Our Conference

February 28, 2026 | Calgary Central Library

Join us for a full day of learning for UX professionals, featuring compelling keynotes, in-depth sessions, and dynamic short talks across multiple tracks. The schedule is expertly crafted to balance reflection and application, providing ample networking opportunities.

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Conference Sessions

8:00 AM

📍 Patricia Whelan Performance Hall

Doors open & Registration

9:00 AM

📍 Patricia Whelan Performance Hall

Opening Ceremony

9:05 AM

📍 Patricia Whelan Performance Hall

I Have No Idea Where the Heck Ideas Come From

  • Xerxes Irani | Global Director of UX Community & Culture at Google
Opening Keynote: A candid exploration of creativity, curiosity, and uncertainty behind how ideas actually emerge in design and life.

10:00 AM

45-minute sessions

📍 Performance Hall | Leadership

Designing Leadership: Skills that Shape Impact

  • Ammneh Azeim (She/Her)
    Director of User Experience – Innovation and Digital Solutions at Alberta Health Services

Drawing on nine years of leading design and innovation in public healthcare and private sectors, this session explores purposeful leadership as a design discipline.

📍 BMO Room | Accessibility

Implications of not considering accessibility from the start

  • Loui Garcia (He/Him)
    Senior UX Designer at J5 
  • Scott Herron (He/Him)
    Speaker and Facilitator, Digital Accessibility Workshops at VESSMEDIA

Strengthen design rationale when making a business case for building accessibility within their organization.

📍 Room 013/014 | Artificial Intelligence

When Everyone Prompts, Thinkers Win: The Designer’s Edge in the AI Era

  • Alex Gonzalez (She/Her)
    Lead Product Designer at Cisco 

Learn practical strategies to apply critical thinking alongside AI, including spotting bias, reframing problems, and designing with intention.

11:00 AM

25-minute sessions

📍 Performance Hall | Leadership

Journey Ops: The Missing Link Between UX Design and Organizational Change

  • Alex Mejia, MBA (She / Her)
    Customer Experience Consultant
How UX practitioners can extend their influence, operationalize insights, and make design relevant long after delivery.

📍 BMO Room | Innovation

UX of Silence: Who Are We When the Interface Disappears?

  • Radhika Jamwal (She / Her)
    Human Experience Design Manager at WONGDOODY
This provocative talk introduces a near future vision that challenges designers to redefine their role not as visual creators but as cognitive governors who advocate for user agency, trust, and the right to think privately.

📍 Room 013/014 | Artificial Intelligence

Design System for the AI-Driven Future

  • Nataliia Tymofeieva (She / Her)
    Product Design Manager at Quorum Information Technologies Inc.

Explore how Design Systems accelerate development, and why they serve as a key foundation in the AI era – ensuring speed, consistency, and intelligent design decisions.

11:30 AM

45-minute sessions

📍 Performance Hall | Strategy

UX 🤝 Product: Bridging strategy and delivery

  • Andrew Turnbull (He / Him)
    Managing Director, Product & UX at Evans Hunt
Explore the shared space between UX and Product, how these roles are evolving, and how to build stronger partnerships that lead to better outcomes.

📍 BMO Room | Service Design

Mistakes Designers Make: The Habits That Limit Your Influence, Credibility, and Growth

  • Sydney Johnson (She / Her)
    Head of Design at J5 | Co-Founder Service Design YYC
This session will explore the most common mistakes designers make when they focus on craft without context.

📍 Room 013/014 | IoT

UX Design for Industrial Enterprise IoT

  • Cory Kenealey (He / Him)
    Manager, User Experience at Blackline Safety
  • Kyleigh Birce (She/Her)
    User Experience Designer at Blackline Safety
  • Patrick Wu (He/Him)
    Senior User Experience Designer at Blackline Safety
  • Taelynn Graham (She/Her)
    UX Designer, Data Visualization at Blackline Safety
Discover the unique design considerations the team made while developing the user experience for connected safety products.

12:15 PM

📍 Patricia Whelan Performance Hall & Floor 0

Lunch time

1:00 PM

45-minute sessions

📍 Performance Hall | Panel

How design roles are evolving in the market

  • Kerry Harmer (She / Her)
    Innovation Designer and Ignition Lead at KPMG Canada
  • Fouad Jallouli (He / Him)
    Director, Service Design for the Government of Alberta

  • Lauren Sandberg (She/Her)
    Partner & Chief Growth Officer at Daughter Creative

Discuss how design roles are continuing to evolve in the current constrained market.

📍 BMO Room | Architecture

Being a Designer in an Architecture-First Environment

  • Sarah Dunn (She / Her)
    Senior Service Designer at Government of Alberta
Explore the relationship between UX and digital architecture, and how understanding systems, standards, and constraints can actually expand what is possible in design.

📍 Room 013/014 | Artificial Intelligence

The AI investigator’s guide: Choosing the best tool for your needs

  • Paula Deschamps Madeira (She / Her)
    Senior User Experience Architect at City of Calgary
Learn how to examine and compare AI tools to understand their behaviour and limits. No guesswork, just practical ways to uncover what each tool can and can’t do.

2:00 PM

25-minute sessions

📍 Performance Hall | Leadership

Creating the Role You Need: My Journey to Becoming a UX Metrics Lead

  • Shane Gryzko (He / Him) 
    Assistant Vice President; Sr. User Researcher in Financial Services
Learn strategies for demonstrating value, building stakeholder buy-in, addressing concerns about organizational readiness, and structuring pilot proposals that minimize risk while proving impact.

📍 BMO Room | Innovation

Fast-growing team - Design operations

  • Eloisa Jaremco (She / Her)
    User Experience Architect at City of Calgary
Turn chaos into clarity. We will cover fast-paced strategies for improving work visibility, managing capacity, and enabling project sharing, while fostering team cohesion and reducing meeting overload.

📍 Room 013/014 | User Research

Democratizing UX Research: Scaling Insight Without Diluting Rigour

  • Areï Rodelys (She / Her)
    Senior UX Researcher at Evans Hunt
A pragmatic model for democratizing research without diluting quality: what to delegate, how to protect rigour and accountability with lightweight guardrails.

2:30 PM

📍 Patricia Whelan Performance Hall

Reimagining Government Services: How Designing for Trust, Dignity, and Human Emotion can deliver a high ROI

  • Ryan Hum (He/Him)
    Associate Assistant Deputy Minister and Chief Client Experience Officer (CCXO) at Service Canada, Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC), Government of Canada.

4:00 PM

📍 Greta Bar

After Party