56.3K
Downloads
300
Episodes
Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas - the Rainforest podcast showcases those who are contributing to and / or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta. Rainforest Alberta is a world-class community of dreamers and doers, connected by a common goal of making Alberta fertile ground for building, developing, and growing innovative ideas into sustainable ventures. https://rainforestab.ca
Episodes
Tuesday May 24, 2022
Tuesday May 24, 2022
What challenges are you currently facing in your business? Do you have a reluctance to engage with legal workflows and processes? This week Jen digs in with Shane Fast, Co-Founder and Director of Cloud Security at Athennian. Athennian takes the out of control and complex to automated, efficient, and smooth. With cloud-based entity management, Athennian frees legal teams from manual processes, allowing organizations to scale their entities without scaling their overhead. Learn more about Shane's background in tech, how Athennian came to be, and what's next for this company with big impact.
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-171-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Jennifer Morrison is InceptionU’s learner champion. She has over 11 years of experience as an educator and received her Masters of Educational Leadership from High Tech High Graduate School of Education in San Diego, CA. Jen possesses extensive experience in project-based and experiential learning and design thinking.
Jen spent many years teaching middle and high school students which provided her with a foundational love of learning and passion for exploration and personal growth. Following her natural curiosity and growth mindset, she honed her leadership skills and dove deep into project based learning during her time at High Tech High.
As the Learning Catalyst and Lead Program Designer with InceptionU, Jen provides valued leadership, guidance, meaningful connections and an engaging learning environment. She is deeply dedicated to each of the learners and their success. As Simon Sinek says in The Infinite Game, “what good is it having a belly if there's no fire in it? Wake up, drink your passion, light a match and get to work.”
Guest: Shane Fast likes building things and helping people. Working in tech since 2016 has given him the chance to do lots of both. So far, Shane's career has been very rewarding, because of that he wants to keep going and pay it forward. Shane hopes to see the tech ecosystem in Calgary continue to grow and thrive.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
Show Links:
Show Quotes:
"We [Athennian] serve to give superpowers to paralegals and legal teams across North America."
"We landed on a few key things that have been built into our values and hiring process. The three big things are diligent builder, focused creatives, and ambitious learners. There are built in contradictions which is intentional to ensure that we are conscious about growing our team with a balance of skills, energies, and mindsets."
"I tell people about the original sins in our codebase all the time. While we have solved a lot of them, dealing with technical debt is always a bit unfortunate and at the same time, they provide great growth opportunities for our team."
"The software industry keeps you humble. You have to be adaptable and flexible, especially as an entrepreneur."
"The 7262 Conference was inspired by a production outage last year. We gathered as a team, all the engineers on one call, and the only error we had was error 7262. While it's an inside joke and we were all humbled by the experience, it is representative of our team coming together and collaborating to figure things out. In this spirit is why we have named and created the Athennian 7262 Conference."
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: New Idea Machine
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan
Tuesday May 17, 2022
Tuesday May 17, 2022
Combining her experience in the beauty industry with her background in science, a student of the Platform Catalyzer program, Rana Hyatt set out to solve a problem that has been a significant and expensive issue worldwide.
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-170-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Al Del Degan I have been involved in software development for more than 25 years. I have started companies, lead companies and worked for companies - doing many different things. I am honored to be considered a leader in Alberta's innovation ecosystem, and I give back as much, and often as I can. When I am not working or podcasting, you will find me pursuing my passions of photography, crypto investing, and wood working along with the occasional round of golf.
Guest: Rana Hyatt. Having spent decades in the beauty industry combined with her science background, Rana see’s first-hand the necessity and potential of technological innovation in the industry.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
Show Links:
Show Quotes:
"You're like, oh, I need to clean these. And then you put your makeup on. And then you put your brushes away and your makeup away. And then the next day, when you come back to put on your makeup, you're like, oh yeah, I forgot. I need to clean these. And then the cycle just repeats. It's this awful cycle."
"I was ambitious and be like, we're going to be ready in six months. And they're like, you're not going to be ready at all."
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: New Idea Machine
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan
Tuesday May 10, 2022
Tuesday May 10, 2022
It is common to talk about entrepreneurship and starting a business, or taking a business to the next level. In this episode, Peter and Brad talk about when people want to exit their businesses and the enormous considerations that follow.
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-169-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Peter Beaudoin Peter manages strategy and partnerships for an innovative alliance of energy companies committed to reducing environmental impacts through collaborative R&D efforts. Peter worked for more than 20 years in Asia building and investing in a variety of businesses. His most recent role outside of Canada was with the World Wildlife Fund, where he was the Chief Executive Officer of WWF China, based in Beijing. Prior to that, Peter lived in Hong Kong for 15 years working in the technology industry.
Guest: Brad Gaulin, P.Eng., MBA, is a serial entrepreneur & business growth coach that has been growing organizations for over 13 years as a consultant, & for over 40 years as a professional, executive & entrepreneur. Brad empowers businesses to consciously know, grow & sell by combining a proven agile corporate transformation process with an ESG conscious business philosophy. Clients can leverage his extensive experience in strategy, innovation, growth marketing, organizational design, operational excellence, team building, leadership & cultural transformation. He honed these skills in the upstream energy sector, engineering, construction, pipelining, industrial products/services, IOT automation, information & web technology.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
Show Links:
Show Quotes:
"What do you want your legacy to be? How much money financially do you need to support what lifestyle? So you need to define what's the legacy for your family? What's the legacy for your employees and your customers and the community? How do you want to be seen? So you need to get clear on what you want that to look like."
"What makes us truly feel fulfilled? And it's autonomy, mastery and purpose and, you know, you've got control of your retirement, but when you don't have a purpose, you don't feel like you make a difference in the world. And I'm sorry, but golfing everyday does not make a difference in the world. Then people start to get depressed and they start to look back and then they start to wonder if it was the right decision."
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: New Idea Machine
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan
Tuesday May 03, 2022
Tuesday May 03, 2022
James is a founder of Skip the Depot - An app that coordinates the pick up of your "empties", takes them to the bottle depot and automates the deposit of your return or sends it to a charity of your choice. James runs a software development business so his tech team applies true agile development to spin out features based on customer feedback.
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-168-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Lindsay Skabar is the co-founder and Chief Marketing Officer at Bōde, Canada’s first online real estate marketplace. Giving customers choice and access are central to her personal and business philosophy. Before her career in tech and real estate, Lindsay served on the Global Business Development team at Axia, which brought high performing, low-cost fibre optic internet to rural Alberta and globally to the USA, France and Singapore. She participates in humanitarian work around the world and in her hometown of Calgary. She continues to be committed to non-profit work in the form of board engagements. Former Chair of Aids Calgary and Chair of the Branch Out Neurological Foundation for many years. Lindsay now sits on the Mount Royal University Foundation Board. She studied business and marketing at Bishop’s University. Lindsay is focused on scaling Bōde across Canada, and eventually, internationally.
Guest: James Trask is a business and technology professional focused on disrupting industries and delighting customers.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
If you enjoyed this podcast, please consider giving a listen to the Shift Podcast by Alberta Innovates
Show Links:
Show Quotes:
"I drove the truck around picking up containers and listened to customers so I could bring this information back to the developers and we could create new features... we were deploying new features every couple of days."
"We never let any of the issues that we saw linger for a long period of time, because we were constantly innovating. We were constantly changing things. Um, the fact that we were making decisions and if they were wrong, we just cut them off and we switched and went to another way."
"A large part of resources that we're hiring are fresh graduates out of school. And part of the reason that we like to do that is because you end up recruiting folks who are happy and eager to learn, get some work experience in the workplace, and don't have any necessarily preconceived notions of how things are done."
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: New Idea Machine
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan
Tuesday Apr 26, 2022
Tuesday Apr 26, 2022
Tony Grimes has a chat with Tait Hoyem talking about being a programmer in the Accessibility space.
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-167-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Tony Grimes is a contract programming instructor for SAIT and InceptionU. He is the founder and organizer of the Pixels and Pints Meetup group. Tony is a lover of space, pinball and making things.
Guest: Tait Hoyem is an open-source software developer specializing in accessibility.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
If you enjoyed this podcast, please consider giving a listen to the Shift Podcast by Alberta Innovates
Show Links:
Show Quotes:
"when I was, you know, 10 or 11, I was always on the computer. Whenever there was a problem, my parents were like, oh, Tait can fix it. But actual software development, and in addition to that, Linux and that ecosystem, that specifically came out of Minecraft."
"It was totally a cross section of passions, which is what I keep looking for today is something that's not just great engineering, but something that's great engineering, and something that helps me out."
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: New Idea Machine
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan
Tuesday Apr 19, 2022
Tuesday Apr 19, 2022
Laura Kilcrease, CEO of Alberta Innovates discusses Inventures, Alberta's largest innovation conference. The event brings together investors, entrepreneurs and global thought leaders who are redefining the future.
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-165-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Peter Beaudoin Peter manages strategy and partnerships for an innovative alliance of energy companies committed to reducing environmental impacts through collaborative R&D efforts. Peter worked for more than 20 years in Asia building and investing in a variety of businesses. His most recent role outside of Canada was with the World Wildlife Fund, where he was the Chief Executive Officer of WWF China, based in Beijing. Prior to that, Peter lived in Hong Kong for 15 years working in the technology industry.
Guest: Laura Kilcrease is the Chief Executive Officer for Alberta Innovates, including its subsidiaries InnoTech Alberta and C-FER Technologies.
Recruited from Austin, Texas, Laura is the founder and former-managing director of the venture capital fund Triton Ventures, LP. She is widely recognized as one of the key figures in changing Austin’s economic landscape from one struggling with the economic ups and downs that come with oil dependence to a high-tech environment that is today recognized as one of the #1 Entrepreneur City and best place to live and work in the U.S.
She is the founder of the Austin Technology Incubator (ATI), one of the United States’ first technology business incubators, and co-founder of the Austin Technology Council, a premier networking organization that cultivated the growth of the Austin economy. Laura also launched Capital Network, one of the largest angel investor networks in the U.S. with over $150 million in completed transactions.
Laura has more than 25 years of hands-on experience in commercializing technology, and a deep understanding of how to identify and build new business opportunities. Prior to accepting the role as Alberta Innovates’ CEO, Laura was a seven-year member of the Alberta Research and Innovation Advisory Committee, which guided the former Alberta Innovates’ corporations.
In Austin, she gave her time and expertise to a number of non-profit boards, including the Women’s Leadership Advisory Board of Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, the Beyster Institute, World Congress for Information Technology 2006, and the IC² Institute at The University of Texas at Austin, among many others.
Laura has often been recognized for her outstanding achievements. She has received numerous honors and awards, including the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award, the Austin Business Journal’s Profiles in Power Award, and the University of Texas McCombs School of Business Women in Business Leadership Conference Trailblazer Award.
Born in London, Laura received her certification as a Chartered Management Accountant in the U.K. and a Masters in Business Administration from the University of Texas.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
If you enjoyed this podcast, please consider giving a listen to the Shift Podcast by Alberta Innovates
Show Links:
Show Quotes:
"the last real live Inventures in 2019, within six months, there was $116 million of transactions done. And within the first year, even under COVID, it was approximately $246 million of deals done."
"I'm also hoping that everyone can come out and reconnect with their old friends, but also meet their new partners. Because this is a time where we need to come together, post COVID, and really kick butt with the rest of the world."
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: New Idea Machine
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan
Tuesday Apr 12, 2022
Tuesday Apr 12, 2022
Can you harness human energy? Join Chris and Val as they discuss the world of vision, people, data, traction, and collective work helping community first.
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-165-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Val McCarty is in the business of helping organizations visualize, communicate, and execute strategy in real time. Her studies were acquired at both University of Alberta and Grant MacEwan University, and encompassed Management, Education, and Human Services, with an aim to continue learning. Her previous experience includes the Financial Sector, Fitness Sector, and Early Childhood Education. When Val is not at work you can find her outside with her grandkids, or looking forward to the next live jam.
Guest: Chris McPhee graduated from the U of Saskatchewan with degrees in Comp Sci and Engineering and moved to Calgary for work. After working in software development for several years, he became an independent project management consultant before moving to a small start-up company to run the day-to-day operations. After growing that company for 8 years, it was successfully sold and then Chris moved to the acquiring company to work in the M&A group. Prior to his company being acquired, Chris implemented the system described in the book Traction and loved it so much that he has now decided to devote his time to helping other entrepreneurial companies implement the system to accelerate healthy growth in their companies.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
If you enjoyed this podcast, please consider giving a listen to the Shift Podcast by Alberta Innovates
Show Quotes:
"what grounds me to the Rainforest community, I just feel like there's a, there's an opportunity for, a rising tide to lift all boats."
"our leadership team, as we got to a certain size, we were really challenged with kind of being on the same page."
Links:
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: New Idea Machine
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan
Tuesday Apr 05, 2022
Tuesday Apr 05, 2022
Join Peter Beaudoin as he discusses with Mike Bignold, Founder and CEO of CostCertified, the opportunity to radically transform the construction process for homeowners, contractors and suppliers.
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-164-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Peter Beaudoin Peter manages strategy and partnerships for an innovative alliance of energy companies committed to reducing environmental impacts through collaborative R&D efforts. Peter worked for more than 20 years in Asia building and investing in a variety of businesses. His most recent role outside of Canada was with the World Wildlife Fund, where he was the Chief Executive Officer of WWF China, based in Beijing. Prior to that, Peter lived in Hong Kong for 15 years working in the technology industry.
Guest: Mike Bignold is the founder and CEO of CostCertified, a Y Combinator and venture-backed saas-enabled marketplace for residential construction, based in Calgary. Originally from Canmore and with a business degree from UBC, Mike later ran a contracting company and built CostCertified to manage his own business when he couldn’t find a tool that helped him provide a better customer experience. Mike has a rare overlap of experience with coding, construction and business which was crucial in building the core of CostCertified that is used by hundreds of contractors every day. CostCertified generates its contractors over $90m of annualized revenue, and its 65 team members are driven by a vision of radically transforming the construction process for homeowners, contractors and suppliers.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
If you enjoyed this podcast, please consider giving a listen to the Shift Podcast by Alberta Innovates
Show Quotes:
"One of the happy accidents of building this configurable tool with all this data, front loaded is that we're able to de-risk the construction workflow."
"Well, it never gets easier. So every month it's never like, you've reached the stage where you can sit back, it's the next problem? And things are, you know, the office is bursting at the seams and it's like a game of whack-a-mole."
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: New Idea Machine
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan
Tuesday Mar 29, 2022
Tuesday Mar 29, 2022
Shaping the future requires us to "shake things up." Christa Hill and Renee Matsalla are two authentic, badass, superstar ladies doing just that in the innovation ecosystem in Alberta. All too often products are built just because someone asked for it, not necessarily because it was needed. According to Christa and Renee, product management IS the future and brings the customer, the business, and the empowered team together to achieve meaningful, purposeful business goals with impact. This work matters! Curious to learn more? Join Jen as she has a fun and enlightening conversation with Christa and Renee about all things product management!
P.S. - Christa and Renee, it's time to get the band back together!
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-163-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Jennifer Morrison is InceptionU’s learner champion. She has over 11 years of experience as an educator and received her Masters of Educational Leadership from High Tech High Graduate School of Education in San Diego, CA. Jen possesses extensive experience in project-based and experiential learning and design thinking.
Jen spent many years teaching middle and high school students which provided her with a foundational love of learning and passion for exploration and personal growth. Following her natural curiosity and growth mindset, she honed her leadership skills and dove deep into project based learning during her time at High Tech High.
As the Learning Catalyst and Lead Program Designer with InceptionU, Jen provides valued leadership, guidance, meaningful connections and an engaging learning environment. She is deeply dedicated to each of the learners and their success. As Simon Sinek says in The Infinite Game, “what good is it having a belly if there's no fire in it? Wake up, drink your passion, light a match and get to work.”
Guests:
Renee Matsalla is a Co-founder at Tacit Edge Product Leadership where she helps people reach their potential as product leaders. Before this, she was a product leader at Benevity, where she specialized in visioning and launching Benevity’s most innovative products. Renee’s product leadership was instrumental in Benevity’s unicorn $1.1B valuation. Renee has also worked in Berlin and San Francisco where she led the launches of mobile monetization products used by Facebook, Google, and the world’s largest mobile game developers. She now coaches Product Managers to become product leaders in the growing Alberta tech ecosystem.
Christa Hill is a Co-founder of Tacit Edge Product Leadership where she uses her industry expertise to fuel our economy with empowered, innovative, and diverse product leaders that embody the entrepreneurial spirit. She also serves as Vice President of Product YYC where she is at the forefront of creating Product Management curriculum for SAIT and other educational and corporate institutions such as the New York Federal Reserve Bank. To find out more visit TacitEdge.ca.
Christa started her career in the early days of online banking and money transfer services, while also working in various compliance roles in the financial services industry. She then took on a passion project in the not-for-profit sector to revitalize a local community recreation center. Upon her return to tech, she discovered a path from Product Ownership at Getty Images to Product Management at Benevity. At Benevity, now a $1.1B unicorn tech company, her work was instrumental in scaling the platform to onboard and vet over 2 million global not-for-profits and disburse over $2 billion in funds, while elevating the grants application process in collaboration with Microsoft USA. She then led the vision of Benevity’s content API, which is designed to become the engine of Benevity's end-user experience.
Christa returned to FinTech with Morgan Stanley At Work as Vice President, Global Private Markets Product Management. Christa was instrumental in moving money around the globe through purpose-built services that facilitate liquidity events within employee stock plans for private fortune 500 companies and start-ups. Additionally, she used her extensive API experience to create the first-ever public-facing API that scales the administration of a corporation’s lifecycle from private ownership to IPO. This ground-breaking work secured Morgan Stanley’s position as the premier product for Private Markets liquidity activities. Together with her technology partners, they rose from millions to billions of dollars in activity within 12 months.
Now, Christa is most known for coaching early and established Product Managers, helping them deepen their expertise and helping them thrive in their careers. She brings empathy and humor along while tackling the grey areas of the role, with the goal of creating future product leaders for our increasingly digital world.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
Show Quotes:
"Perfection is not possible and once I truly accepted that, my whole life completely changed. I just said, I don't care...I'm going to try things."
"I need autonomy, I need to be myself, I need to practice product there way I believe it should be practiced, and also, it's going to be contagious. Don't hire me if you don't want that. This mindset changed everything for me and the last two years have allowed me to experiment in ways that I never thought were possible to create the life for myself and my daughter that I've always wanted."
"The exclusivity of the product manager role is not going to serve us in the next phase of our ecosystem growth. We have to let it go. What are we going to do to get people into this field so we can all thrive?"
"With the growing demand, we can't afford to not democratize access to education and funding to open up this field to people who are interested and provide them access to the network of people who can help get them these jobs."
"Awareness breeds interest. If we can meet that interest with education, how can we accelerate the competency of product management with where we are? The potential is endless."
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: New Idea Machine
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan
Tuesday Mar 22, 2022
Tuesday Mar 22, 2022
Join Peter Beaudoin as he discusses with Ken Scheck and Joel Magalnick about their recently launched event platform BLive Music that enables musicians to host virtual shows.
For the transcription of this episode please visit: https://www.rainforestab.ca/yyc-blog/podcast-episode-162-transcription
Thank you for listening to the Leaders, Innovators and Big Ideas podcast, supported by Rainforest Alberta. The podcast that highlights those people who are contributing to and/or supporting the innovation ecosystem in Alberta.
Host: Peter Beaudoin Peter manages strategy and partnerships for an innovative alliance of energy companies committed to reducing environmental impacts through collaborative R&D efforts. Peter worked for more than 20 years in Asia building and investing in a variety of businesses. His most recent role outside of Canada was with the World Wildlife Fund, where he was the Chief Executive Officer of WWF China, based in Beijing. Prior to that, Peter lived in Hong Kong for 15 years working in the technology industry.
Guests: Ken Scheck is the Founder of BLive Music. Inspired by his long-time passion for live music and his experience helping grow a local industrial business from $3M to over $300M in annual revenue, Ken set out on a journey to bring this passion into the everyday lives of as many people as possible. In doing so, BLive supplies a network of hosts that create opportunities for performers while giving fans a new way to connect and build relationships with the artists they love. Where does live music go between concerts? The BLive app—that’s where!
Joel Magalnick’s innate curiosity allows him to ask critical questions and view a challenge from multiple angles. Joel has brought this experience to BLive Music, where he serves as product and marketing lead to bring the joy of live music to audiences, wherever they may be. Live music has certainly brought him joy over the course of his own life — it’s a well-kept secret that he sometimes sings louder than the actual performer.
Joel’s experience includes more than a decade as editor and publisher of a newspaper, and in addition to his work with BLive is a podcast producer and strategic communications advisor. He’s also a professor of user experience design at MacEwan University and sits on the steering committee of Rainforest Edmonton.
Please be sure to share this episode with everyone you know. If you are interested in being either a host, a guest, or a sponsor of the show, please reach out. We are published in Google Podcasts and the iTunes store for Apple Podcasts We would be grateful if you could give us a rating as it helps spread the word about the show.
Show Quotes:
"So rather than being too picky and too focused on trying to find the performers that you like. We put some trust in a host, just like with a podcast. We might not know all of the guests that are gonna come onto this Rainforest Podcast here, but we know that Peter, Al, you're gonna put together good content. So I'm going to put my trust in you."
"I see fans being able to. Turn the app on anytime and find something that is interesting to them and it's live music it's happening right now. And it's within some form of community that they wanna be involved in through the host, through their location or through the performer that they want to hear."
Credits...
This Episode Sponsored By: Assembly Coworking Space
Episode Music: Tony Del Degan
Creator & Producer: Al Del Degan