Cheryll Watson is a proud, born and raised Edmontonian from the northside community of Beverly. She has built her career as a business executive, bringing 20 years of experience in strategic business transformation, innovation, and advocacy in both the private and public sectors. Her career began at IBM in the late 1990s. She went on to spend 15 years with Silicon Valley headquartered Intuit, a Fortune 500 firm. Intuit’s relentless focus on the customer and their commitment to developing world-class leaders gave her the opportunity to gain the skills and practices required to lead in large and complex organizations.

Most recently, Cheryll has led growth in the economic and innovation ecosystems of Edmonton and Alberta. Recognizing the need to catalyze our future economic prosperity, she joined the Edmonton Economic Development Corporation and founded Innovate Edmonton. Her team’s mandate focused on collaborating to create the best possible environment for technology innovation, assisting with securing venture funding and supporting local startup companies to grow and scale.

She is an active and engaged community leader committed to serving her city. Most recently she was named the Chair of the Building Stronger Futures Capital Campaign for the Terra Centre for Teen Parents and is a founding member of the Downtown Recovery Coalition. Throughout her career Cheryll has served on a variety of boards, including Co-Chairing the Startup Genome Global Senior Advisory Policy Forum, as a mentor in the University of Alberta Venture Mentoring Service and as Fundraising Chair for the Zebra Child Protection Centre.

Cheryll, her husband Geoff, and their four adult children actively contribute to causes and issues that have directly impacted their family’s lives, or will in the future, including mental health, child poverty issues, and environmental causes.

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