Steve Currie is Chief Marketing Officer at Communitech, Platinum Sponsor for this year’s Fluxible. We asked Steve some questions about Communitech spaces, places, and programming; and how they support a community of tech. Here is what he said:

Communitech has been a long-standing supporter of Fluxible, thank-you! Why is sponsoring the festival is important to you?

Our primary role at Communitech is to support our members as they grow their organizations. Fluxible is a great example of how passionate and dedicated people have galvanized the local community around user experience, which is a critical piece of the puzzle in creating successful tech companies. At Communitech, we're committed to supporting Fluxible as it builds community and brings like-minded people together, including attendees from near and far. It's a great opportunity to showcase the Waterloo Region tech scene and highlight some of the great companies that call Waterloo Region home

Communitech now offers UX boot camps as part of your Academy programming. Can you tell me a bit about those?

We created the Communitech Academy to fill learning and development gaps that our members identify and user experience has been on the list as a high-priority topic. Last year, we tapped into the strong UX talent pool in the region to create a UX boot camp that provides hands-on training delivered by industry experts. The boot camps are available to individuals and we also offer options for full teams. The boot camps are a great addition to the 100+ strong User Experience meetup group that convenes regularly.

In addition to being a sponsor, Communitech is hosting several meetups and the Fluxible party. What are some of the ways your locations and spaces help foster innovation?

It's really about fostering a sense of community and providing both startups and large companies with the tools and connections they need to fuel their growth. And to spark that innovation, we provide startups with space, coaching/mentoring and connections to speed their time to market; we offer innovation training through the Communitech Academy and we work closely with large organizations to introduce them to startups and to build innovation teams to rapidly prototype solutions for new products or internal process improvements.

What are some of the new and exciting initiatives on the horizon for Communitech?

We are embarking on a new initiative focused on the Future of Work and Learning, which takes into account mega trends in rapidly changing technology, shifts in demographics, and the emergence of freelance work.

We have seen that these trends present a complex challenge for countries, governments, communities, academic institutions, organizations, and individuals. And we know that swift action is required and no single stakeholder can meet this challenge on their own. The Communitech team is leading the development of a unique strategy with a coalition of multi-sector partners (e.g. private sector, public sector and academia) in Waterloo Region to build a community of practice to help future-proof organizations and build more resilient communities. This Future of Work community coalition model is the first of its kind in Canada and is building the foundation to scale the learnings and promising practices to other communities across Canada and internationally. We'd love to hear from interested parties and share our model with other communities.

For more information on Communitech, including their Academy Programming check out communitech.ca or follow them on Twitter @communitech.