University of Waterloo students gathered for getCONNECTED17, a digital marketing and new business conference created by third-year global business and digital arts (GBDA) student and Communitech campus ambassador Tiana Eghdam.
The networking and workshop conference took place at Communitech March 24.
Eghdam created getCONNECTED17 after attending many conferences because she felt her degree fell short on the digital business side. Edhgam wanted to take everything she learned from all the conferences she went to and create one of her own.
“I got the opportunity to go to many conferences, and I just learned so much and I got to meet so many people, and that kickstarted my career in such a big way,” Eghdam said. “I wanted to take everything I loved from all the events I’ve gone to, and the things that I didn’t like. I wanted to create something myself and see what it’s like, now that I’ve been to so many.”
With her position at Communitech, Eghdam was given the opportunity to start her own student-centric event.
“I had to find a way to bring the experience and opportunities I found with all these people and resources to students in a way that’s accessible and isn’t intimidating for [students] to get started,” Edgham said.
The event hosted speakers from various backgrounds who spoke about their work and gave advice to students on marketing and business in the digital age.
Speakers included Code/Design to Win first place winner and GBDA student Filip Jadczak, who gave a workshop on customer journey mapping; Vanessa Faloye, the online editor for whatamission.com, who talked about “millennial guts” and tips she learned as a young entrepreneur; and Quarry social media specialist Naheed Somji who spoke on the keys to marketing on social media.
“The objective I want [to achieve] from this is helping students be aware of what jobs are available after school,” Eghdam said. “I wanted to bring the awareness that [digital marketing] jobs exist and I wanted to help build those skills though Q-and-As, workshops, and lectures.”
Eghdam hopes to turn getCONNECTED17 into an online platform “where students and different people who are looking to get advice with their careers can connect with professionals all across the world,” instead of just leaving that valuable information at the event.
