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with alliz 2026

The Unscripted Career

More than a job title.
A summit to shape your story and find your voice.

Overview

The annual alliz event, "The Unscripted Career,", is a unique platform for participants to share their personal experiences and passion projects. It is dedicated to empowering everyone to forge their own careers and future, affirming that every unique journey holds true value.

The summit brings together startup founders, students, freelancers, and professionals from diverse backgrounds, fostering dialogue with industry mentors and creating deep connections with peers. We also facilitate valuable connections with startup companies actively seeking to recruit emerging young and global talent.

Date
Time
13:00 – 20:00
Venue
Tokyo Innovation Base
Stage (2F)
Language
English
Capacity
150
Admission
Free

Why Attend?

Be part of a vibrant community and the moment dedicated to mentorship, impact, and accessibility.

Forge Powerful Connections

Network with industry leaders, collaborators, and peers who share your passion and drive.

Gain New Perspectives

Immerse yourself in engaging sessions and valuable resources designed to inspire fresh ideas and broaden your horizons.

Accelerate Your Career

Discover pathways to invaluable mentorship, exciting job prospects, and professional visibility that will propel your journey forward.

Who Should Join?

While everyone with an interest is warmly welcomed, this event is especially crafted for:

  • Students

    University students and recent graduates exploring how to shape a meaningful career path.

  • Freelancers

    Independent professionals building a portfolio, client base, and clearer long-term direction.

  • Career Pivoters

    People changing industries, roles, or work styles and looking for practical next steps.

  • Founders

    Startup founders and builders who want to connect with emerging global talent.

  • Conveners

    Community leaders, educators, and organizers creating spaces for career growth.

Timetable

  1. Doors open & Check-in

    Doors open for check-in and pre-event networking.

  2. Opening Remark

    Welcome from the alliz Team and introduction of sponsors and collaborators.

    allizCareer Mentorship Community
    https://alliz.jp

    alliz is a member-led career mentorship community dedicated to helping students and early-career professionals with career design and development in Japan. Through events, mentorship, and shared learning, we foster connections that inspire personal growth, skill development, and long-term success in the tech industry.

    Tokyo DesignWhere Designers Build & Connect
    https://tokyodesign.framer.website/

    Tokyo Design is a Japan-based, non-profit community for designers and builders. We host regular events where people explore ideas, learn new tools, and build together connecting locally while actively collaborating with global industry leaders and creative communities.

  3. Keynote Speech

    Future-Oriented Career: Gain powerful insights from a prominent mentor on shaping your aspirations, leveraging mentorship, and navigating the future of work.

    Born and raised in Bangkok, I moved to Japan in 2014. With over a decade in product design, my journey has included I balance full-time work and , side ventures, and build Signary - turning early ideas into stories and experiences people love across cultures and markets.

    From Following Paths to Creating Proof. An Unscripted Career.

    I followed the “proven” path for years but side hustles reminded me how design can create real impact, and pushed me to build my own things. This talk shares that shift and what it means for designers in an AI-shaped world. From hands, to heads, and to hearts.

    Techno-humanist leader at SAP Japan, bridging enterprise platforms, AI, and human-centered design. PhD, MBA, and university lecturer exploring ethical digital transformation, value co-creation, and how technology, culture, and aesthetics shape meaningful business and human outcomes.

    Designing a Tech Career: From Specialist to Leader

    A personal journey from technical specialist to leadership roles in a global cloud company. This keynote draws on real international experience and focuses on intentional career planning, honest skill reflection, finding the right mentors, and practical templates and frameworks I personally used to shape my career.

    AI and cloud architect, entrepreneur, and independent researcher with fifteen years of experience across Japan, Germany, and China. Background includes global engineering leadership and customer solutioning at Microsoft and AWS. Passionate about AI at the intersection of technology and humanity.

    Reinvent Yourself Beyond Labels

    I've moved across continents, industries, roles - journalist, designer, engineer, cloud/AI architect, entrepreneur - often without a precedent but always guided by calling. In this talk I'll share my journey and tips on how to purposefully reshape your career and reinvent yourself beyond labels.

  4. Lightning Talk

    Career Stories: Hear authentic journeys from a wide range of speakers, including startup founder, student, freelancer and volunteer.

    An engineer with a career spanning Microsoft, Google, Meta, and startups. His early work focused on platforms and he helped invent and develop core web tech. For the past three years, he has focused on ML & generative AI.

    The Harder You Think, The Luckier You Get

    This talk reveals career luck is really systems engineering. Define your objective, observe what’s happening, identify drivers & limits, and apply leverage. Luck is what happens when you apply leverage to systems… and technology, teams and markets are all systems.

    I’m a product builder who started without a technical background. By leveraging free resources and building engineering and design teams, I launched my own product and opened doors to multiple product manager opportunities in tech.

    From Non-Technical to Product Builder: How I Made It Work

    I’m a product builder who started without a tech background. By leveraging free resources and assembling engineering and design teams in an unusual way, I launched my own product, unlocked multiple product manager opportunities, and openly share the process behind it.

    I am a Palestinian/Jordanian college student studying abroad in Tokyo, while already studying abroad in New York. You’d think I really love studying… I’m currently doing research in Reinforcement Learning in Bipedal/Quadrupedal Locomotion.

    I still don’t know what I’m doing

    I have been lucky time and time again to find the opportunities I have found. Regardless of my focus and burning desire for improvement, it is ultimately luck that has gotten me where I am. My perspective now revolves around learning to increase my luck.

    A bilingual brand and localization consultant, supporting global founders and teams expanding into Japan. With experience across startups, finance, and community initiatives, I help clarify strategy and translate it into culturally grounded execution, so trust builds faster and decisions feel clearer.

    Why I Volunteer: Staying, Caring, and Building Community in Japan

    Why volunteer in a country often defined by its challenges? Miki shares personal stories of choosing to stay in Japan, and how volunteering became a way to care, build community, and find clarity in her career. A reflection on responsibility, presence, and choosing to act.

  5. Panel Discussion

    Exploring Tech Careers: Corporate vs. Startup. Mentors unpack the key differences and paths in both environments.

    Riccardo Parenti is a Lead UXD at Amazon Japan, where he leads customer experience strategy for Amazon Rewards and incentives across large scale ecosystems. His work sits at the intersection of design systems and product strategy. Prior to Amazon he worked across local startups and international teams, navigating ambiguity, scale, and cultural complexity.

    My Career Driver

    I am driven by building real impact at scale without losing human judgment, big tech gives me structure, leverage, and the responsibility to think long term, startups teach speed, ownership, and accountability, I have experienced both and believe strong careers are built by moving intentionally between these environments. Today AI is a force multiplier in how I think, design, and collaborate, it helps me explore faster and make better decisions without replacing critical thinking.

    Mayuri Sangle is a Product Manager with experience in both Big Tech and startups in Japan. She has worked at Rakuten and amptalk, building scalable products while balancing structure, speed, and strong collaboration within diverse, cross-functional teams.

    My Career Driver

    I am driven by creating meaningful product impact while building strong teams. Big corporates enable growth through structure and scale, while startups accelerate learning through ownership and accountability. I believe sustainable growth comes from balancing clarity, autonomy, and people-centered leadership.

    Driven to escape the "success trap" of large organizations, where existing norms hinder true innovation. I lead a venture to embrace creative destruction, prioritizing disruptive growth over simply maintaining the status quo in my career.

    My Career Driver

    Driven to escape the "success trap" of large organizations, where existing norms hinder true innovation. I lead a venture to embrace creative destruction, prioritizing disruptive growth over simply maintaining the status quo in my career.

  6. Break & Networking

    Take a quick coffee break and prepare to join a group mentoring session or visit the booths.

  7. Group Mentoring

    Join mentors for intimate group sessions offering individualized advice and insights on building careers across both startup and corporate landscapes.

    AI and cloud architect, entrepreneur, and independent researcher with fifteen years of experience across Japan, Germany, and China. Background includes global engineering leadership and customer solutioning at Microsoft and AWS. Passionate about AI at the intersection of technology and humanity.

    Mentoring Area

    Inter-disciplinary self development, career development.

    An engineer with a career spanning Microsoft, Google, Meta, and startups. His early work focused on platforms and he helped invent and develop core web tech. For the past three years, he has focused on ML & generative AI.

    Mentoring Area

    Using AI agents.

    I’m a product builder who started without a technical background. By leveraging free resources and building engineering and design teams, I launched my own product and opened doors to multiple product manager opportunities in tech.

    Mentoring Area

    1. Building a business and product without a technical background; 2.Pivoting into product management role

    Driven to escape the "success trap" of large organizations, where existing norms hinder true innovation. I lead a venture to embrace creative destruction, prioritizing disruptive growth over simply maintaining the status quo in my career.

    Mentoring Area

    1. Building AI-driven products by eliminating vision-execution gaps. 2. Career strategies for escaping the "success trap" of large organizations. 3. Practical methods to integrate marketing, design, and engineering for disruptive business growth.

    Mayuri Sangle is a Product Manager with experience in both Big Tech and startups in Japan. She has worked at Rakuten and amptalk, building scalable products while balancing structure, speed, and strong collaboration within diverse, cross-functional teams.

    Mentoring Area

    1. Big Tech vs Startup Product Management — differences in decision-making, ownership, speed, and career growth; 2. Choosing Between Big Tech and Startups — trade-offs, expectations, and long-term growth; 3. Developing a Strong Product Mindset — thinking in outcomes, not features.

  8. Booth & Networking

    Open networking time to connect with speakers, mentors, and sponsoring organizations to learn and explore collaboration.

    https://linkyu00.studio.site/

    Linkyu is a life coaching service that helps to reconnect with yourself and move forward. We create a safe, energizing space and turn self-awareness into practical steps through coaching conversations, workshops, and nature-based events.

    https://www.signary.jp

    Signary is a narrative-led studio elevating founders’ dreams into launch-ready foundations. We craft brand stories, UX/UI, and design systems to deliver scalable, AI-ready assets that align teams faster, reduce risk, and accelerate launches with confidence.

    https://alliz.jp

    alliz is a member-led career mentorship community dedicated to helping students and early-career professionals with career design and development in Japan. Through events, mentorship, and shared learning, we foster connections that inspire personal growth, skill development, and long-term success in the tech industry.

  9. Closing Remarks

    Final wrap-up and organizer acknowledgments.

Registration

Registration and Deadline
Registration
Complete the registration form on the alliz website. Successful registrations will receive a Google Calendar invitation.
Deadline

Provide real-name identification. Submitting false information may lead to the rejection of your registration.
Cancellation
If you need to cancel your registration, follow the instructions provided in your registration confirmation email by Friday, February 13.
TIB Membership
Please download the TIB app, register as a member, and obtain your QR Code for entry.

Sponsors and Exhibitor

Displayed in alphabetic order

Sponsor

Grow

https://grow.team/

Grow is Japan’s leading recruiting agency for Tech and Start-ups. We help startups to launch and scale in Japan.

Sponsor

Linkyu

https://linkyu00.studio.site/

Linkyu is a life coaching service that helps to reconnect with yourself and move forward. We create a safe, energizing space and turn self-awareness into practical steps through coaching conversations, workshops, and nature-based events.

Visit our booth

Low-energy mornings, dreading work, stuck in either/or choices, procrastinating until you feel worse? Linkyu is coaching, not therapy or career advising. A calm, grounded space to reconnect, get clear, and take one doable next step. Come say hi.

Sponsor

K.K.SIGNARY

https://www.signary.jp

Signary is a narrative-led studio elevating founders’ dreams into launch-ready foundations. We craft brand stories, UX/UI, and design systems to deliver scalable, AI-ready assets that align teams faster, reduce risk, and accelerate launches with confidence.

Visit our booth

Dreams / Elevated. Product Foundation Focus. Welcome everyone with dreams. Stop by to share your vision. Turn it into a memorable story and measurable direction. Leave with our Founder Foundation Framework to start building your own things with confidence.

Exhibitor

alliz

https://alliz.jp

alliz is a member-led career mentorship community dedicated to helping students and early-career professionals with career design and development in Japan. Through events, mentorship, and shared learning, we foster connections that inspire personal growth, skill development, and long-term success in the tech industry.

Visit our booth

Visit us to explore project-based internships and volunteer opportunities that build your portfolio. Get personalized career advice and discover how alliz supports your journey in designing a unique, unscripted professional path.

Host and Collaborators

Displayed in alphabetic order

Host

alliz

https://alliz.jp

alliz is a member-led career mentorship community dedicated to helping students and early-career professionals with career design and development in Japan. Through events, mentorship, and shared learning, we foster connections that inspire personal growth, skill development, and long-term success in the tech industry.

Photography Supporter

E’s eye

Originally from Bordeaux and based in Japan for over twelve years, Estelle Etourneau found in photography an intuitive form of expression. Through E’s Eye, she captures her perspective, preserving meaningful moments with sensitivity and intention.

Design Supporter

G!FT

https://g-ft.com/

G!FT is a creative design hub delivering surprise and delight. Specializing in East Asian youth culture and cross-border business, we drive innovation in product development, branding, and AI.

Operation Supporter

Tokyo Design

https://tokyodesign.framer.website/

Tokyo Design is a Japan-based, non-profit community for designers and builders. We host regular events where people explore ideas, learn new tools, and build together connecting locally while actively collaborating with global industry leaders and creative communities.

Collaborator

Tokyo Innovation Base

https://tib.metro.tokyo.lg.jp/

Tokyo Innovation Base aims to be a global node of innovation. It is a place where diverse individuals connect and support innovators who will advance society with their groundbreaking ideas and technologies. Tokyo Innovation Base aspires to be the world’s most startup-friendly location, initiating a new wave of innovation.

Staff

Displayed in alphabetic order

Alex Ballard
Psychology Teacher, Basis International School
Beau Tana
Co-Builder, Tokyo Design
Bhushith GH
Computer Science Student at TUJ
Bokang Xu
Coach & Founder, Linkyu
Cassey Colobong
Intern at alliz Art Student at TUJ
Congqin Chen
Founder, alliz
Estelle Etourneau
Photographer, E’s Eye
Kaung Khant Oo
International Business Student at TUJ
Lindsay Ryu
Co-Builder, Tokyo Design
Massimiliano S.
Program Manager, Amazon
Miki Toyota
Content, Localization & Brand Strategy Consultant
Verena Silalahi
International Relations Student at TIU