April Hicke, co-founder and CEO, Toast (Photo courtesy Sam Doty/Toast)
When women in tech gather, the world gets a little more colourful.
The Toast Summit in Calgary was a sea of bright blazers and packed panels, where women came together to talk about what the future of tech actually looks like.
(Hint: the ladies are hired, leading, thriving, and getting that bag.)
As Toast described their event: “think Space Barbie meets tech thought leader.”
Founded in 2022 by April Hicke and Marissa McNeelands, Toast is a recruitment firm created to diversify technical teams, addressing issues like the gender pay gap.
“Feminism is not a social cause,” said Hicke, opening this year’s summit. “It is economic infrastructure.”
That belief is at the core of Toast Summit, designed for women in tech to build community, share skills, and take on systemic challenges head-on.
“Companies with diverse teams perform better, they grow faster, they retain more talent, and they deliver stronger results,” says Hicke.
“Feminism isn’t dead. It’s the smartest, most overlooked growth strategy that this country has.”
Between engaging panels, fireside chats, a women-owned market, and even rooftop yoga, the day carried a balance of resolve and optimism. It was a glimpse of what the future of tech could look like, and a reminder of why building equity is not optional.
Kicking off the ‘Women Doing Cool $h!t’ panel, Sarah Micho of Greenpeace Canada gave a candidly simple piece of advice, when it comes to connecting with broader leadership about job opportunities.
“If anyone, why not me?”
Pretty great advice, TBH.
“Give reasons to include yourself, and that your voice does matter,” she added.
Joined by Andrea Grand, co-founder of Barbet, Megan Chayka, co-founder of Stathletes, and moderator Winta Asefaw, partner at Cassels, Brock & Blackwell LLP, the panel expressed the idea that leadership rarely follows a straight line.
Sometimes the most important step is simply deciding to take one.
“I think as women, sometimes we can automatically disqualify ourselves,” says Micho. “Don’t discount yourself.”
One recurring theme of the discussion was the need to speak up and ask for what you need. From funding to mentorship, opportunities often come to those who are direct about their goals.
Resilience also surfaced as a practical skill. Andrea Grand compared entrepreneurship to a video game where each level brings new challenges, but skills from earlier stages still carry forward.
“You get to a level,” she said. “You understand the level. You know who the bosses are, you know who the villains are. You’ve got it perfected, you win. And then all of a sudden, a whole new level opens up.”
In these moments, resilience comes through as a combination of reflection and re-shift.
“I also truly believe sometimes a no is a blessing in disguise in some ways,” she added.
Chayka reframed failure as part of the process, saying, “Success is not what we want; excellence is what we want. And if you’re excellent at what you do, you will find success.”
Pushing back against the pressure to say yes to everything, the panel offered one takeaway that drew nods across the room: “no is a full sentence.”
Boundaries protect energy and create space for focus, especially when demands are constant.
For leaders and professionals, the advice is both simple and difficult: put yourself forward, connect with peers at the same stage, and be specific when asking for help. Confidence grows through practice, and resilience comes from reframing setbacks as learning moments.
The discussion underscored that progress does not require perfection. It requires clarity, persistence, and the courage to claim your place in the room.
What does it take to navigate a field that is evolving faster than organizations can keep up?
How do we trust human intuition in the face of growing AI and digital analytics?
‘Gut Check: When Intuition Beats The Algorithm’ took these questions to task, underscoring that instinct remains as important as metrics, and, as the panelists agreed, the abundance of data can create “analysis paralysis.”
Moderator Anna Baird, chief customer officer of generative AI GTM at Google, joined panelists Zoe Lavena, software engineering manager at Helcim, Youstina Attia, senior associate of cloud, data & AI at PwC, and Janka Coppens, AVP, AI & advanced analytics at ATB to ask a pretty big question in this age of AI:
Why ARE experience and intuition still at the helm of good (digital) decisions?
As Coppens put it, “I think [often] we focus on the technology aspect of it and not the people aspect of it.”
“When something seems off, there usually IS something off, and that obviously comes with experience,” added Attia.
That human layer — asking the right questions, noticing when something feels off, and building teams that can adapt — was echoed throughout the discussion. Panellists argued that AI literacy and trust will only grow if people see both the limits and the possibilities of these tools.
The conversation also touched on leadership qualities that can help shape how AI is used.
In a quick-fire round, each panellist offered one word for what women bring to technology and AI:
“Kindness”
“Adaptability”
“Empathy”
“Open-mindedness”
All simple words, but together they sketch a leadership model that prioritizes collaboration and perspective alongside technical skill.
Business leaders take note. AI adoption is not only about building models or automating processes. It is about setting structures, expectations, and cultures that integrate human judgment with machine capability.
That means balancing efficiency with ethics, measuring outcomes against purpose, and ensuring teams have the skills and the space to adapt.
“For me, it’s not really a collision between humans and technology,” said Coppens.
“It’s more about that partnership, collaboration and how you can bring the best expertise and then combine it with the technology to support [the] most effective way.”
“Sport is a mechanism to become a global active citizen,” said professional footballer and social activist Farkhunda Muhtaj, during a powerful fireside chat with Courtney Dragani, chief growth officer of The51.
“When you have a greater purpose behind why you play and compete, it makes it that much easier to stay during the challenging times.”
The topic of the chat was leading in a time of crisis, and there’s no better example than Muhtaj’s story. It’s a clear example of resilience and staying grounded in moments of uncertainty.
Former captain of the Afghanistan women’s national team, Muhtaj was a key figure in the evacuation of the Afghan Girls’ Youth National Football Team during the 2021 Taliban takeover.
When the Taliban gained sensitive information that would identify the team and their families shortly after the takeover, Muhtaj knew she had to take action.
“I was in my home, Toronto, at the time. I had no clue what to do. I had no road map, or had never done anything of this sensitivity or magnitude, but I knew I had to act, and I had to do it immediately,” she explained.
Reaching out to many organizations, Muhtaj got in touch with American ex-intelligence officers that agreed to help her try and get the team and their families out of Afghanistan.
The mission failed dozens of times before it succeeded. Players and families faced days on the road without food or water, traveling between safe houses in two major cities, relying on Muhtaj’s directions over WhatsApp. After months, the players and their families found safety in Portugal.
To this day, women’s sports participation is banned in Afghanistan, but the team hasn’t given up. They created the unofficial Afghan Youth National Team, Ayenda FC, in a bid to stay prepared for the day Taliban rules are overturned.
As the saying goes: if you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready.
“We’re at international standards and levels, and we’re not playing catch up again,” said Muhtaj.
Currently, Muhtaj plays for the Calgary Wild FC, and is a passionate advocate for women in sports.
Speaking candidly about the barriers women face, she recalled being the only female coach at a high-performance club, pressured by toxic leadership and pushed to the margins.
“That’s probably why there’s not a lot of female coaches in the game, because they get pushed out when they are genuinely passionate and really deserving of opportunities, but people don’t want to see them grow.”
Her advice to women in both sports and business? Set boundaries early, support others rather than compete, and never underestimate the ripple effect of representation. Young girls, she noted, need to see role models to believe they can follow the same path.
“You have to set the tone right from the beginning. The moment you allow people to walk over you, someone else is going to witness it and do the same.”
Muhtaj’s final message was clear: take action for what you believe in.
“Empathy without action is baseless.”
How does aligning business strategy with deeper purpose reshape growth?
Opening the ‘Purpose is Profitable’ panel, Rebrick CEO Christine Tatham asked the audience to close their eyes and think:
Is there a time at work, recently, where you really felt that something that you did, mattered?
For Linda Biggs, co-founder and CEO of period products company joni, growth means leaving things better. As she explained, “We believe that social impact and economic prosperity can, in fact, co-exist.”
Joni donates 2% of revenues to nonprofit partners, embedding purpose directly into its model. This year alone, the company marked a milestone of one million products donated.
Jessica Murray, director of marketing at Redbrick reflected on her career shift during the pandemic, when success metrics like promotions and salary no longer felt meaningful.
“If I’m going to spend… 40 hours a week being away from my daughter, and if I’m gonna say to my daughter, well, this is the choice that I made,” she said, “then it better be something good.”
She argued that clear values not only attract talent but also build loyalty, reduce burnout, and create better outcomes. Your time and energy is a resource, so she urged the audience to ask: “What is my impact? How am I spending this resource in the world?”
“Growth has been finding meaning in things outside my day job and breaking the burnout cycle,” said Hiba Amin, co-founder of Creative Little Planet, highlighting the personal side of aligning values with work.
After cycles of burnout, she said growth meant setting boundaries and choosing clients whose missions resonate.
Biggs stressed a good fit and alignment of values over profit desperation.
“Purpose comes before profit,” echoing the session name.
“Was your mom a working mom?”
“How do you balance work and kids?”
“You look very well-rested”
“Did it affect your career, taking parental leave?”
“What are all the hobbies you picked up during leave?”
“What’s for dinner tonight?”
“Who’s feeding your kids?”
You’re getting annoyed, aren’t you?
They’re real questions and comments faced by women in professional settings.
They’re also both exhausting and infuriatingly irrelevant. (Seriously, is common politeness even in the room with us?)
In an eye-opening play on these delightful double standards, Toast’s infamous ‘Men in Tech’ panel was back, wrapping the summit by putting three executive-level men in the hotseat.
This time, however, there was a fun Dad twist.
The Fathers — Ralph Sadowski, chief of staff at Shopify, Terry Rock, president and CEO of Platform Calgary, and Marco Pimentel, CMO at Redbrick — joined Ada Slivinski, VP at Talk Shop, to answer all of *those* questions, while also diving into issues like parental leave, childcare, and the invisible workload of working moms.
While the conversation was peppered with laughs, Slivinsky ended the discussion by turning to the audience with one mother of a takeaway:
“You don’t have to answer these questions, and you can also clap back.”
A, freaking, men.
(Ugh. Let’s just add this here so they don’t get the last word.)
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