Author: Claire Edwards

Lifetime Achievement Award

Hilary Foulkes, Board Member, Chord Energy & Pine Cliff Energy; Senior Advisor, TPH Canada; Vice-Chair, Let’s Talk Science

Hilary Foulkes is a trailblazer in the energy sector, known for her resilience and adaptability. From geologist to corporate governance leader, she has been a strong advocate for mentorship, diversity, and community involvement. Notably, she’s mentored over 25 women in the industry and supported causes like Let’s Talk Science. Her journey, shaped by perseverance and a commitment to giving back, makes her an inspiring role model for future leaders.

Large Enterprise Award

Shelley Powell, SVP, Operations Improvement & Support Services, Suncor

With a remarkable 30-year career in the oil and gas sector, Shelley’s journey from process operator at Suncor to senior vice president demonstrates the power of resilience and embracing challenges. She encourages young women to push boundaries and prioritize self-care.

Small/Medium Enterprise Award

Allison Grafton, President & Founder, Rockwood Custom Homes

As the president of Rockwood Custom Homes, Allison is a bold leader who emphasizes integrity, mentorship, and staying true to your values. She is deeply committed to supporting fellow entrepreneurs and pushing the limits of what’s possible in Calgary’s entrepreneurial landscape.

Professional Services Award

Alison Jackson, Managing Partner, EY Calgary

Managing partner at EY, Alison is passionate about advancing diversity and coaching women to achieve their full potential. She believes that leadership requires authenticity and a commitment to creating inclusive environments where everyone can thrive.

Social Enterprise Award

Sue Tomney, CEO, YW Calgary

As CEO of YW Calgary, Sue has helped grow the organization into a sustainable social enterprise. Her leadership is grounded in integrity, curiosity, and humility, and she has played a key role in raising over $53M to support women and families in need.

Male Champion Award

David Smith, Retired CEO, Keyera Corp.; Director, Advantage Energy Ltd. & Wajax Corp.

A long-time advocate for women in business, David’s work at Keyera Corp has led to 50% female representation on its senior executive team. His commitment to diversity and inclusion has made a lasting impact, and he believes building diverse teams makes us all stronger.

This article is filled with incredible stories of determination, leadership, and the drive to make a positive impact. These award winners’ achievements are shaping Calgary’s business landscape, and their journeys will inspire you to embrace change and lead with purpose.

Go check out the full article in Business in Calgary to read more about these exceptional leaders and their groundbreaking work!

When it comes to our mental health, knowing specifically what we’re experiencing can be helpful so we can get better. But the symptoms of burnout, stress and depression so often overlap. Someone can feel severely overwhelmed and not necessarily be struggling with burnout. The same goes for the physical symptoms associated with burnout, like fatigue,
headaches or insomnia. It can be hard to identify the root cause of our issues — so how can we tell if we are facing burnout?

Burnout is an ongoing deep state of exhaustion. It often inhibits feelings of accomplishment and enjoyment — especially at work, as it typically derives from prolonged work-related stress. For women in leadership, it can be easy to ignore signs of burnout or dismiss them as something else, especially when they feel external pressure to keep pushing forward, even when symptoms arise.

Dr. Valerie Taylor is the department head of psychiatry at the Cumming School of Medicine. As an expert with extensive experience in how mental health relates to the body, she knows the intricacies of burnout and how it shows up. The issue is that the symptoms of burnout can just as easily be signs of a different underlying cause.

As a starting point, Taylor suggests getting any physical symptoms, like weight loss, pain or cognitive changes, checked out by a physician to rule out any medical concerns. There’s no use in assuming your sudden changes in appetite and sleep patterns are linked to burnout when they may need to be uniquely addressed.

On the other hand, people often think depression is the cause of burnout when, in reality, it’s more often the opposite, explains Taylor. It’s a little trickier to decipher the root cause, but Taylor explains burnout is more situational, whereas depression is less so, affecting more areas of your life and going as far as causing thoughts of self-harm.

It’s difficult yet vital to identify exactly what you’re experiencing in order to find the right treatment and solutions to heal. Taylor suggests revisiting what you’re feeling through a new lens.

“I often try to tell people, ‘If you saw the symptoms that you’re experiencing or the things that you’re feeling in your friends, what would you do?’ Often, that type of self-reflection can be helpful,” she says.

To help you find out if you’re struggling with burnout, the Mayo Clinic offers the following questions to consider.

• • • Do you question the value of your work?
    • Do you drag yourself to work and have trouble getting started?
    • Do you feel removed from your work and the people you work with?
    • Have you lost patience with co-workers, customers or clients?
    • Do you lack the energy to do your job well?
    • Is it hard to focus on your job?
    • Do you feel little satisfaction from what you get done?
    • Do you feel let down by your job?
    • Do you doubt your skills and abilities?
    • Are you using food, drugs or alcohol to feel better or to numb how you feel
    • Have your sleep habits changed?
    • Do you have headaches, stomach or bowel problems, or other physical complaints with no known cause?

If you answered yes to any of the questions, consider the possibility of burnout. Examine your work environment and reflect on whether that may be the cause of any of the above issues. Get a doctor to check your physical symptoms to rule out any different medical or mental health issues.

“Pay attention to your pain. If you don’t feel well, try to understand where that’s coming from, whether or not there’s another underlying physical cause, or if something is going on within your work environment or home environment. Don’t push it off and try to white-knuckle your way through it. That has rarely worked,” affirms Taylor.

Join the discussion on how burnout shows up in professional women. Become a member today.

With International Women’s Day around the corner, women are asked to organize galas, celebrations and fundraisers, adding more to their workload of unpaid tasks.

Every year, March 8 marks International Women’s Day. International Women’s Day (IWD) celebrates the achievements of women and girls in social, economic, cultural and political climates, and calls to accelerate gender equity. IWD dates back to the 1900s as a way to fight for women’s rights. We’ve come a long way since then: women gained the right to vote, shattered many glass ceilings in male-dominated fields, and have more equality in legislative rights — celebrating these achievements is valuable. But behind the celebration, there’s a hidden cost for women.

Emotional labour and unpaid work

It’s important to acknowledge how far women have come and how far we have yet to go, but IWD events tend not to dig that deep. And sometimes, these events can feel performative — think of the companies who host a special day for women yet continue to have a gender pay gap and tolerate a work culture that is dismissive toward women. The cherry on top of these once-a-year events? Women are usually the ones asked to organize them.

The weight and responsibility of planning IWD often falls on the shoulders of women. Across the board, women make up the majority of those who take on unpaid work. Think of social committees, school volunteers and gala organizers: women tend to take on those roles, and this is largely due to a volunteering history from when most women did not hold paid positions. Yet now that most women are in the workforce, the expectation to take on additional, unpaid responsibilities remains.

Companies will often ask female panellists to speak without pay, female employees to organize an IWD gala outside of working hours or ask the women in the office to brainstorm ideas on what the company can do.

It’s time to revisit how we celebrate and advance women and make sure it’s causing more good than harm.

How can we celebrate differently this year?

This IWD, ensure the way you or your company celebrates does not bring more unwanted work to women. And know that the responsibility to plan and organize an event doesn’t have to fall on you if you’re the one being asked. This year, alleviate the emotional labour some women have to carry and celebrate in useful ways. Some Calgary-based companies, like Toast — a member collective for women in tech — are even going as far as sitting this IWD out.

Celebrate women in your circle. Instead of sharing a trending Instagram post everyone has seen, make your declarations more personal and intentional. If you feel like making a statement online, make sure it’s attached to action, like donating to organizations that help advance women’s rights and successes. In the workplace, women want equal pay and healthy work cultures. Ask your employees what they need or what could help them. Revisit company policies. Find the gaps and start closing them.

Join Axis in helping promote women in the workplace. Become a member today.

Women make up slightly above 50 per cent of Canada’s population, yet we are still far from equal political representation.

Historically, there were no women’s washrooms near the House of Commons. Originally, political spaces were never imagined as rooms where women would be welcome. And while women have made great strides in the political landscape today, the gap in women in politics remains.

Sarah Elder, owner of Madame Premier and podcast host of The Briefing Note, has an extensive political background, having worked as a research officer and assistant to various municipal ministers. She knows firsthand the lack of representation of women in political discussions as someone who has been, at times, the only woman in the room.

Elder explains that fundraising for a campaign is one of the biggest barriers to elected positions in politics. Beyond funding, professional background and the perception of unpaid work act as barriers, too.

“If there are two people in front of you, and you ask them both, ‘What do you do?’ One of them says, I’m an accountant at an oil and gas company,’ and the other says, I’m a stay-at-home mom,’ and they both want to run for office. Who do you think people would naturally turn towards as being thought of as a more qualified candidate?” asks Elder. It’s the standard to dismiss women who have taken a career break to take on domestic responsibilities without ever acknowledging the possibility that she may have extensive political expertise.

The Glass Cliff

An additional phenomenon that affects women, and one we are currently seeing in today’s Canadian political landscape, is the Glass Cliff. The Glass Cliff happens when a woman is put in a leadership position at a time of crisis or uncertainty where failure can be imminent. Following Trudeau’s resignation, three women have entered the race to become the next Liberal Party leader.

“They would inherit the crisis, turmoil and everything that Justin Trudeau is leaving in his legacy and his departure from politics, coupled with the precariousness of being in a minority government and, almost immediately after, going into a federal election, where the outcome of that election and the future of the Federal Liberal Party is really uncertain,” explains Elder.

The issue is not that women can lead in difficult times; it’s what happens after the circumstances cause her not to succeed. Also, it’s worth asking ourselves why women are called on in times of crisis and ultimately set up to fail.

“We want women to lead and be political leaders in a good time, not just a bad time, when their chances of failure are high, because who comes up after them in the vacuum of leadership? Typically, a man.”

Elder explains that when a woman fails in the eyes of the public, it’s easy to look past the circumstances she took on and only see a lack of qualifications or skill. Plus, it sets up an unfair, yet common, argument to say that a man in power has always worked before; therefore, we should return to it, albeit once the woman has cleaned up the mess.

Participating for change

Before 1918, women did not have the right to vote, and even then, it was exclusionary for certain women. “Women had to fight for the right to vote and to be considered persons under the law in Canada,” says Elder.

Today, some overlook the fight for that right; only 68.5 per cent of women voted in the general 2019 election. At just over 50 per cent of Canada’s population, women make up the majority, and in a numbers game, there’s a lot of power in the majority.

“There is a huge diversity of thought and political belief within that percentage, which is absolutely fundamental to healthy democracy,” says Elder. “What we also have in there is a huge opportunity, as women, to shift policy.”

If women rallied together, no matter their political stance, and became more involved in politics — whether through elected roles, voting involvement or advocating for more participation — the impact would be significant.

With more women at the table, policy-making includes more voices and creates effective change in policies that affect everyone. “All of a sudden, the conversation changes when you have possibly even just one person at the table who has a different lived experience,” says Elder.

Don’t miss more conversations on women in leadership. Become a member today.

In our new Burnout 101 series, we’ll dive deep into all things burnout and provide expert tips on what it is, the risks associated, how to recognize and manage it, and how it pertains to mid-to senior-level leaders. This month, we look at the basics of burnout and how people reach that point of exhaustion. Plus, Dr. Valerie Taylor shares some tips to help manage its symptoms.

Burnout is more than just feeling too busy or overwhelmed, and it doesn’t happen overnight. It tends to show up after an accumulation of varying factors and/or prolonged stress, resulting in a state of all-encompassing exhaustion with negative and serious effects. For women who work in senior leadership with a lot on their plate, it can be hard to recognize whether or not what they’re feeling is burnout.

“People talk about feeling frayed at the edges. They’ve lost the capacity to handle things the way they once did because they are exhausted,” says Dr. Valerie Taylor, department head of psychiatry at the Cumming School of Medicine. Taylor has extensive experience in mental health and its links to the body. She leads the Taylor Lab, which investigates potential new treatments for mental illness, among other focuses. She has various clinical trials that are looking at modifying the gut microbiome as a way to treat mental illnesses. Her research and knowledge on the links between mental illness and disease provide expert insight into why burnout is so much more than just a catchphrase.

Common reasons that lead to burnout are having too much on your plate to manage, not feeling recognized or valued, having difficulty setting boundaries and feeling like you’ve lost control.

Burnout shows up as mental, physical and emotional exhaustion, with symptoms that can include headaches, muscle tension and other types of physical discomfort, brain fog, difficulty concentrating, a diminished sense of accomplishment and fewer coping skills.

“If we’re thinking about work, things that you used to take joy from at work, you don’t anymore,” explains Taylor. “What happens if that’s not addressed is that it can lead to a sense of helplessness and a lack of motivation, and then you become less engaged, and it starts to create a vicious cycle.”

And while it is critical to address, it can be difficult to manage. Here, Taylor suggests a few tips to help you lessen the effects of burnout.

Avoid multitasking: Mute the email notifications, move away from your phone, work in shorter, uninterrupted bursts and focus on the task at hand. Start building time in your day for a rest or a planned walk, and avoid phone distractions.

Make time to be mindful: It’s easy to overlook taking breaks, but setting aside a little bit of time to relax, reset and take a few deep breaths can make a big difference. Taylor suggests exploring different apps that encourage mindfulness and relaxation periods throughout the day.

Set clear boundaries: Know your limits and enforce them. This will help you feel like you’re gaining back a sense of control, which can be helpful when things feel overwhelming.

Pursue activities you enjoy: While it’s important to avoid taking on too much, finding something that will give you a sense of personal satisfaction is also valuable. Taylor suggests community engagement activities, like volunteering, to boost how you’re feeling. “Those things actually change your brain. They increase chemicals like serotonin, dopamine or oxytocin that make us feel better.”

Surround yourself with good people: Taylor explains that “burnout can make us socially isolated. You may think, ‘I feel miserable. I don’t want to make my friends miserable. I’m not going to go be with them.’ But actually, those small activities, even just laughter, can really make a huge difference.”

Don’t miss out on our events, networking opportunities and more conversations exploring issues relevant to mid-to senior-level leaders. Become an Axis member today.