Jen Shaffer is a full-time professional genealogist living in Minneapolis, Minnesota and the owner of The Formidable Genealogist. She is passionate about short form genealogy education and posts social media videos daily across TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and BlueSky. She has been interviewed by many newspapers and local news affiliates regarding TikTok use for small businesses. In March 2024, she wrote the cover story for the Association of Professional Genealogists Quarterly highlighting using short form videos for your genealogy business, which also received the 2024 APG Quarterly Excellence Award. She has been a researcher for the Know Your Ancestors podcast and the Relative Secrets television show hosted by Jane Seymour.
Jen has a very broad knowledge of various research subjects, while also specializing in Slavic, Nordic, Irish, Mexican, Canadian and U.S. research. Her formal education is in the linguistics field with a B.A. in Russian Language, a B.A. in Russian Studies and countless courses in Spanish, German, Norwegian and Latin. She holds a certificate of Russian language immersion from Veliky Novgorod State University in Veliky Novgorod, Russia.
Jen is the booth coordinator for the Association of Professional Genealogists and adores connecting with others at in-person events like RootsTech, the National Genealogical Society Conference and the Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society Conference.
