How I find networking events in data & analytics
3 websites + 2 seminar series for statisticians, data analysts, and data scientists
In several prior articles, I have written about the importance of networking for career development and job searching (including my own experience). As a statistician in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, I use the following 3 websites to find networking events:
1) Luma is popular for business and technology. It has listings for many seminars and workshops, and even the social events tend to be geared toward professionals in the tech sector.
2) Meetup is more focused on groups and meeting people within them. There is a wide range of groups for both professional and social purposes, and I like that registered users within a group can communicate with each other. The interface is also fairly easy to use. I encourage you to view the number of members in each group to assess the size of the networking opportunity.
3) Eventbrite has listings for many types of events. This website has an inconsistent interface, so I encourage you to follow these steps to find events for professional networking:
Search for “data” and enter your city of interest. (Eventbrite pre-populates a default city based on your IP address.)
On the left, filter for “Business” or “Science & Tech”.
If you wish, filter for your dates of interest.
In a big city like Toronto, there are often many free events. Under “Price”, you can filter for “Free”.
If you work in biostatistics in Toronto, I encourage you to attend the networking events hosted by the Toronto Applied Biostatistics Association (TABA). You can learn about its upcoming events by emailing taba.exec@gmail.com to sign up for its email list. It hosts 3-4 events every year, and each event has roughly 3 seminars and a networking portion. The location alternates between downtown Toronto (where the hospitals employ many biostatisticians) and Mississauga (where the pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies employ many biostatisticians).
There is also the annual Biostatistics Research Day at the University of Toronto (UofT), which usually occurs in the late spring of each year. (This event is also called the SORA-TABA Workshop. SORA is the Southern Ontario Regional Association of the Statistical Society of Canada. Historically, SORA, TABA, and UofT have collaborated to host this workshop together.) This year, the event took place on April 28, 2025. I encourage you to email biostat.dlsph@utoronto.ca for more information about future events or follow UofT’s Dalla Lana School of Public Health on Eventbrite. A quick search on Google shows similar events in Montreal, Calgary, and London (Ontario).
How else do you find networking events in data & analytics? Please comment below!