadian Institute for Medical Advancement to help companies conduct cannabis research (a niche she found that existed in the industry). She is the president of the Clinical Research Association of Canada, which provides a forum for educational events supporting talent and research innovation in Canada. Sabrina is currently the Vice President of Clinical Affairs at TerrAscend where she is responsible for the conduct of clinical research to advance cannabinoid medicine. She is especially interested in women's health and works to ensure that cannabinoid products address the medical needs of women.
Reena Rampersad is a cultural foodie and cannabis connoisseur, originally born in Toronto but of Trinidadian descent. She spent all of her 20s earning a living as a social worker in Detroit, but her interest in food culture would eventually steer her into a permanent career as a Restauranteur. She is currently the owner/operator of two catering and private dinner companies, The Limin Coconut and High Society Supper Club. As an open supporter of Cannabis, Reena has been advocating the benefits for years and uses her culinary skills and influence to help shift the negative perceptions and stigmas that exist regarding it’s use.
As a young girl, Reena witnessed her grandmother using Cannabis in the making of various salves and remedies while her father battled the law and society for his choice to partake. Many of her family members were victims to the War on Drugs so her participation in the industry is both personal and political and she sees it as one of the greatest and most ignored civil rights violations of all time. As a result, both of her companies have strong social justice ties and involvement and Reena is also the Volunteer Coordinator for The Campaign for Cannabis Amnesty, a campaign that is currently drafting legislation and asking the federal government to provide blanket pardons to those with previous non violent cannabis convictions in an effort to promote an equitable industry. Reena has been featured on the CBC’s The Current, Episode “Cooking With Cannabis”, in a Zoomer Media spot on the ONE Network alongside a few other articles in The Globe and Mail, Now Magazine and other smaller publications focused on cannabis and cooking. Reena currently resides in Hamilton, Ontario with her husband, Louic and their cat Buddy.
Pauleanna Reid is the co-founder of New Girl on the Block, a mentorship platform for millennial women, helping them navigate the path between professional success and personal fulfillment. Her passions include advocacy for anti-bullying and mental health. She contributes her time spreading awareness, providing expertise on media platforms, and delivering keynote talks in schools nationwide. When she is not working with young adults, she is growing her brand as a professional writer. She has successfully crafted a business in storytelling as a journalist, two-time author, celebrity ghostwriter, and contributor on forbes.com.
Vicki Saunders is an entrepreneur, award-winning mentor, advisor to the next generation of change makers, and leading advocate for entrepreneurship as a way of creating positive transformation in the world. Vicki is Founder of SheEO and #radicalgenerosity, a global initiative to radically transform how we support finance and celebrate female entrepreneurs. Vicki has co-founded and run ventures in Europe, Toronto, and Silicon Valley and taken a company public on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Vicki was recently named one of the 100 most influential leaders of 2015 from “EBW – Empowering A Billion Women”, In 2001, Vicki was selected as a Global Leader for Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum.
Olga Semenovych leads community development and citizen engagement initiatives at Groundswell Projects, a design thinking consultancy that supports organizations and companies working towards long-term positive change-making. Her profound passion for participatory governance has taken her to Jamaica, Philippines, Ethiopia, Ukraine, and to several of Toronto's inner suburban neighbourhoods to support community-led change through creative participatory processes.
Olga holds a Masters in Design from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design, a Masters in Planning from the University of Waterloo, and a Bachelor in Public Affairs and Policy Management from Carleton University. She teaches citizen engagement, negotiation, and mediation at the University of Waterloo School of Planning.
Madeleine Shaw is a graduate of Queen’s University with a BA in English Literature and Women’s Studies. During her time there, she received the Tricolour Award, the University’s highest non-academic distinction for service to the University community, for her years of work as a campus feminist leader. She started making reusable menstrual pads and period underwear in 1993, in response to allergic reactions she was having to disposable products, and wrote the first business plan for Lunapads in 1994 as a student at the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT).
A graduate of the THNK School of Creative Leadership Madeleine channels her infinite curiosity into exploring how design, social change and gender equality can be reimagined in business. In 2015 Madeleine received the inaugural Vancouver Board of Trade Wendy McDonald Award for Entrepreneurial Innovation. Retired from her operational role at Lunapads as of the end of 2017, she now divides her time between producing G Day, a national event series for tween girls, and Nestworks, a family-friendly workplace concept under development. When she’s not creating innovative ways to change the world, Madeleine can be found tending her vast garden and enjoying time with her husband and teenage daughter.
Suzanne Siemens is a Chartered Accountant (CPA, CA) and graduate of the Sauder School of Business from the University of BC. After a successful career in both public practice and industry, Suzanne began seeking work that aligned with her values around social justice and environmental activism. In 2000 Suzanne joined forces with Madeleine Shaw to co-found Lunapads, an award winning social impact business that specializes in sustainable alternatives to disposable menstrual products.
Suzanne is frequently invited to be a speaker at events across North America for her expertise on the future of retail and e-commerce, sustainability, diversity and inclusion. In addition to her role as CEO at Lunapads, Suzanne is on the Advisory Council of the Georgia Strait Alliance, a local marine conservation not-for-profit organization. She lives in North Vancouver with her husband and 2 sons and spends her weekends, rain or shine (mostly rain!) trail running in the forest.
Samantha Slade is author of Going Horizontal – Creating a Non-hierarchical Organization, One Practice at a Time (Berrett-Koehler Publishers), Samantha believes organizations can be a microcosm of the world we want to live in. For 20+ years, Samantha has been pioneering novel organizational models and practices for a world that makes more sense. Blending the autonomy of freelancing with the benefits of organizations, Samantha co-founded Percolab an international network of co-design organizations, all co-managed, and a co-working coop in Montreal, where she is based. Samantha puts her background in anthropology and education to use in her work be it with the French government or local community organizations. Member of the Quebec Social Innovation network, Samantha is engaged in the lab movement to effect systemic change.
Bianca Sprague (CEO of bebo mia inc and Baby & Me Fitness) is a badass queer entrepreneur. She lives in Toronto and co-parents her daughter, Gray, with her partner, Alana. Bianca feels passionate about creating access to quality pre and postnatal care for marginalized communities. She is an advocate for mental wellness for the entire family, and especially for the birthing parent, after suffering from PPD in silence and losing her father to suicide in 2012. Her goal in business is to create opportunities for women to tap into their intuition and follow their wisdom to create a business and life they love. Her brand bebo mia inc. is a training, mentorship and social justice organization for women* in the maternal health field.
A different culture from both the patriarchal boardroom model and the female-centric multi-level marketing industry, bebo mia offers opportunities for women to work from home while making an income for themselves and their families. They develop inclusive, accessible trainings for women that provide the skills needed to grow and sustain a lucrative business. bebo mia remains fiercely committed to their original mission that was developed in 2008: Connect women to their intrinsic value and power.
*Bianca defines women as women-identified, femme-presenting, two-spirited, genderqueer, trans-inclusive, gender-non-conforming, androgynous, agender, intersex, bigender, gender questioning, gender fluid, butch, non-binary, queer positive or any person that would like to be included in this definition.
Rivera Sun is the author of The Dandelion Insurrection, its sequel The Roots of Resistance, as well as an accompanying study guide to nonviolent change. She trains people nationwide in strategy for nonviolent movements and has co-hosted a weekly radio program on social justice movements since 2011. Her essays have appeared in over 100 publications across the United States. She is a frequent speaker and presenter at universities and colleges on strategic nonviolence and social justice.
Dr. Elizabeth (Dori) Tunstall is a design anthropologist, public intellectual, and design advocate who works at the intersections of critical theory, culture, and design. As Dean of Design at Ontario College of Arts and Design University, she is the first black and black female dean of a faculty of design. She leads the Cultures-Based Innovation Initiative focused on using old ways of knowing to drive innovation processes that directly benefit communities.
With a global career, Dori served as Associate Professor of Design Anthropology and Associate Dean at Swinburne University in Australia. She wrote the biweekly column Un-Design for The Conversation Australia. In the U.S., she taught at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She organized the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative and served as director of Design for Democracy. Industry positions included UX strategist for Sapient Corporation and Arc Worldwide. Dori holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Stanford University and a BA in Anthropology from Bryn Mawr College.
Nancy Wilson is the co-founder and CEO of the Canadian Women’s Chamber of Commerce (CanWCC). CanWCC is a national, not-for-profit organization that advocates for the economic priorities of women-owned businesses. As CEO, Nancy is responsible for achieving CanWCC’s strategic goals with respect to education, services, and advocacy for women-owned businesses in Canada. Nancy is also a Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA, CGA) with over a decade of accounting experience in various corporate
roles.
Theresa Yuan is the host of the weekly podcast, en(gender)ed, which explores the systems, practices, and policies that enable gender-based violence and oppression and the solutions to end it and uses gender as a lens to better understand power and oppression and its impact in the private realm, so as to better recognize and confront it in the public sphere. Teri's journey as an intersectional feminist began in college, where she studied feminist film criticism, post-colonial pedagogy, and cultural criticism. Along the way, she has added to her identity: survivor and survivor advocate. She believes that by developing a cultural literacy around power and abuse of power, we can reclaim how we define liberty in relationships and in civic life and solve many of our most urgent social (justice) challenges.
Christina Zeidler is a filmmaker, artist, and "Lead Alchemist" of The Gladstone Hotel. Wearing the dual hats of developer and entrepreneur, Christina set out in 2003 to renovate and revitalize the historic Victorian building using a community based approach. Her approach to management is distinctly feminist as The Gladstone Hotel upholds a strong anti-oppression framework through its operations. She is the creator of the Gladstone Hotel’s “Artist Designed Room Project” using local artist/designers to implement individually resigned hotel rooms, even creating a room herself entitled “snapshot”. With 37 unique artist designed hotel rooms, a multi-use second floor, a restaurant and two bars, The Gladstone Hotel is more than just a hotel, it is a hub for the arts which fosters the local community while providing instant access to the arts scene for those traveling to Toronto. In her spare time Christina engages in as much community activism as possible.
EFF'S "MADAMES" OF CEREMONY
Dr. Golnaz Golnaraghi, Founder of Divity Group Inc., is a consultant and intersectional feminist management scholar with more than 12 years of leadership and team development experience. She is an accomplished educator, senior facilitator, researcher and author. Prior to starting her own company and entering academia, Golnaz held marketing management roles for 15 years in consulting and professional services firms. Through her passion for innovation in teaching and learning, she led the successful design and delivery of a portfolio learning model for five new Bachelor of Business Administration programs for an Ontario-based college. Golnaz was also co-recipient of a significant research grant through the Ministry of Advanced Education and Skills Development for her work in experiential learning in higher education leadership courses at the same institution.
Golnaz holds a Masters of Business Administration degree from the University of British Columbia. She earned her Doctor of Business Administration from Athabasca University where she studied critical theoretical perspectives, feminism and postcolonial theory. She has presented her work at international conferences including the Academy of Management, CMS and given a TEDx Talk titled From Silence to Voice: Embracing My Hybrid Identity. Golnaz has published her work in books and peer review journals including the International Journal of Cross-Cultural Management, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, and The Oxford Handbook of Diversity in Organizations.
Petra Kassun-Mutch is a serial social purpose entrepreneur, start up and business growth incubator management consultant, and publisher, deeply committed to creating a more inclusive, just, human-centered and generative economy through the power of feminist business practice, pedagogy, theory, innovation and entrepreneurship. Her enterprise, Eve-volution Inc (2014), a B Corp certified, lean, networked feminist enterprise advocates for and designs programs that promote equity and inclusion in startup and community-based economic development ecosystems. Her magazine, LiisBeth serves as a convener, capacity-builder and voice for the growing, 10 000+ all gender, entrepreneurial feminist community. Mutch current serves as the Executive Director of Food Starter, a food processing entrepreneur incubator and accelerator program with a 20 000 sq ft processing facility in in Toronto.
Mutch is a certified Feminist Business Model Canvas Master Coach and holds an EMBA from the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management. She is a co-founding, co-producer of the Entrepreneurial Feminist Forum—an educational, collaboration and resilience-crafting conference for entrepreneurial feminists of all genders. Her work was recently recognized in the Canada 150 Women: Conversations with Leaders, Champions and Luminaries book which was published November 2017. Mutch was recognized as one of Canada’s Inspiring 50 women in April 2018.
Lex Schroeder is a writer/editor, business strategist in the systems thinking community, and Co-Founder of Feminists at Work. As Co-Founder of Feminists at Work, Lex brings a feminist lens to transforming businesses, organizations, and systems. Her focus these days is creating new knowledge at the intersection of gender justice and the future of work. Lex has led strategic initiatives at The Berkana Institute, The Lean Enterprise Institute, and Take The Lead, a U.S. nonprofit dedicated to gender parity in leadership across all sectors by 2025.
Lex has presented workshops or spoken on collective leadership at NYU, Yale, See Jane Do, and the Harvard School of Public Health, among other places. Her views on leadership have been featured in ELLE France, strategy+business, Fast Company, and Boston.com. Lex is trained in the Art of Hosting, a set of participatory leadership methods that allows for emergence and responsive design. She lives in Harlem and tries to get to the Maine coast as often as she can. Her favorite dance troupes are Ballez and STREB Action Lab.