Dynamic Government Affairs & International Relations leader Nadia Theodore takes her talents to the private sector
November 23, 2020
Diplomats come and go.
After serving their country abroad for a certain period of time, envoys are recalled home to work in their Foreign Affairs departments or sent to another overseas destination.
With her time winding down as Canada’s Consul General to the Southeast United States based in Atlanta, Nadia Theodore was surprised when Maple Leaf Foods Inc. reached out late last year with a job offer.
“From a business and work perspective, the company was quite new to me,” she said. “So, I had never interacted with them in my work and have never been employed in the agro space before. I had no idea where they were going, but when I decided to research the company, I thought, ‘Wow Nadia, what an opportunity to come back home and create an impact with an organization whose direction is very much in line with where I see myself in terms of the intersection of business and values’. I believe in economic success that’s driven by social value and excellence with authenticity.”
A producer of food products under leading brands, including Maple Leaf Prime, Country Natural and Schneider’s, Maple Leaf Food is also a leading protein provider to several Canadian restaurants and chains and the world’s first major carbon-neutral food company.
Last month, Theodore made her debut in the private sector as Maple Leaf’s Senior Vice-President of Global Government & Industry Relations after spending the last 22 years with the federal government.
“What clinched it for me was when I got the opportunity to have my first of many interviews with Chief Executive Officer Michael McCain and President & Chief Operating Officer Curtis Frank,” she said. “They are such authentic leaders. They were honest, open and transparent with me about who they are as leaders and what their vision for the company is. It was so refreshing that I thought I am really interested in this and it is going to be good.”
Maple Leaf is one of three animal protein companies in the world and the only food company in Canada to set science based targets that are aligned with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change goals.
When Theodore touched down in the United States three years ago as Canada’s head of mission for the Southeast United States, she had to quickly get up to speed and learn who the key players are.
The ability to learn on the fly is something that will serve her well in the new role.
“The importance of relationships and the ability to quickly develop them where you have little to no context and background are critical,” Theodore pointed out. “For me, the agro food space is completely new as I don’t know the players and I am not an expert in the field. Also, I am a genuinely curious person and I believe that the more that you double click on things and explore them, the better it is. In this new job where I will be dealing across multiple business lines of the company, I think having that curiosity will be very beneficial to me.”
Leading the diplomatic representation of Canada in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, North and South Carolina and Tennessee, Theodore managed a 22-member staff and spearheaded initiatives to strengthen community, regional and diplomatic ties and build stakeholder consensus among other job functions.
In between landing in Atlanta in the middle of Hurricane Irma and leaving in the midst of a global pandemic, her diplomatic representation was stellar.
One of the highlights of her time was the integral role she played in the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) that came into effect on July 1 to modernize the 26-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
“It was such a all-hands-on-deck by heads of mission across the U.S network, working together to get out there and do what we could to drive towards a successful conclusion outside of the core negotiations which were handled by negotiators in Ottawa and Washington,” said Theodore who made her career in Global Affairs Canada Trade Agreement & Negotiations Branch. “The role that we played on the advocacy front made a difference and we know that because members of the United States Congress cited back publicly lines that we had provided to them during our advocacy calls. That helped to build the narrative around why the Canada, U.S, Mexico relationship is so important and why the agreement needed to be modernized.”
Prior to going to the United States, she worked on several major trade initiatives, including the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic & Trade Agreement (CETA) that created jobs, strengthened economic relations and boosted Canada's trade with the world’s second largest market.
Though primarily focused on trade issues in her first two years, Theodore – who was featured on the cover of December 2018/January 2019 edition of the Southern Automobile Alliance magazine -- was instrumental in promoting Canadian values and cultures and opening the mission to the Canadian Diaspora.
“Many Black and other visible minorities in the Southeast USA and in Atlanta in particular said to me when I would open up the doors of the mission to them and invite them to events and include them in the brainstorming that they never had been invited and more importantly they had never seen the Canada that reflects who they are reflected back to them abroad,” she noted.
Theodore paid tribute to career diplomat Stephen Brereton who also had an open door policy.
The Consul General based in Atlanta for five years up until 2014 passed away in September 2019.
“When I first met Jay Bailey who is the President & CEO of the biggest Black entrepreneurship incubator in Atlanta, he took out his mobile device and brought up a picture of Stephen from years ago and said, ‘I had a relationship with the mission years ago and I am glad to rebuild it’,” she recalled.
But for a family funeral in St. Lucia, Theodore logged about 40,000 frequent flyer miles for work in the 12 months leading up to COVID-19.
“I was in a privileged position during the pandemic, so I got to decide what our staff was doing,” she said. “I wasn’t forced like many people to react and adjust to what their leadership required them to do in order to deliver on business goals. I was also lucky that I was the leader of an organization where it is very easy for everyone to work from home, though perhaps not mentally and emotionally. But from a practical standpoint, we were able to deliver on our core business objectives from home.”
Theodore, who spent her Grade 12 year in 1995 in St. Lucia at the Sir Arthur Lewis Community College when her father – retired economist and eight-time St. Lucia Calypso Monarch McGriffin Theodore (The Mighty Terra) -- returned to the Eastern Caribbean island to be the second in command at the National Insurance Corporation, did her Law studies externally in Trinidad and spent a year in the Office of the Ombudsman in St. Lucia before returning to Ottawa to complete her Master’s in Political Science at Carleton University.
Joining the federal public service as an Assistant Manager in the Aboriginal Policing Directorate at Public Safety Canada, she went to the Department of Foreign Affairs & International Trade 15 years ago. She was the Chief of Staff to the Deputy Minister of International Trade at Global Affairs Canada prior to her diplomatic assignment in the U.S.
Will Theodore return to the public sector down the road?
“If you had asked me if I would ever be going to the private sector, I would have said ‘no, no’,” the married mother of a seven-year-old daughter said. “But here I am, so you never know where life takes you.”
