Immigrant mothers honored at HEC Montreal career conference

On International Mother’s Day, HEC Montréal hosted a celebration of resilience, leadership, and purpose at the Immigrant Women’s Career Conference — an event spearheaded by MamaNest, an organization committed to empowering immigrant mothers in their professional journeys.

“It is the first Immigrant Women’s Career Conference here in Montreal and we are actually exploring the different challenges of carry development for immigrant women across life stages,” said Masha Rezaei, founder of MamaNest and director at Immigrant Women’s Career Conference.

In partnership with HEC’s Social Business Creation platform, the conference highlighted the paths of immigrant mothers across five life stages — from adolescence to post-retirement — spotlighting their triumphs, talents, and contributions to Canadian society.

“I would love all of the immigrant women to know that for building their careers here in Canada they do not need to wait for the right opportunity, they do not need to wait for the right time, they just need to explore, they need to expose themselves into the professional settings like this and I would love for them to experience a safe environment here today in this event so that they can present themselves and get a job easier,” said Rezaei.

With five inspiring speakers, four insightful panelists, and over ten engaged community partners, the event served as a rallying point for career-focused immigrant women.

“As we age, we move through different life challenges, it’s about learning a new culture,” said Mai Thai, professor at HEC Montreal and director of the social business creation program. “Now you are at just high school, learning a new language, learning a new culture, and fighting your own identity. That’s a unique challenge and then when you become young professional, you go to university and start fighting for your career, getting your voice heard, and the kind of contribution you want to make to the home country and the host country. Then how to keep your culture, but at the same time contribute to the vibrant culture of the host country.”

This journey isn’t easy — especially for those new to Canada. But for immigrant moms like Pouran Samani, support from MamaNest made all the difference

“Here it was really challenging and the important thing that I didn’t know was finding good networking, so I didn’t know who to ask who to refer to,” said graduate and MamaNest volunteer and Immigrant Women’s Career Conference. “Masa helped me on that and you know I can say networking is the important thing that you need when you are in the new environment new country and new culture.”

“I’d like to say as an immigrant woman who is career focused we all need the same opportunities so it’s really nice to have these spaces like this and so I would love to hold this event every single year and make it an annual thing,” said Rezaei.