What it Takes to Partner with the Biggest Bank in Canada: a relentless team
By: Sahr Sj Saffa
Tags: Team Collaboration, Growth, Education, Community Engagement, Partnerships

C-Tribe Festival announces a partnership with RBC’s Future Launch Program

About RBC Future Launch

RBC Future Launch is a 10-year $500 million commitment to help Canadian youth prepare for the jobs of tomorrow. We are moving beyond financial investment by engaging the public and private sectors to further understand the issue and make a significant impact on the lives of young Canadians.

RBC Future Launch is a catalyst for change-bringing people together to co-create solutions so young people are better prepared for the future of work.

Young people today are faced with three critical barriers they need to overcome to be successful:

Solutions for lack of relevant experience

Solutions for lack of relevant skills

Solutions for lack of professional networks and mentoring

Future Launch is a core part of RBC’s celebration of Canada 150 and is the result of two years of conversations with young Canadians from coast to coast to coast.

Working together with young people, RBC will bring community leaders, industry experts, governments, educators and employers to help design solutions and harness resources for young Canadians to chart a more prosperous and inclusive future.

Over 10 years, RBC Future Launch will invest in areas that help young people learn skills, experience jobs, share knowledge and build resilience.

Firstly, thank you to all that have supported C-Tribe to this point. This could mean something as significant as attending the festival or something as simple as reading our emails; we wouldn’t be here without your help.

What started off as a cold email in February of 2018 led to much more. The recipient on the other end opened my email and responded saying “he’d like to hear more” which was enough to have me email Vishan, Sr. Youth Innovation Manager at RBC, an average of two times a week for the last year and a half. Anything I could do to get his ear even for a brief moment.

He gave me more than that: Vishan gave me a chance to talk about the C-Tribe vision and how we wanted to create a platform that celebrated diversity and helped more innovative and creative people achieve their dreams. I told him we needed partners who could bring L.I.F.E. to the endeavor: Labor, Influence, Finance, and Expertise. Every single chance he had he offered his insight on how we could make the event presentable to the greater RBC team. He really believed we were on to something and he felt there was a great fit with the Future Launch initiative that was created by RBC in 2017 (read more about Future Launch below).

Being in Toronto over the last few months he took the time to welcome me to his office in an effort to further our discussions. Today he and his colleague Allison gave me the official go-ahead that RBC will be officially partnering with C-Tribe for our 2019 calendar — joining the City of Edmonton, and Microsoft as our presenting partners!

From L to R: Allison Tam, Digital Coordinator (RBC); Sahr Saffa, Chairperson (C-Tribe), Vishan Persaud, Sr. Youth Innovation Manager (RBC)

Some of you may know that it has taken a lot of blood, sweat, tears, missed expectations, forgone promises, lost relationships, and lonely nights to get to this point. Just last year, for example, about 3 weeks before our festival, Vishan had to deliver the bad news to me that RBC would not be able to partner with us despite the fact C-Tribe checked all the boxes to seal the deal. His corporate team in Toronto really wanted to get behind it, but the regional team in Alberta didn’t have the capacity to integrate. It was a big blow to the festival. We were counting on that partnership to help us get to break-even and to help elevate the guest experience.

We had ambitious plans last year and I had to be the bearer of bad news to the C-Tribe team letting them know the situation. Furthermore, a week later another crucial partner for us (Home Depot) dropped out. If you follow me on Instagram. You may remember my Instagram story last year where I was trekking in the snow from 8 AM to 8 PM, knocking door-to-door on businesses, trying to make up the difference. Many people supported the efforts (thank you to all those that did!), but it wasn’t enough in the end. We were heading into our festival strike date severely under-resourced.

However, the team stuck with the process. As a group, we worked extra hard to find ways to make things work.

Long and behold after the dust settled, we still were able to produce something worthwhile and something that would help further position Alberta as a place for global ideas, talent, and opportunities.

We took a loss financially and received some harsh criticism in the places where we had no choice but to cut corners, but many people still loved it, and we brought into fruition an event that was experienced by over 1100 guests from 5 different countries. We knew that the foundation was set for bigger and better things.

Some of the team from 2018. From L to R: Alyssa, Alfred, Destanee, Jules, David, Dr. Mihaela (speaker from Seattle), Sahr, Vanessa, Jared, Bianca; Adriel kneeling.

Fast forward to 2019 and we’re still licking our wounds, but now we have some additional companionship and partners to do some of the heavy lifting. In basketball terms, it’s like we took a beating in the playoffs the previous year, but we re-focused our efforts, had some major off-season free-agent signings, and we’re entering the following year with a chip on our shoulder. Partners that believe in the mission of exposing more opportunities to underserved communities like Edmonton.

We wouldn’t be here if it was not for the sacrifices of our team from the year prior which gave us something tangible to show-and-tell. Yes, creating something from scratch isn’t for everyone and don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes that many won’t see. However, when you’re surrounded by people that see a problem in the world and will not stop until they make an impact; that’s inspiring. That energy fuels me day-in-and-day-out and I’m excited to go to battle every day.

In 2017 I wrote an Instagram post after our 2nd festival saying that C-Tribe will be one of the biggest economic, social, and cultural drivers of change our city has ever seen; on par with global events like South By South West in Austin, Texas or Web Summit in Lisbon, Portugal.

We’re not there yet, but today we achieved a small victory and we’re only just getting started. See you in November.