I’ve been delinquent in these posts the last couple of days while in the madness of Toronto Tech Week–which would have been far more insane if it weren’t for Alison Pearce. So let’s talk about her.
In the days after we launched the Gander website, I received a VERY enthusiastic message from a woman who was eager to help us grow our community. Not only was she exceptionally charming in her message, but in snooping her LinkedIn, I discovered that she had spent a chunk of her career running community events and programming for Creative Commons and Reddit.
Kinda perfect already.
We booked a call for the same day, and I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. Within minutes she had aspirations for a Gander event at Toronto Tech Week, and was rifling through her connections to help us find our way into Web Summit in Vancouver. I was thoroughly sold.
And then, I dropped the ball.
I spent the next two weeks frantically getting a team together, speaking with investors, and doing all the things a startup does. When we finally managed to meet again as a team, we each talked about what we were working on.
Me: “I’m sorry, Alison. I assume we’re too late for Tech Week?”
Alison: “No no. I got us into Tech Week. We’re doing a creator event at an art gallery. We have sponsors, a banner, business cards, wall art, a DJ, and a touch screen station for a product demo. The total cost is almost nothing.”
I was floored. And maybe a little worried that she just gave me permission to drop the ball more often 🙂
And THEN… when we couldn’t get a spot at Web Summit… she just hopped a plane and went anyway.
This past week, Alison has been running her butt off meeting folks, setting up events, managing them, entertaining, introducing people, making speeches, and then tearing the events down again. And somehow managed to throw her sister a birthday surprise at the same time. All with the energy of 60 people and a smile.
There is zero chance I could have gotten through this week without her. And for that, as well as all of the incredible work she is doing building community for Gander across the country, I am terribly, terribly grateful.
Thank you, Alison.
