VPFA R.I.S.E. - June 2024

Gratitude and looking forward with optimism

Dear VPFA Community,

Welcome to the June 2024 edition of our VPFA R.I.S.E. Newsletter. Summer is here and I hope you are looking forward to these upcoming weeks of warm weather with anticipation and plans for rest, rejuvenation, and meaningful moments of pause.

As I reflect on the past year, I want to express my sincere thanks to each member of our portfolio team for your hard work and dedication.

Operations are often a behind the scenes job, providing the essential services and supports needed for Queen’s to fulfill its academic mission. But behind the scenes is not unseen – your work and your contributions matter. We simply could not advance our institution’s purpose and amazing initiatives without you choosing to show up day after day. Thank you for your commitment to excellence.

I also want to acknowledge this has been a difficult season for many as we navigate a climate – both locally and globally – of great uncertainty. During these times, it is paramount to safeguard our mental health and our sense of optimism for tomorrow. There are many supports available to you, including those within the new wellness hub on the Human Resources website.

Taking time to rest and recalibrate is essential to ensuring good all-around health.  I am certainly looking forward to some quality time at the cottage with family and great friends, and I hope you all will find some time doing whatever rejuvenates you this summer.  

As you prepare for your vacation, or when you return, I invite you to voice your ideas and solutions for a better tomorrow. Please visit the Get Involved page on the VPFA website, where you’ll find a fillable form called Ideas Speak alongside the Coffee with the VPFA signup. I welcome your ideas, recommendations, and solutions on how to improve and innovate our operations and inspire continued excellence in our people.  

Our vibrant community is a steadfast source of inspiration; let us all find ways to encourage and uplift each other. 

With best wishes for a wonderful summer,  

Donna

Donna Janiec, FCPA, FCA
Vice-Principal (Finance and Administration) 

Leadership Highlights 

Heather Woermke, Associate Vice-Principal (AVP) (Finance and Administration) (AVPFA), is a Chartered Public Accountant with a deep dedication to continuous improvement and championing the professional development of her team members.

“One of my favourite parts of the job is seeing people grow and change, and given the time, flexibility, freedom, and opportunity to flourish,” she says.

After beginning her career as an accountant and progressing through a series of industry and public sector roles, Heather joined the university in 2010 as the Controller, tasked with providing leadership to Financial Services. She recalls being told during the recruitment phase that it would be a “really hard job” as the unit was at a point of transition. Embracing the challenge before her, Heather led the unit through the bumps associated with the launch of PeopleSoft Finance and, working with a talented and dedicated team, brought necessary structure and protocols to the unit.

She went on to serve across Queen’s in other roles, including Associate Vice-Principal, Finance, a stint as Interim AVP Human Resources and later as Executive Director, Finance and Operations for the Faculty of Arts and Science. In early 2020, she took on the role of AVPFA, bringing with her a cross-campus perspective on the University.

Heather describes her team as impressive, determined, and focused on finding effective solutions and delivering results to a diverse body of clients. At the core of her leadership philosophy is advocating for and nurturing a supportive culture of openness: “We can’t fix what we don’t know.”

“I am both proud of and privileged to work with such an amazing team,” she says. “We say what we are going to do, and then we do what we say we are going to. At the end of the day, all you have is your word. Relationships are built on trust.”

Outside of work, Heather is honing her DIY home renovation skills and enjoys spending time reading and canoeing at her cottage with her family.

Meghan Corbett, Facilities

This fall, Meghan Corbett enters the final year of her Engineering Physics – Materials undergrad degree. She has complemented her studies with a 16-month work term as the 2023-24 Energy Engineering Intern with Facilities.  

Please tell me about your degree and career path.  

I came to Queen’s in 2020 when everything was completely online due to the COVID-19 pandemic. I was fortunate to live in Residence and meet some people, but it was super limited. We had to stick to our floor; even grabbing food at the dining halls was limited, which was a weird first-year experience. Coming to university during COVID has made me really appreciate going to the office every day or going to in-person classes. 

I chose physics because I enjoy problem solving and have always been fascinated with exploring the big questions of the universe. Engineering brings a practical approach to solving other real and more applicable problems we face in the world today. I worked in the physics department summer after second year, researching with a dark matter search experiment called PICO. 

My internship with Facilities is a nice complement to what I'm studying; while not directly related, there's overlap with materials and energy that relates to physics, especially as our world is getting more interdisciplinary. 

Tell me about your internship with Facilities. 

The internship is 16 months; I started last May, and I'll be finishing in August. The new intern who’s taking on my position has started, so I'm onboarding and mentoring him this summer.  

I work most closely with the energy and sustainability team, although my work extends to other Facilities areas. There's cross-departmental exposure, providing perspective on different systems and opportunities to apply a sustainability lens to all of it. 

My work covers a variety of projects and initiatives, like the summer electricity peak demand management program to help save on utility costs and looking for energy savings or other retro-commissioning opportunities. I also complete and submit grant applications for incentive opportunities, which involves doing measurement and verification to determine energy savings. 

I support by calculating energy savings to advance business cases to demonstrate the long-term cost of ownership. Sometimes that means advocating for the more expensive option now as it’ll translate into savings over time. It’s also about incorporating energy savings planning from the get-go rather than it being an add-on near the end of a project. A building can still run without running efficiently, so it’s part of our job to push for those things to be included. An example is updating the building standards for Queen’s to set our expectations moving forward. 

What are some of your key takeaways from the internship with Facilities? 

This internship has given me industry exposure and I'm seeing the operational side of how we run our university, verses from my student or research perspective. I’ve had opportunities to work with so many people in Facilities – from engineering to our trades to project management to finance. 

It's interesting given the geopolitical atmosphere at Queen’s right now, including with the budget deficit, to see where priorities land relative to the university's overarching goals and strategies. For our energy team, we want to save energy and move toward decarbonization, but there's only so much financial capacity - we can't go with the most energy-efficient thing all the time. It’s real-world experience in learning how project design or scope can change, given constraints.  

The piece that I've enjoyed the most though is the people I’ve met. I love to listen and learn because everyone has experience and knowledge to share. We have some very talented people with Facilities. 

What are some of the most important lessons that you've learned in your career? 

It's a short career so far, but something important I’ve noticed is being able to appreciate different priorities and opinions. Listening to other perspectives can help you see something more efficient or an opportunity for a better system that you might not have thought of otherwise, rather than defaulting to automatic thinking or simply replacing what’s broken with what was there before. 

In terms of career goals, what would you like to tackle next?   

Well finishing my degree is step one. For my fourth-year electives, I’m hoping to take more courses focused on environmental pieces related to physics, like nanomaterials or nuclear physics. Through this internship especially, I've found myself drawn to an environmental focus more often, and how my engineering degree can cater to that. 

What personal goals would you like to tackle? 

I grew up camping with my family. I want to do more exciting hiking and canoe camping trips. I’ve always wanted to go for a hiking trip to Baffin Island, so hoping to do that sometime soon, maybe once I graduate. 

Traveling - I haven't traveled a lot. I love trying new foods and exploring a city by exploring its food, I think it gives you a good feel of the culture and people. 

Have you found any good restaurants in Kingston you would recommend? 

For me, I really enjoy places that have live music and good food, like Blu Martini or Musikki’s. Some of my other favourite spots around town are the Portsmouth Tavern, Wok-In, Chez Piggy, Tango Nuevo, and Bearance's.  

Are there any books, movies or shows that have had an impact on you and why would that be? 

Hidden Figures, the movie about the three women who worked for NASA, was a good movie. The barriers today are less explicit than 20th century women in STEM faced, but there's still a lot we have to face, and that movie speaks to that experience. 

Through this internship, I met an engineer who works with Utilities Kingston, and she described it well: you don't necessarily get explicit comments anymore or people actively demeaning or undermining you, but oftentimes you still feel like the unicorn in the workplace. 

Seeing women in their roles doing their thing and people not making a big deal about the fact that they're women or making assumptions about their capability is important for me. It shouldn’t be “brave” or “rare” to see women succeeding in these roles; I want to be one of many. One of the engineers at Facilities - Janet, our senior electrical engineer - is a really cool figure for me. She does her work, she does it really well, and she's extremely intelligent, so without realizing she helps break down those biases or assumptions, not just for me as I’m starting off my career feeling these barriers, but everyone her work impacts. 

If you could sum up Queen’s in a word, what it be and why?  

The word is challenge. I see it in a good way, through the lens of my degree and this internship: it’s been a good challenge in terms of my learning and how I’ve grown as a person. 

The other perspective I see that word working with Facilities, I've seen a lot of the challenges faced by Queen’s in this moment. I think we tend to see those challenges more as barriers to avoid, but it's important for Queen’s to embrace those challenges maybe more than we’ve been doing - there are lots of opportunities for us to be better through change. 

About the program 

The Facilities internship program has welcomed students since 2013. Students enjoy a unique experiential learning opportunity in a fast-paced professional setting while contributing their enthusiasm, energy, and skillsets to advance projects and initiatives. 

Sandra Jeffers, Risk and Safety Services

Please tell me about your career journey and how you came to Queen’s. 

Prior to Queen’s, I did a lot of office administration jobs and then worked at an industrial plant for about five years, where I was sequestered to a very small space with the same people doing the exact same thing every day. 

I needed a change and applied for a casual position at Queen's in Residences. I worked there for about a year and a half and eventually ended up at the Queen's University International Center (QUIC). I worked mostly with inbound students, helping them find short-term housing and sort out health insurance.  

I had the opportunity to take courses on supporting outbound students, and as luck would have it, a position opened, and I was in that role for several years.  

I came over to Environmental Health and Safety in 2012 and have been here since. 

Tell me about your current role. 

I'm an OCASP specialist - OCASP stands for Off-Campus Activity Safety Policy – and the Emergency Support Program Coordinator. The policy governs all our off-campus activities, not just for students but also employees and any of our authorized volunteers. I provide guidance, support and training for our community members involved in off-campus activities. I also coordinate the Queen’s Emergency Support Program where I spend a lot of time checking the world news for any emergency situations where we may have community members located. If there is an incident where somebody needs assistance, I provide guidance and support and connect them with International SOS which is our third-party provider that can provide support in the field.  

Whenever I see something that might be impacting any of our community members, I reach out to make sure they're aware of the situation and to find out if they're okay or if they need any assistance. 

I also deal with experiential learning from a risk management perspective. I look at the types of experiential learning happening on campus, which is something that is growing considerably every year. 

I also do website maintenance and provide support to the Joint Health and Safety Committee. It is a different day every day. 

What scenarios do people encounter while abroad? What support is required? 

We've had people come down with malaria or other illnesses while on university sanctioned activities off-campus. If they're in remote locations, I’ll work to help find a full-service medical facility that provides the same type of medical treatment they would expect in urban cities. 

One of the biggest challenges for students is cultural maladjustment – it can be hard for them to navigate a foreign country, especially for longer periods of time. We get lots of calls from people who need either some emotional support or just somebody to connect with.  

People have had their luggage or travel documents stolen. We once had a student traveling in Guyana with other students, and she had everything stolen about a day and a half before they were to leave. They were leaving quickly due to escalating violence. She had no passport. Her mother sent a copy of her passport to the Canadian consulate in Guyana, which wasn’t accepted because they couldn’t confirm where it was coming from. Our office got involved and by working with the International Affairs Minister, we were able to ensure she had that passport, and was able to leave with the other students.  

When COVID first hit, that was the biggest situation I’ve ever dealt with – it was on such a large scale. When it first started it was one country, but things quickly spiraled with one country after another closing borders. 

Some students couldn’t come home for five to seven months. It was a lot of long hours providing support and connecting our community members abroad with the right people and information. 

Is there a project you've been involved with that you're particularly proud of? 

I was part of the team that revamped the OCASP policy. I'm proud of the work that it took to complete that project. It took us a few years to clarify and streamline the policy, revamp the entire website and streamline the online tool to provide a better user experience. We also created a companion piece, a progressive web app, which allows another way for us to connect with our community members if there's an incident. It also allows staff, faculty, and students quick and easy access to the START – the Safe Travel Activity Registration Tool - to be able to register trips or access pertinent information while abroad.  

What are some of the most important lessons that you've learned throughout your career? 

Change is going to happen and you better flow with it, because it happens all the time. 

The first 20 minutes every day when I check world news can shift my day very quickly. You’ve got to be flexible and adaptable. And you’ve got to love what you do; if you're not doing it for the right reasons, things get old and stale very quickly. 

The other thing is you've got to continue to learn. I've been working in this specific field for over 20 years and every day there's something new to learn. 

Is there a skill that you want to learn? 

I'm always working on certain skills, particularly calmness in the middle of a storm and the ability to pick up on unspoken cues. We do deal with people in distress who may not be communicating it outwardly or showing that there is an issue. Sometimes I'm surprised that I didn't catch something earlier. 

I’m trying to listen more and be more engaged when I'm talking to people to try and pick up on the non-verbal cues that there might be something else going on. 

How have you developed that skill of calmness over time? 

I've done the mental health first aid certificate as well as several other training options available through the university. 

The other thing that helps with my calmness is baking. I was never a baker. Then one time when things got very stressful a mentor said to me, you know, you should bake. 

And I said, why would I bake? 

She said because it makes you follow a recipe; you must pay attention to what you're doing. It will force you to take your mind off the other things that are distracting you. So I started doing an awful lot of baking and delivering little packages across campus. 

My mother is German, so I do a lot of German baking including Bienenstich Kuchen (Bee Sting Cake) and a cinnamon roll cheesecake. 

I tend to be loud and fast, so staying calm is something I continuously work at. 

Is there a book, movie or show that has made an impact on you and why? 

The Pursuit of Happyness resonated with me because the main character loses basically everything and has to build back up. 

There are so many times when life will throw you a curveball and you feel like just packing it in or shifting away from things, rather than dealing with the situation. 

But whenever things get stressful, when everything's starting to pile on, it’s about taking one thing at a time. The movie really highlighted for me that you need to continue to learn and have new goals.   

If you could sum up Queen’s in one word, what would it be and why? 

There are two words: one is community, one is opportunity. 

There are so many opportunities at Queen's to grow your career and try different things. The training opportunities offered at Queen’s are key to every part of your life, not just your work. 

I work with people from across the university. I enjoy being a small part of a bigger community where we are all working together, especially when we're supporting others in times of need.