Jordana Knoblauch (B.Comm. 2017) is Impacting her Community Globally and Locally
Jordana Knoblauch (B.Comm. 2017) recently accepted the role of Account Manager at PartnerStack, a partnerships platform to support B2B SaaS companies in building and scaling their partner channels. While helping grow the Canadian tech industry, she is a also helping to make a difference in her local community through her position as Director of Fundraising for The Saskatoon Dog Rescue.
PartnerStack provides growth strategies for its customers by develop partnership programs and external sales channels to grow companies’ revenue. I’m helping develop the Account Management Team at PartnerStack.
You are Director of Fundraising with the Saskatoon Dog Rescue. What are your responsibilities?
I make sure we have enough money coming in to constantly be taking care of the dogs. I plan events, fundraising initiatives, or anything that generates revenue for the organization. I also organize and coordinate the volunteer teams, so I'm in charge of all volunteer experience. Right now, I manage three sub-coordinators, but we will be growing the team to five or six sub-coordinators as we look to expand our program to help more dogs and more rural communities.
You have your B.Comm. from Edwards, what was your time like at Edwards? What were you involved in?
Everything, literally everything. That involvement is how I got my career going the way I did. During my time at Edwards, I was on the Edwards Business Students’ Society and JDC West. I spent five years on JDC West, as Solo Captain and Co-Captain and on the team for two and Godparent for one.
Apart from that I was the Marketing Students’ Society vice president, on Five Days for the Homeless, and the World Mining Competition, which at the time was called the National Mining Competition (NMC). In my year on NMC I was Delegate Relations and I helped recruit teams globally. We had a team from India, two from the UK, from Germany, and the United States. Because we were able to grow the competition globally the name changed to World Mining Competition happened which was really exciting.
What's your favorite memory with Edwards?
JDC West was my one true love. Having the ability to be in a leadership position as a student and the ability to have the Co-Captain and Solo Captain year was really the highlight and a big growth moment.
The other would be when we won School of The Year during JDC West when I was a Godparent. The recognition of being the top business school against the likes of schools like Sauder School of Business or Haskayne School of Business was so rewarding.
What is the most rewarding or your favorite part of the work that you do today with PartnerStack?
The ability to connect with big companies and large organizations to help them develop strategies for their growth. For example, we work with Stripe, one of the biggest payment processing companies in the world, or QuickBooks or Intuit, to directly influence how they are growing revenue.
The other really rewarding part is working with a big Canadian tech company. I came from I was working at an American company for the last three years so it’s nice to be back working for a Canadian company. Canadian tech is developing so quickly and is really making a name for itself globally; we are no longer small players. Even in Saskatchewan, we have some big names, such as Vendasta (whom I used to work for) and 7Shifts making waves in the space, and have programs like Co.Labs (which was developed by a classmate of mine while at Edwards) to help support those companies and their growth. It's a very exciting time to be in this industry in Canada.
What is the most rewarding or your favorite part of the work that you do today with the Saskatoon Dog Rescue?
The impact locally. I'm remote employee for PartnerStack, which is great, but I was missing that piece of still being connected to Saskatoon where I’m born and raised. With the Saskatoon Dog Rescue, I see the direct impact our work has, either through the people who adopt dogs for us, the community impact, or working with different fundraising sponsors around Saskatoon.
But my favourite part is the work we do in Northern and rural communities, lots of those are facing overpopulation problems. We provide education on how to better handle these problems and will spay and neuter dogs on site, so the overpopulation problem doesn't continue.
What advice do you have for students and alumni looking to pursue a similar career as you in tech?
The number one thing I always recommend is putting yourself out there and getting involved with the various student groups and the leadership positions that are available. Do not worry about messing up, it’s a low-risk environment where you can develop these leadership goals to better set you up to leadership position, either in nonprofit or your organization in the future.