BCBUSINESS.CA MARCH 2020 BCBUSINESS 63
Your employees
matter to you.
Their families matter to them.
Protect what matters most with
the right benefits plan.
604.269.1000
hubinternational.com/bcbiz
company was going to remain in the busi-
ness that they were in," Jit recalls. "So I
started looking around to see if I could
move laterally, and realized that because I
didn't have a degree I wasn't even getting
through the online applications."
BCIT's technolog y management
degree prepares students to lead tech-
driven teams and organizations. Appli-
cants must have at least one year of
relevant technical work experience, plus
a technical diploma or degree. Candi-
dates without those credentials can earn
special admission if they have at least five
years of relevant experience in the work-
force. Jit qualified easily: she was already
working in a position her fellow class-
mates aspired toward. She graduated in
2013 and quickly earned a promotion
from manager to director.
Jit isn't a software developer, but she
can speak the language and break down
how applications are built to come up
with how to deliver them. And, critically,
she can translate between her organiza-
tion's business leadership and its techni-
cal teams. Her
BCIT degree helped her
pull together different components of her
job. "It just gave me a much better end-to-
end understanding of the whole process,"
she explains.
A MANAGEABLE COMMITMENT
Mid-career professionals like Dahabieh
and Jit often demand programs that are
part-time and flexible. Thompson Riv-
ers University's bachelor of technology
in trades and technology leadership can
accommodate almost anybody's sched-
ule. The Kamloops-based school delivers
the degree's courses online to students
across Canada, who can start and com-
plete them at their own pace because
admissions and course registrations run
continuously.
The
TRU program is designed for
tradespeople, technologists and techni-
cians looking to move into managerial
positions or run their own businesses,
and who need to learn how to organize
and motivate productive teams. An envi-
ronmental technologist, for example,
might want to start her own environmen-
tal monitoring firm. As the degree's name
implies, it's less focused on science and
engineering and also attracts leadership
aspirants from the trades.
Chris Stubbs is a project control ana-
lyst and director of program development
