QT Blog

Jarret Leaman (he/him) has dedicated a lot of time and effort to find not only professional success but also happiness for himself and his community. He’s worked hard to attain a Bachelor of Business Administration with a minor in Indigenous Studies from Trent University, a Master’s degree in Industrial Relations through the School of Policy Studies at Queen’s University, and he’s also won awards for his work with the 2SLGBTQ+ Indigenous community.

He received The Sovereign’s Medal for Volunteers from the Governor-General, on behalf of Queen Elizabeth II, and he was named one of Huffington Post’s Top 3 Indigenous Millenials in Canada. These impressive accomplishments didn’t come easy to Jarret though – like all of us, he had a unique journey to proudly claim his identity.

“We're always looking to build our community and safe places for people who are like us,” says Justin Finnegan, the leader in charge of Wealthsimple’s 2SLGBTQ+ Employee Resource Group (ERG), known as Rainbow. Finnegan and his team are devoted to helping the employees of Wealthsimple “find their people” – something crucial to easing the stress of coming into a new workplace. Rainbow’s efforts have grown considerably over the past few years; proof of how important the group has become.

Back in 2018, when Rainbow was founded, it consisted mostly of allies. At first, it was hard for the group to find a purpose, which resulted in an unfortunate lack of community. After Wealthsimple employees shifted to mostly remote work due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Rainbow took on a new level of purpose and began to really take off with the help of communication tools like Slack.

Taylor Bond is an entrepreneur, queer leader, and community organizer who wants to make sure more people in our community are able to achieve success within the tech industry. After studying political science at the University of Toronto, he worked in sales for a number of different tech companies, created his own tech startup, and was able to negotiate his company’s acquisition by a larger firm. Outside of his professional life, Taylor’s identity and confidence were really formed during his time as a young competitive swimmer and queer community organizer. 

Although it’s indisputable that Taylor has been successful in his endeavours in tech, he maintains a level of humility about it all. He has worked hard to achieve his goals, but he also acknowledges that he was afforded a number of privileges that helped him along the way. The ability to work day and night, where others might have families or other obligations that take up their free time, is one such privilege he recognizes in his life. He says that his luck goes back even further than that, to his childhood as a "third-culture" kid – someone who spends their formative years in places that are not their parents’ homeland.

Laura B. MacDonald is currently the Director of Finance & Accounting at Local Logic, living what she says is a life she never imagined for herself, but for which she is deeply grateful. 

After pursuing an education in the arts, including a Masters of Art History from the University of British Columbia, Laura embarked on a mission to become an “art star”. In pursuit of her dream, Laura worked various full and part-time contract jobs to fund her personal performance art practice. Her income was often erratic and unreliable for many years. Eventually, this life started to wear Laura down, and she realized she needed to make a change in order to provide herself with a better life.

Looking For Change

Laura set the intention of starting over from scratch. She went through a systematic decision-making process she says was immensely helpful for making such a tough choice. She made two lists, one described everything she wanted in a job and the other was an inventory of all of her skills and strengths. 

Having struggled with job insecurity as an artist and activist, Laura knew that she wanted to never face unemployment again, so her first list included things like “part of a professional order” and “something every organization needs”. The list of things she was good at included being organized, negotiating, and managing money. With these lists in mind, Laura spent time researching online, and finally decided on a new life as an accountant.  

It wasn’t easy for Laura to get back into the learning groove. She didn’t have many resources to rely on when she enrolled in the undergraduate commerce program at Concordia but what she did have was lots of hard-learned punk wisdom. Translation? She knew how to make something out of almost nothing. 

Starting Over

Laura used the Lifelong Learning Plan (LLP) to borrow interest-free from some small RRSPs she had saved, waited tables part-time at a worker’s coop restaurant and then applied for a small amount of student loans to make up the gap. But within 6 months she was able to impress one of her professors with stories of her experience teaching in anarchist free-schools, landing herself a position as a teaching assistant. 

Meanwhile Laura feverishly researched and applied for scholarships, more than thirty within her first year. This process of hunting for scholarships is usually overlooked by students but Laura’s experience shows that it is worth the effort. Laura received a $20,000 scholarship, later discovering that she was one of only ten applicants, and that some scholarships aren’t even handed out in certain years because nobody applies for them at all.

Near the end of her undergrad, Laura was offered a job with the Montreal office  of PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), one of the most prestigious public accounting firms in the world. It was a huge opportunity – only 50 candidates were chosen out of more than 1000 applicants that year. The competition amongst her classmates had been fierce and the opportunity was so prized that Laura was willing to try to fit in with the generally conservative culture of being an auditor at a “Big Four” firm. 

Charli Deville is Montreal’s Premier Deadbeat Daddy, a world class performer and pioneer in the drag king scene, but by day they’re a front end web developer. In November, they were gracious enough to sit down with us and talk about how they balance these two roles, and how one even provides them with the confidence to succeed in the other.

Growing up in Manitoba at a time before our vocabulary included the language we currently use to describe the trans and nonbinary experience, Charli settled with the identity of “tomboy.” It wasn’t until after they moved to Montreal that they began to feel comfortable redefining who they were personally, which ended up helping them professionally as well.

A new life in a new community

After receiving a degree in communications from the University of Winnipeg, Charli came to Montreal to work as a graphic designer but they found that the work wasn’t as stable as they would have liked. They also realized that there was one skill that seemed to make an employee indispensable–coding. Charli was quick to act on this realization and enrolled for a three month long coding bootcamp, which they say helped them find a more secure job with twice the salary!

Coding can seem like a difficult thing to get started in, and even Charli says that they felt like they were “too dumb” to figure it out at first. In fact, when they got their new job so quickly after bootcamp, they started to struggle with imposter syndrome. They didn’t feel qualified for the job, and even thought someone had made a mistake in hiring them, a feeling many of us are probably familiar with.

How did they cope with this struggle to feel qualified? According to Charli, performing in drag has helped them improve their confidence. Their performances helped them connect with the queer community, where they were understood and supported. In this supportive space, Charli’s differences were celebrated rather than hidden, and unfortunately they have been all too familiar with the feeling that they need to hide.

Hiding in the workplace

After being fired from their last job for personal reasons, Charli found themself holding back at their new workplace. They felt like they couldn’t be their authentic self if they wanted to have a steady job, so they kept it a secret. They even wore a special shirt to the interview that helped them “femme it up” and put potential employers at ease.

When they needed to take a month off work to recover from a gender reaffirming surgery, they needed to let their predominantly cis-male coworkers in on at least part of their identity and was relieved to find that they were surprisingly surpportive. Looking back, Charli wishes they were more open at this job from the start because now they see their queer identity as a commodity rather than a hinderance.

A brighter, prouder future

According to Charli, many tech companies are at the front of the pack when it comes to creating inclusive hiring policies. They suggest that when a queer person goes to interview for a tech company it’s better not to hide who they are because their identities should be seen as valuable resources to the companies who want to hire us.

If you’ve been inspired by Charli’s story to pursue a new life in tech, you’re in luck! There are plenty of resources out there to help. From free resources that will allow you to explore coding to see if it’s something you’re interested in, to more in depth bootcamps like the one Charli took part in or those ones offered by Autodesk. Of course, if you’re just looking for a new job where you can be open about your identity like Charli, make sure you come to our Qareers Virtual Job Fair on April 8 for your opportunity to meet with recruiters from companies we know and trust

QueerTech’s mission to queer the tech ecosystem is driven not only by a desire to have greater representation in the tech industry but also to ensure that the jobs queer people are finding will be safe and secure no matter how we identify. As a part of this mission, we can’t wait to host the Qareers Virtual Job Fair, a fantastic opportunity for you to meet with employers that we trust to be committed to fostering safe and inclusive work environments. 

Our first job fair in 2021 will take place on April 8th, and registration for attendees is open now so don’t wait any longer to save a spot for yourself!

To make sure you get the most out of your Qareers experience, we’ve written up a short guide to help you navigate the virtual platform we’re using and to give you a sneak peek at the employers who will be there.

Get familiar with Brella.io

Hello to our wonderful QueerTech community, and please allow us to extend a heartfelt congratulations for making it this far into 2021! It’s hard to imagine that January has already blown past and we now find ourselves knee-deep in February but we hope that things are looking brighter for you all this year.

QueerTech founders,Naoufel Testaouni and Andy Saldana.

With plans to expand virtually to Toronto, Waterloo, Vancouver, Calgary, Ottawa, Quebec City, and Halifax, 2021 will be QueerTech’s year of connection and growth, and we’re so excited to share everything we have planned to help the queer community move on in the wake of a pandemic that will hopefully soon be under control.

QueerTech in collaboration with Carlos A. Godoy L. Senior Vice President at Impact Public Affairs (www.impactcanada.com), a public relations firms put together a digest to help you take advantage of the package.

2019 was a momentous year for Queertech. It was our first full year as a non-profit, and the year we truly ‘grew up,’ putting a stake in the ground about who we are, the values we stand for, and what we’re going to do to grow, foster, and support our dynamic community of queer and trans people working in tech in Montréal and New York City.