In this episode, we sit down with Maureen Kempston Darkes, Toronto, General Motors Canada’s first female president and Tri Delta Woman of Achievement. Join us as we delve into Maureen’s groundbreaking career, hear her stellar advice and learn the pivotal role Tri Delta plays in her life.
In this episode, Maureen shares her remarkable journey from the automotive industry to becoming GM Canada’s first woman president. From her unconventional career path to her commitment to women's healthcare and education, Maureen shares valuable insights and advice to all of us on taking risks, getting uncomfortable and embracing an entrepreneurial spirit. We discuss the importance of the role of female mentorship in business, mutual support and the transformative power of education. Maureen talks about the recognition of being named one of Tri Delta’s 2024 Women of Achievement with a shoutout to all her Canadian sisters as well as the impact Tri Delta plays in her life and endeavors. You won’t want to miss this very special and inspirational conversation with this exceptional sister!
Hello, Tri Deltas, and welcome to another episode of the Let's Talk Tri Delta podcast. I'm Karen White and I have the privilege of serving as Tri Delta’s Chief Executive Officer. I also have the amazing joy of interviewing some of our fantastic sisters and bringing you their stories right here on this podcast. And today I am super excited to talk with Maureen Kempston Darkes from our Toronto chapter. She is one of our 2024 Women of Achievement. So women of achievement is a Tri Delta recognition.
This year we're recognizing three extraordinary women. Among the thousands of extraordinary Tri Delta women, needless to say, these are women who are breaking glass ceilings and really paving the way for the next generation of women.
So among Maureen's many accomplishments, accomplishments as General Motors Canada's first ever woman president, she led the way and changed the landscape of automotive leadership and the industry.
She was inducted into the 2022 Canadian Business Hall of Fame for her contributions to Canadian business. So let's get right to it. Let's welcome Maureen to the podcast and dive into her incredible career and story.
Maureen, hello, welcome.- Wonderful to be here and to meet you.- So let's dive in. Tell us about yourself. Can you share a bit maybe about your background, growing up,
your childhood, and then your connection to Trideltha?- Sure. I was born and raised in Toronto. My parents were Irish immigrants to Canada. And my father died when he was very young and he left my mother with three children.
And I have two older brothers. one's a doctor, one's a dentist, and I went through law school. We were very privileged to live in Toronto and to be able to go to the University of Toronto.
My education actually became a foundation for the career that I had. It gave me credibility to enter a number of different types of areas. And my time at U of T,
was really one of the most pleasant times I've had. It was always challenging. My time with Tri Delta was just superb. I had met just excellent, excellent friends.
We're still friends to this day. We have lunches together, an occasional dinner, and during life, you know, things happen, but we're always there to support each other.
And it's just really a wonderful relationship. And it's just, it's just, it's just, it's just, it's just, my time at university just really very engaging and amicable and it was always a sort of a home away from home if you talk about it.
You know he's a very large university but Tri Delta was a really special place. Our fraternity home and whatever and the sisters that were there was it made my university experience really remarkable.
We love hearing that. that and just for our listeners, we did not script Maureen to say these things. We often talk about Tri Delta being a home away from home and so it warms my heart to hear that it holds that place for you as well.
You're right, going to big universities, right? There's so much to deal with. Right, right and and everybody who's there supporting each other and you know at the time our numbers were small enough.
that we could host Monday night dinners at the house. And one, and everyone had to take their turn at doing dinner. And it was just an awful lot of fun.
You know, what we, what one would choose to prepare for the other sisters that we just had a lot of fun doing it. You know, it was just an amazing experience. I love it. And you still keep up with sisters today.
So, so for the audience, Maureen and I connected. back before the holidays as we were sharing the announcement about her being selected a woman of achievement. And she was headed off that weekend to meet with sorority sisters.
So how did that go? Where did you go? And how did it go? Just just great. Well, we had a number of dinners and things. We actually stayed in Toronto, but we had a number of events planned. And we like to do that. You know,
as we get older, it's just nice to stay in. in touch and, you know, know what each other's families are doing and how we can help each other and whatever we do. And just,
you know, great dinners and a lot of fun laughter or movie or two. And it's a nice way to enjoy your friendship. It just really is.
And it's a low key, very nice, collegial kind of relationship that they're just the best, right? So you're, you're journey, Maureen, let's pivot to that.
It's truly impressive, right? It culminated in becoming the first ever woman president of General Motors Canada. Now, you didn't land in that job immediately post college,
right? So didn't you share with us the journey and some of the challenges and even roadblocks, especially being a woman in such a traditionally traditionally male dominated industry like the automotive industry.
Well, first of all, when I joined the automotive industry, it was really quite unique to have a woman go into the automotive industry. I had been practicing law on a downtown law firm and I was on assignment there for two years,
and then I was going to go back to practicing law. It was interesting when I went there, as I say, there weren't any other women. executives. And I looked at that,
and I thought, well, why would that be? Because at that time, women were coming out of universities and much larger numbers, MBAs, engineering, all of the kinds of skills and things that are important to the automotive industry.
And I would say to my confers, it doesn't make sense. We need to be attracting these people. And by the way, women buy 50 % % of the cars and trucks and they influence 80 % of the purchase decision.
So the more that we could make the inside of the company look like our outside customer base, I felt that was a major win. But I have to tell you,
my career was not a totally preset planned thing. Right. And it evolved and what I learned is that. I had to be open to the possibilities and I had to take on different risks and I had to learn early in my career to get out of my comfort zone and try new things,
engage with new things and at first it's very difficult, but after a while you get to enjoy the experience and you take on new challenges, you know, with a great vigor and you know when I look back at my my career,
and I always say this to younger people, do not overplan your careers. My career--- Great advice.- My career had nothing to do with what I thought I was going to do.
I thought I was going to be a school teacher. I really wanted to be a teacher, but when I was graduating with my first degree, there were no jobs. So I thought, well, okay, I'll go into law school. And so I went to law school and--- Plan B is law school.
- That's law school. That's fascinating to me, right? Backup plan.- So I went to law school, I graduated well, went with a very large firm and whatever,
and was enjoying that. And then I had this chance to go to GM. I was gonna stay for a couple of years and then go back to practicing law. But the fact was that ended up in a 35 year career with General Motors that spent law,
finance, finance, public policy, and Canada, and the United States becoming president of General Motors of Canada, and then even beyond that going on to be the group vice president of Latin America,
Africa, and the Middle East. And that's, you know, running a region that's three continents and some 24 countries, every language pretty much known, the man's spoken there. But none of it was planned.
And the thing I say to young people today, don't over plan your careers, but be open to the possibilities. And at first, it's difficult to get out of your comfort zone.
But once you've done it once or twice, you'll come to really enjoy the experience. And it will take you to places that you never thought imaginable. I think that's what I love that advice for for our young members or young women or young alumni,
right? And because I do do think if you're comfortable, oftentimes you're not growing.- Exactly right.- And that's--- It takes some courage, you know,
it takes some courage, but once you've done it once or twice, you build that courage. And I think then you learn to become entrepreneurial and you learn to be,
you know, to create groups and create the capacity to work with other people in different areas. areas. And that's really important. I think to be collegial and to be entrepreneurial,
whatever you do in life, I think those are really two important qualities that serve you well through your life.- Such great words to live by. It does make me think a little bit of our ritual,
right? And, you know, where we're invited to have perfect confidence in ourselves, right? But then to really question. question ourselves, know what we do well, right? Be thou the master,
right? But then know what we don't do well, right? And then, you know, surround yourself with those people who kind of fill in the gaps for you.- You know, in my view,
you get your basic education and you're proud of it and it's a real building block. But I've also learned that leaders evolve.- Yeah. you know, they take every opportunity to learn and to experience different things that helps them grow in their current careers and leads them on to new careers.
But I've always looked at the great leaders that you see, they're always evolving in their thought processes and how they look at things and continuous education for them in that area is really important.
Thank you for sharing all of that. And I'm thrilled that we're going to get to talk to you more as we make our way through the next few months leading up to Tridel Disconvention where we'll be recognizing you and two other amazing women as our women of achievement.
I can't wait for you to meet them, right?- I'm really looking forward to it as well.- It is a powerful group of women. So I wanna talk to you about your, your activity and your volunteerism,
right, your activity in other organizations. You have several causes that you're passionate about and you volunteer, you give your time and talent to make an impact on these organizations.
You want to talk to us a little bit about what you're involved in these days? Well, there are two things that are really important to me. First is access to health care and particularly,
particularly women's healthcare. And I've done a lot of work on that and making sure that we're doing all the research we need to do to support women and their health. There have been periods of time when we don't even know whether an aspirin a day was really right for women and for preventing heart attacks because guess what,
there weren't any women in the study. Well, that should never happen again. So I've worked in places like women's college. hospital, it's a major hospital in Toronto, let's focus on women and research.
I've done that in past years. I continue to have a very great interest in making sure that we have, you know, appropriate health care for women that we're focusing on.
And after all, we're 50 % of the population and we, you know, contribute to families immensely. So we need to protect women's health care and they need to have. in my view,
a say in control over their health care, so that's an important issue to me. The other important issue that I focus on is access to education.
For me, it was a major building block, and I think it's a major building block for others as well. And, you know, Canada is a country of immigrants and like my password against the Canada was important that we should you know be educated and one of the things I've done is establish some bursaries and things at the University of Toronto that's really directed to people that are the first generation in their families to
go to university. That's the difference maker, right? Yeah, it is. a big, it's a big differentiator for people.
And I think we have to make that available to people. So it's education and healthcare and ensuring that it works for everybody. And so it's something yes,
I am passionate about.- Well, and we love hearing that, right? And it so aligns with the work that Tri Delta is. doing just broadly in the world, right? And I'll mention to our viewers and our listeners,
we are both recording today from our home offices and Maureen, your phone's ringing, right? So people are still looking for you, which I love so much.- Sorry about that.
I thought I had it controlled, but you're not doing those things. You never do it. I'm sorry.- It is totally fine because my dog is snoring so loud in the background that I'm hopeful you don't hear him.- I'm hoping I'll get to see him before the interview's over.
- He does have a great life, I will tell you. I do wonder if he ever goes to work, if he'll be totally qualified to, you know, certainly record a podcast, right? So, but I love,
you know, the idea, and you know now, having been, you know, reacquainted with, you know, Trial does broad initiatives, how passionately care about women's lives. mental health, you know,
overall health, but their mental health to the degree that we've got programming at the collegiate and soon, the alumni level, to address the mental health needs of our members.
- And then of course, the work that we do to support women's education. Yes, Tri Delta is a social fraternity, right? Co-curricular on some level, but we exist at the beginnings of one's membership.
many people's membership, right, in that collegiate environment, specifically to support women as they're making that transition, right, from high school to college and then college to real-world,
whatever real-world holds for them. And I think we should take that that support even further as we go forward in our careers to support other women that are coming up in the business world and in other areas.
I mean truly we have experience, we have a lot of learning to share and I think it's important for a woman to support other women. A hundred percent. We've got in recent years research that says mentorship is a key predictor of women's well-being.
When you think about Tri Delta, the impact nature of our organization, that could be a natural outgrowth of what we're doing as collegians and then alumni.
And to your point, many of us are in a position to give women a hand, right? As they're working their way through their career journeys. So a lot of hearing you say that.
- Many times at the board table, it takes an advocate right?- Yeah, it's a natural outgrowth of women's well-being,- Yeah, it's a natural outgrowth of women's well-being,- Yeah, it's a natural outgrowth of women's well-being,- Yeah, it's a natural outgrowth of women's well-being, happen. And I think that women who have experienced some success in business have a role to play in advocating for other women that they
believe will be major contributors. And we should accept that responsibility.- I love it. I cannot tell you how well you're going to get along with the other women of achievement. I happen to know one of them very well and you are speaking her language,
that particular woman. is Sandy Beach Lynn, previously served on Tri Delta's executive board, is very involved in an organization here in the states called Paradigm for Parity around closing the wage gap for women and just a passionate advocate for women.
So you are making my Tri Delta heart very happy today. Okay. So let's shift gears for a minute, right? And talk a little bit about little bit about,
you know, as you think back on Tri Delta and maybe the life lessons learned during that time, are there ways in which Tri Delta impacted your career as you were coming along?
Well, yes, because I saw other Tri Delta's who were moving ahead and doing really interesting things in life. And I saw their approach to life. and they were always very collegiate you know and engaging and I think that's so important in life to be collegial to be entrepreneurial to be engaging to be able to work with people and you know also you know to learn how to support people that that needs some help you know
and I don't care who you are in life and it any point in time Somebody needs some help and I think it's important, you know that we stand together and we support people that need help And we do it in a way that makes a difference for them And then they can go on and do things that they never thought they could do so I think the support of environment It is really really important and and I learned that from my
other Tridel's assistants You know, it was just a great place place to go, you know, when you wanted to talk to somebody or share something and, and whatever there, the triad ELSA sisters were there,
and we supported each other. And I think that's the basic quality that, you know, I find endearing to road life. I want to congratulate you on being awarded the 2023 Woman of Achievement Honor and Recognition.
What does this achievement mean to you? personally and maybe even professionally?- A great deal personally for certain and professionally. And to be recognized by your fraternity,
by your sisters as someone who has contributed, those are great recognitions. I mean, they're your friends, they're your colleagues, they're people that mean so much to you.
So it's just a wonderful feeling that they thought it was a great achievement. to think about you as having contributed. And so it warms my heart. But you know, I think I really accept this award too for my other sisters and tried to help them in Canada.
You know, I think I really share this with them because we were a great team. You know, we shared lots of things together. We continue to do it. And I think this is a recognition to Tridelt and the Toronto chapter for the people that are there today,
the people who've been there in the past and for the work they do on campus. And professionally, look, it's always wonderful to receive an award, but it's really special when it's award that it's personal to you.
It's not just about business achievement. achievement. It's about something that's special in an interpersonal way with other people. That reflects values beyond,
you know, just the boardroom. It reflects, you know, hopefully some leadership skills and that you helped other people and that you are a good college mate and you are a good fraternity mate and that those aspects of your work.
life are just as important in so many ways. Well no doubt you are a good mate to all and continue to be. Now looking ahead, what's next for Maureen?
What projects or endeavors are are you excited about pursuing in the future? Right now I'm just I'm just so up to here with with board work and a few very special projects going but I do want to continue on.
focus on access to education for people. I do want to continue a focus on helping to provide health care and particularly to the many groups that don't have health care you know we have to find better ways of delivering health care.
It needs to be inclusive of people and that's very much you know in some ways a Canadian sort of of thing, but it matters to me that there are so many people that don't have access to healthcare.
And I think we have to find ways to do it, not only making them eligible for healthcare, but in helping the doctors and the whole practice of healthcare being able to cope with the huge demands that are on them today.
How do we make their offices more efficient, more helpful for the patients? broader space of people. How can we contribute knowledge and learning to helping them do what they need to do every single day,
which is just enormous, enormous issues for them. So those kinds of things matter to me. Well, I am glad that you are an advocate in that space.
No doubt things will get done, Maureen. Thank you. Your life. and career are an inspiration to women everywhere. We are so proud to call you our Tri Delta sister and so happy to shine a spotlight on you as a 2021 achievement.
Thank you for even considering me for this award. I mean, it truly is an honor to be recognized by Tri Delta and I'm really looking forward to meeting you in person and meeting the other Tri Delta sisters at the convention.
It will be a wonderful experience for me. Same here. We look forward to it. I want to invite our listeners and our viewers to join us in honoring all of our remarkable women of achievement in two additional podcast episodes.
And then we'd like you to stay tuned on social media because we are going to be celebrating tri deltas and women's accomplishments throughout the entire month of March in honor of women's history month.
It will be a month long.-long celebration that you won't want to miss. We'll also celebrate both our 23 and 24 women of achievement in person at Tri Delta 61st Biennial Convention this summer.
July 11th through 14th will be in sunny Orlando, Florida. We do hope you'll join us. If you haven't registered, you'll find all the details on our website at Tri Delta .org /events and as always we would like you to like and subscribe and rate our podcast.
We love five-star ratings at Let's Talk Tri Delta. Thanks for joining us, and until next time, Delta Love.