Stakeholder and person she interacts with. It’s the quality of product and service, marketing efforts, branding, and financial leadership. And it’s ALL about people. She believes that through the business, there is a total commitment to every person, employee, client, supplier, and community that needs to experience this commitment.

“I find the finest leaders to lead our business and functional areas. I am not good at being a micro-manager, and I don’t do great at being a delegator. Many leaders think they must have all the information to develop all the plans and decisions. I am slightly different – I employ some of the finest and most experienced leaders,” explains Tersia. “Why have them and pay them good wages and tell them what to do step-by-step? I empower them to lead their areas and hold them accountable for results. Think about it: If we need to increase the Gross Margin, we give the task to the team. The operations return with strategies, processes, and other ideas to decrease the procured cost of materials, improve efficiencies and automation ideas, and increase plant productivity and utilization. The sales team reverts their actions to target specific products, market segments, new product development, new customer-focused multi-territory agreements, etc. THERE IS NO “I” in TEAM – it’s a team effort, and we hold each other accountable. We challenge and push each other – but always respectful.

Tersia has built a “safe space” on trust and transparency. This “bubble” gives employees the space and opportunity to share ideas and perspectives. Employees are far happier with a freely collaborative culture.

Doing Inspirational Work

Tersia was involved in a community project for a not-for-profit organization outside Canada. They dealt with a lot of substance abuse and with some of the harshest, inhumane situations imaginable, right down to parents debauching their children. “We placed and tried to find safe spaces for people to be able to recover and heal. At one point we could not find a place for a specific young man timely. He was on death row on his own,” elucidates Tersia. “I took him into our home. For weeks he slept and lived under “guard” in our home. I took him to the office with me, he followed me to my kids’ school or into town to buy groceries. The weeks became months, and he fully recovered to become a healthy person who is making massive contributions to others today. I learned that investing personally in someone, no matter how dire, yields the best returns one can ever imagine.”

The pioneering learned this moral from her father. Tersia’s father is the kindest human alive – but he is also the one person who taught her never to compromise her values. He allowed her to chase her dreams and showed her that hard work makes everything possible. He retired from the military and became a farmer. “He knows the value of people following you with uncompromised loyalty, but he also taught me that no war is won by a single act of courage – it’s the men and women behind you that sacrifice the most and together wins the war,” she says. “As a farmer, he knew that every plant grows if it’s given sunlight, oxygen, and loads of fertilizer. I try to apply that to our business. Our people’s growth fuels the growth of our business.” Another person who influenced Tersia to become a leader was her spouse. He has been her strongest motivator, supporter, and teacher, encouraging her to do good in the company and society.

Becoming A Leader

Employers typically go through all the scientific and business-like things, such as regular reviews, performance evaluations, etc. Still, Tersia has learned that one can influence and understand people more through a one-on-one, at their job station, or meeting for a cup of coffee approach. According to her, people want to do the right things and grow, but growth for one is different from growth for another, and a leader needs to understand the same thing. It is about being able to stand up and be honest with people, allow them balance, and honor their families that sometimes sacrifice so much for them working in the business.

Tersia states that one can become a good leader if one can learn about creating opportunities for growth, assigning new responsibilities, and inviting input. “You learn more here than in the evaluation that says oh “Steve” needs to get excel training, or “Janice” needs supervisory development,” she adds.

Creating A Great Company

Wasteline Containers Ltd. specializes in Designing, Developing, and Manufacturing high volume waste and recycling collection systems and custom work. The Wasteline hands-on approach, through many years of experience, allows the company to alter products to meet the consumers’ everyday needs. The company is modernly trained on an ongoing basis to support the cost-effective production of its products. This allows Wasteline Containers to maintain a competitive market position to keep consumer costs in line.

“There is a lot to be done professionally in our business. We strive to become a true multi-territory, national and North American player of repute. We always look at expansion possibilities, whether organic, through territory expansion and/or acquisition,” states Tersia. “I would like to continue to work next to my team to strive to be a truly dominating player in our chosen markets across North America. And personally, I want to travel more with my husband Dirk, and see and experience more of what this beautiful planet has to offer.”