Shawn Shafai

Shawn Shafai began their career in 1991 as an Analyst (Xerox Network Services) at Xerox, Inc. In 1996, they founded Digital Realities and served as its Director. In 1998, they became a Systems Engineer at CIBER Network Services, Inc. Shawn then joined Cisco in 1999, where they held various roles including Business Transformation Executive & Field CTO, Cloud & Data Center Solutions Adviser, Enterprise Adviser, Global Head of Networking, and Manager, Network Engineering - Western US & Latin America. During their time at Cisco, they founded a global extranet service and managed projects & programs for IT Infrastructure Chief of Staff. In 2002, they founded Red Fin Marketing, LLC, a digital marketing company with a special focus on non-profits & organizations. In 2010, they co-founded Bit Bees, LLC, a software company innovating on Apple's iOS platform.

Shawn Shafai earned a Bachelor of Liberal Arts & Sciences from the University of Illinois Chicago in 1992, majoring in Criminal Justice and minoring in Anthropology and Ecology. Shawn then went on to obtain a MBA from San Jose State University in 2003. Shawn also holds certifications from Amazon Web Services (AWS), VMware, (ISC)2, APM Group, Google, ASQ, Cisco, Microsoft, and Google AdWords. Theirmost recent certification is the Amazon Web Services Solutions Architect Associate which they obtained in 2022.