Thank you Medtronic

The sun has set on my time at Medtronic and I couldn’t be more grateful.?After almost 15 years, I’m thrilled to take some time off to enjoy the summer, which I am filling with painting, gardening, reading, cottaging, and travelling with my family.

To my Medtronic family, I say thank you for the gift of time off.?

I would be remiss not to extend a few more words of gratitude.

Thank you to Lenaee Dupuis (she/her) , Lynda Pike and Yvan Deurbroeck for seeing my transferable skills all those years ago.?When I saw the job description, I couldn’t believe this was something people got paid to do all day! Thanks to you I found my new vocation. Pam convinced me Medtronic was the place to be when she said, “if we try to forget our emotions, we begin to lose our humanity.”?

Thank you to Jane Wilcox for being instrumental in making the first two PR campaigns I ever worked on IABC award winners. Terance Brouse you remain my favourite pitch writer of all time.

Thank you to Omar Ishrak for coming onboard a year later and inspiring us with the promise of value-based healthcare.?This led to a decades-long thought leadership strategy in Canada, led by Neil Fraser and Pamela Winsor and supported by Gabriela Prada, Hamid Sadri, PharmD, PhD(c) and Jason Vanderheyden. I am forever grateful that Neil insisted I put my name on content we worked on together. That is rare for a communicator to experience, but then so are you. More importantly, we saw real changes in how people talked about procurement and the value of innovation. And Medtronic Canada became the leader in the market.

Thank you to Genevieve Lavertu for always going the extra mile to explain “why” something was so important, either in your role as leader of legal counsel, regulatory affairs, clinical affairs, or business development.?You remain one of the most intelligent and inspiring people I have ever met along with Marilise Kassouf.?

Thank you to Connie De Lange for bringing the Americas Comms team together and elevating our strategic communications skills, shining a light on our sub-regions, giving us budget to work with, and celebrating our accomplishments on a bigger stage.

Thank you to Eric Boyles for letting Canada be one of only 10 countries funded when we moved our website to AEM; and to Robyn Harada and everyone else involved for showing that Canada can take on big hairy projects in two languages in record time.

Thank you to Rob Clark for rallying the troops for one of the largest acquisitions in medtech history when Medtronic acquired Covidien. You called it the “super bowl” of communications. It was more like the World Cup! Thank you to Lori Ann Campbell, MBA, who led comms at Covidien Canada, for showing everyone that it didn’t have to be me or you. It could be us.

Thank you to Olaf Felske for almost always saying yes and your sly smile when I convinced you yet again that an investment was worth it.

Thank you to Noel Greaves for saying the hard truth that would keep us all compliant with Health Canada regulations. For reminding me to focus on balance. And to get off my phone.

Thank you to André Guérin and Yvonne Farquharson for making communications such an integral part of the company’s strategy, in good times and in bad.

Thank you to Amy Jo Meyer for your leadership after hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico and customers were freaking out about product supply; and your crisis comms leadership when journalists around the world tried to disparage the entire medtech industry, scaring patients wand frustrating doctors.

Thank you to Farrah Zuberi, Daniel Giacinti and Chet Patel for giving me outstanding marketing strategies to work from so that the communications we developed could be that much more strategic and impactful. And to Angelica Litsiou and Katie Heelis for helping to transform those strategies into award winning communications campaigns.

Thank you to Geoff Martha, Karen Parkhill, Carol Surface for your handling of the first year of the pandemic. You said employees’ health was your number one priority and your actions showed you meant it.?You let others use the IP for a Medtronic ventilator and Canada took advantage of the offer.?As a communicator, it was a stressful time but also a source of pride to be able to share what Medtronic was doing during that unprecedented period.

Thank you to Rafa (why aren't you on Linkedin??) for giving me my dream job leading a global team.?I’m sorry Global Regions didn’t last, but as I said to my team, no one can take the experience away from us.?We all learned about working asynchronously and remotely, the importance of team meetings (worth it despite the early/late hour), and the benefits of working across cultures, including accelerated learning and development. I am incredibly proud of what we accomplished. And I am grateful to call my team members friends (both on the leadership team -- Louise Porter, Nada Chammas, Valerie COURCIER, Masooma Sandeep, Anne, Sandra Ocampo Fiona Pattiselanno, Nicole Gfeller) and on the center of excellence team - Andrew Crawford, Laura Moerman, Naoko Ono, Noriko, Marica, Kate Robbins, Juliette Hagan, Lisa Fratamico).?

To Torod B. Neptune and Jason Moriber for coming in and shaking things up to elevate the function to a higher gear.?For recognizing a global organization needs to be more diverse and international, and for moving with speed to make great ideas happen. I’m rooting for you!

To Eric Boyles and Malena Thoson for letting me be a beta tester for AI in communications.?It’s going to fundamentally change the way our function operates. I just hope AI isn’t why we lost so many award-winning communicators around the world.?It definitely can’t do what they did!

To Monika Paquette, CMP, MBA and Roxane Belanger who have been along for the ride almost my entire career at Medtronic. Thanks for being my partners in success – see all of the above – and for making going into the office so much fun (even if you would rather be at home!).?

An extra special thank you to Neil D. Fraser.?For hiring me because “I would never be ok with good enough”. For giving me a chance to take on strategy, market research, and stakeholder engagement. For sending me to Harvard for the Value Measurement in Healthcare program. For sharing your joy when I exceeded your expectations. For telling me that if I didn’t fail every now and then, it only meant I wasn’t trying hard enough. For promoting me. For welcoming different points of view. For trusting me with the truth during difficult times. For letting me be part of your good-bye. And for caring even after you retired..?Working with you has truly been the privilege of a lifetime.

There are literally hundreds of other people I want to thank, but I have already far exceeded the limits of what is reasonable for a LinkedIn article. If you are reading this and I didn't mention you, please know that I am grateful for having had the privilege to work with you.

While the sun has set for me at Medtronic, I wish everyone still there sunny skies ahead.