ARIA FOUNDATION: BOARD MEMBERS

     Sherry Larjani is an experienced real estate developer and entrepreneur, with a focus on creating beautifully designed spaces that bring her visions to life.  Sherry began her career working as a designer at a luxury architecture firm in Toronto and quickly progressed into building new single-home builds and renovation jobs. In 2010, Sherry created Spotlight Developments, specializing in the acquisition of properties for redevelopment into high density residential, commercial, and mixed-use projects. An advocate for collaboration, she champions inclusivity and teamwork as a foundation for a successful approach towards real estate development. 

     In 2019, Sherry partnered with Urban Capital to create Reina, a project with Canada's first all-female development team to raise awareness of gender inequality in the industry and the many roles women can play. In recent years, Sherry has completed numerous projects and partnered with many major developers including Liberty Development, Urban Capital, and others, continuing her life-long legacy in the real estate industry.

     Ted Sokolsky brings a wealth of community-building experience and knowledge from a career that spans over 50 years in the philanthropic world. Ted served as President and CEO of the UJA Federation of Greater Toronto, a position he held for eleven years until he retired in 2014. During his leadership, Ted oversaw the extraordinary growth of the Toronto Jewish Federation into the third-largest Federation in North America, raising over $100 million annually.

     Ted also established UJA Federation’s Jewish Toronto Tomorrow Capital Campaign-- a groundbreaking capital initiative that redeveloped Toronto’s Jewish community infrastructure over three community campuses across the GTA, raising nearly $400 million in the most extensive redevelopment in the community’s history.  

     Ted formed his own philanthropic consulting firm following his retirement as CEO.  During that time, Ted has been an active Senior Consultant with the Jewish Agency for Israel, Sephardi Voices International, the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, and the Center for Jewish Impact.  

     Ms. Ahmed-Omer has accumulated a wealth of experience and accomplishments in performance measurement, policy development, HR planning analysis, and employment equity and diversity sectors. Ms. Ahmed-Omer has been the recipient of notable awards over the years, including the exceptional service within the Federal Public Service, the Canada150 Community Builder Award, the Hope Academy community contribution award, the Ottawa Black History Community Leadership Award, the top 100 under 40 Most Influential Person of African descent in support of United Nations decade and most recently, the Globe and Mail’s Inaugural Business Changemakers Award (2021), Most recently, last year she was listed as one of Canada's most Influential Women Leaders by Bay St Bull. 

     In the professional realm, Ms. Ahmed-Omer was recently appointed as the Executive Director of the BlackNorth Initiative. In her previous role, Ms. Ahmed-Omer was the Human Resources Specialist within the Public Sector and was primarily responsible for the Visible Minority Advisory Steering Committee of the Agency and working on the agency-wide Employment Equity Action Plan and Anti-racism Strategy.

     Ms. Ahmed-Omer is a founding member of the Justice for Abdirahman Coalition, which advocated securing justice for the late Abdirahman Abdi and his family. A previous member of the Black Agenda Noir organization, a Circle of United Black Citizens whose goal is to cement Black presence on the national radar. Ms. Ahmed-Omer is also the Chair of the Federation of Black Canadians, a national non-profit organization driven by Black organizations across Canada, which advances the social, economic, and cultural interests of Canadians of African descent. 

     Among the many other organizations she has been a part of, Ms. Ahmed-Omer has played an instrumental leadership role in the Ottawa Mayor’s task force combatting anti-black racism. Ms. Ahmed- Omer was a lead researcher for Justice for Abdirahman for its submission to the Justice Tulloch Independent Police Oversight Review and street check review. Ms. Ahmed-Omer has also played an integral role in the rollout of the new Ottawa Police Service’s recruitment strategy and is a lead member of Black Agenda Noir. Her crucial role in the Nyansapo Wisdom, which promotes equity and inclusion for African, Caribbean, and Black Canadians (ACBC) students in education, has seen Dahabo make deputations at the School Board to address a series of challenges facing children and teens of African descent within the Ottawa school Board. Ms. Ahmed-Omer stands as a strong role model, particularly to members of all-Black communities, and has played a transformative role in improving the quality of life of Canadians of African descent and the community at large. 

     Peter has over twenty-five years of experience in design, development, municipal planning approvals, public policy, community engagement, media relations, and housing. Some of his accomplishments are the following:

• Ontario Minister of Housing 
• Toronto City Councillor       
• Chair, Planning & Growth Management       
• Vice-Chair, Toronto Transit Commission 
• Etobicoke City Councillor 
• Executive Director, Tatry Non-Profit Housing Corp. 
• PZM DESIGN, Principal 
• Graduate Architect

     Mr. Guan is a seasoned business and technology strategist and an entrepreneur.   

     With over 30 years of experiences in Canada, United States and China he brings a wealth of technology, management, and leadership experiences and knowledge to the roles that he has played.  

     Mr. Guan worked in consulting capacities with organizations such as Deloitte and Touché, Oracle Financial Services, BMO, TD Bank, Chase Manhattan Bank, AXA, Chinese State Administration of Foreign Exchange, and China Economic Development Trust. He also provided business consulting services to firms such as Bain & Company, McKinsey & Company, Pequot, Clovis Capital Management, S Squared Technology LLC, Perry Capital, LLC, Chilton Investment, NavInfo, High Line Corp etc. for investment due diligence and M&A processes.

       Mr. Guan specializes in business and technology architecture, process improvements, business model analysis, technology, and business due diligence. 

     As an entrepreneur, Mr. Guan held executive positions in several startup companies such as GeoTango Pacific, Fonco, Syndigrow, VVIPLiving and JGOL.  

     He was the executive director and CEO of SinoCom North America Inc., a SinoCom Software Groups of Companies (HKEX).  

     Mr. Guan is a board member of Chinese IT Professional Association.  He was invited to speak at local and international conferences on outsourcing, international businesses, and entrepreneurship.  

     Currently he is the director of Enterprise Architecture and Business Intelligence (BI) for Rexall Pharmacy Group ULC.  

     Mr. Guan was awarded a Ph.D. degree in Systems Design Engineering, University of Waterloo in 1992.  

     Niloo Boroun was appointed as the Executive Director at Consider Canada City Alliance (CCCA) in February 2020. CCCA unites 14 of Canada’s largest municipal regions to build a sustainable and globally competitive national economy built upon the collective strength of each member's ecosystem. Ms. Boroun is also the Principal and Founder of the Toronto based LCG consulting. In this role, Ms. Boroun has undertaken project work for a wide range of clients across Canada and international markets such as Asia, North and South America and designs, implements and mobilizes international delegation strategies- focused in the tech sector.  

     Among her years of work in both the public and private sector, she notably has held roles in the Office of the Premier (Ontario) as a Senior Policy Advisor to the Premier, with a focus on economic development, innovation, international trade, working on files such as CP-TPP & renegotiation of NAFTA (now USMCA); along with immigration more specially on the settlement of recent Syrian refugees in Ontario. She has also served as policy advisor to Minister of Research, Innovation & Science, amongst other notable portfolios.  

    Prior to joining Premier’s office she was the Acting Director of Investment Services & Global Markets at Toronto Global (formally Invest Toronto), Toronto’s foreign direct investment marketing and sales corporation. As the company responsible for attracting inbound foreign direct investment into the City of Toronto, the investment services team works closely with business and stakeholders to access the markets, talent and business resources of Canada's largest city.  

     Niloo has a business background with a Bachelor of Administrative Studies, with specialized honors in Management from York University and is an alumni of the U.S. Department of State’s professional exchange program International Visitor Leadership Program.  

     One of Niloo’s greatest passions is politics and political engagement. She has participated in various local and provincial campaigns along with participating in the 2012 Canadian Mission to Ukraine to observe their Parliamentary elections. She has also served her community on various boards, such as Lumacare and the Iranian Women’s Organization of Ontario. 

     Tatyana Sabitova was born in Ukraine and over the course of her 30-year international career has worked for several leading professional service firms in Europe and North America helping them improve their business models, increase brand awareness, and expand on the global scale. During her 9 years in the US Tatyana became a certified trainer and corporate advisor for Bridging the Gap Program, helping large Health Care Institutions such as Kaiser Permanente and Providence provide equal access to care for diverse populations.   

    After moving to Canada in 2009 Tatyana Sabitova shifted her focus to private sector and in 2012 she was hired by Deloitte Canada where she joined Deloitte Private Real Estate Group. Tatyana managed a large portfolio of Deloitte’s Mid-Market clients encompassing high-rise and low-rise developers, engineering firms, construction and infrastructure companies. She is well known in the industry as an effective influencer and collaborator with a strong ability to partner and build consensus in a multidisciplinary, multicultural environment.

     In 2020 Tatyana Sabitova became a part Deloitte's National Sales Office where she leverages the firm's resources, programs, initiatives and cross-functional services to create new business opportunities with Mid-Market clients.   

     For almost a decade Tatyana has also played a key role in Canada’s Best Managed Companies Award Program, created 30 years ago to inspire, celebrate and build a community of private businesses that are building a better future. As a Super Coach for this program, Tatyana supports successful Canadian privately held companies that are reimagining the possible, driving innovation, and leading the way. In addition, she helps with global expansion of the program by training teams in over 45 countries that have adopted this framework, as well as gathering and sharing best practices in strategy development and execution, capabilities and innovation, culture, ESG, governance, risk management and financial performance with the BM network.   

      Tatyana’s passion for equity, diversity and inclusion has contributed to incorporating it as an actual metric private companies are benchmarked on when applying for Best Managed designation in any geography. She is coaching and advising executive teams on formalizing policies and frameworks to operationalize DEI, accountability, communication and awareness, as well as on measuring success and identifying gaps as a combination of hard data points (such as pay equity) and people’s sentiment/trust. 

     This is year Tatyana spearheaded Deloitte’s Community Advisory Project Ukraine, a pro-bono initiative created in collaboration with the Ukrainian Canadian Congress to help improve the process of settlement of Ukrainians fleeing the war here in Canada, affordable housing being a big challenge to tackle.

     Collins Boakye-Yiadom is a mortgage agent and real estate investor with a supply chain background focused on providing value, experience, and resources to his clients (both first-time home buyers and new investors) to build generational wealth through real estate. Drawing inspiration from his immigrant parents, Collins is an advocate of homeownership, entrepreneurship and wealth-building, and frequently hosts real estate seminars to transfer information and resources to his community and other faith-based organizations. Collins is also an active board member of Dream Legacy Foundation, contributing to the Home Ownership Bridge Program as well as other areas of focus.  

     In Collins' downtime, he spends time with his wife and three boys playing basketball and reading about all things tech!