WHO? Staying Humble. Hustling Hard.
If I could share one phrase that best describes me it would be “Staying Humble. Hustling Hard.” It’s simple really, everything I do, I do so with the confidence that I truly am the best person to do the job. However, no matter what you do, you do with others and this is where being humble is key.
I am working as a consultant, all the while ensuring that my personal passions are alight and well-fueled. What does that even mean? Well, I took the initiative to position myself as an HR Transformation Subject Matter Expert, and decided to learn how to code along the way. That’s right, I decided to challenge myself to LEARN a new skill! That’s what I meant by ensuring my personal passions are alight and well-fueled. If there is an opportunity to learn something new, I take it. If there is an opportunity to teach someone else a skill I happen to possess, I do it.
I enjoy working with people and partaking in conversations where I am able to learn something new, whether that is learning a new fun fact to learning about a quirk one of my colleagues has. I feel fortunate when I’m surrounded by smart people in all walks of life.
WHY? Race cars and pit stops.
Going back to school in order to complete my Masters degree has been a humbling experience. One of my best friends described it as the following: “School by definition sets you back on calendar time but not at all in where we end up. Race cars fall behind when they’re in the pit but they’re just fueling up.” The reality is going back to school set me back financially but forced me to develop myself rapidly. I set ambitious goals and set out to achieve them, in an effort to continue to hustle hard as I always have throughout my career. I went from gaining my undergrad degree from the Schulich School of Business to going and pursuing a Masters of Design at OCAD University. The transition was intentional and I gained so much along the way.
WHAT? Hult Prize 2018: Moving beyond Me and considering the WE
After pitching a scalable, sustainable and human-centric design solution to address the challenge of harnessing the power of energy to transform the lives of 10 million people by 2025, my team (Lucy Gao & Juan-Carlos Sandoval) and I won our campus pitch and moved forward to Regionals held in Toronto, Ontario. The final competition is hosted at the UN Headquarters, where the winning team is awarded 1 Million USD in seed capital plus mentorship.
Exhibit A: This was the first picture we took together (we thought we were being clever with the Canadian flag pulled up on our phones)
This opportunity was so much better with a strong team and together we supported one another through the highs and lows of such an intense competition.
Exhibit B: This is when we were debriefed for the first time about what to expect. Can you see the nerves sinking in?!
Exhibit C: This is us waiting outside the doors before we pitched our business idea.
Exhibit D: I'm totally in the zone, pitching and believing that what we came to share has merit and value for the people whose lives we hope to improve.
I never realized how powerful my background was when it came to pursuing this sort of degree. There is something very strategic about merging the disciplines of business and design along with technology. Understanding how the three disciplines of design, technology and business are being leveraged to solve some of the greatest problems facing the world right now was an eye-opening experience and one that I wished to play in more so in the future. This programs allowed me to see that overlap in a compelling manner and
WHEN? The year is 2075.
I have always loved stories, reading and writing them. Imagining characters and landscapes and the lives my characters lead. Wondering what their worries were and what made them laugh. Who were they laughing with and whether they would be my friend. Naturally, when I started my foresight class and had to think about the future in the context of signals and trends today and be bold enough to imagine a future scenario that would exist in 20-25 years, I had an opportunity to do so while focusing on the serious future implications of “Food Waste”.