Calgary's tech ecosystem is creating opportunities and developing skills for the next generation to stay in Calgary.
Several industry leaders spoke to us about their personal motivations to make Calgary a place where emerging professionals and future generations feel they can find opportunities and build careers. The local tech and innovation ecosystem is making this happen.
Support systems like Platform programming, university entrepreneurship centres, credentialing programs, and internships help emerging talent build careers in Calgary. These communities create an environment where aspiring entrepreneurs, recent graduates, and new Canadians can find opportunities in Calgary instead of moving elsewhere.
Talent development programs help Calgarians cultivate entrepreneurial mindsets, grow from failures, and learn marketable skills. Further, the presence of these programs, support, and career opportunities also attracts advanced talent to Calgary from around Canada and the world.
Below we have testimonials from people across the tech sector as well as from leaders of university educational hubs like Mount Royal University’s Launchpad program and the Hunter Hub for Innovation at the University of Calgary.
“My motivation has always been…I’ve got a couple of grandsons, and I'd like them to feel like if they wanted to stay here that they could they could build a career in whatever industry appealed to them”
– Derrick Hunter, Bluesky Equities
“Entrepreneurship inside a university is talent development, not startup development. We have to celebrate when it fails, as it not inevitably, but usually does. Let's celebrate what was learned, not the fact that it didn't work.”
– Ray DePaul, Mount Royal University Launchpad