Announcing Modu-Loc’s 2019 Award Winners

Last year, Modu-Loc launched the Don Rintoul Founder’s Lifetime Achievement Award, which is presented annually to an exceptional employee who has consistently demonstrated the ‘Modu-Loc Way’ during a minimum of 5 years of employment with the company. Last week, we announced our second-ever recipient of the Don Rintoul Founder’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

This year, we also introduced a new awards program for Modu-Loc employees. The Core Values Awards recognize individual team members for consistently demonstrating a specific core value. The Core Values Awards winners for 2019 were selected by our Senior Leadership Team and Improvement and Advancement Committee.

The Don Rintoul Award and inaugural Core Values Awards were presented to recipients last week at Modu-Loc’s 2019 National Meeting in Niagara Falls, ON. Nearly 60 of our employees from depots all across Canada were there to honour and congratulate the award winners.

Without further ado, our award winners were…

Tod Lafleur (Don Rintoul Founder’s Lifetime Achievement Award)

Tod Lafleur is Modu-Loc’s longest-serving employee, having worked for the company for 19 years! The 9th employee ever hired at Modu-Loc, Tod embodies all of our core values as one of our Field Specialists – but is especially focused on safety. In 2015, he achieved his welding certification, and in 2016 Tod completed the Construction Safety Officer (CSO) course with advanced rescue, fall protection, confined space rescue, and train the trainer for FIT testing on respirators. Tod is also our employee representative for the Western Canada Joint Health and Safety Committee.

On site, Tod is invaluable as one of our best Event Leads, and is often specifically requested by our customers thanks to the excellent service he provides. When he is not out on a construction or event site, Tod can be found in the yard making sure our Vancouver depot runs in a clean, safe, and efficient manner.

Outside of work, Tod is an active team player and is involved on the Modu-Loc Machines ice hockey team and the Field Specialists touch football team. As one employee put it, “It is very clear that he enjoys what he does, who he works with and the company he works for”.

Congratulations to Tod Lafleur on earning the Don Rintoul Founder’s Lifetime Achievement Award – it is well-deserved!

Etienne Boutin (Collaboration & Teamwork Award)

Etienne is someone you can always count on to step in and help when needed. As our Operations Manager for Quebec City, Etienne frequently collaborates with our Montreal and Ottawa depots. In fact, for the last 7 years, Etienne has made sure to block off his schedule during the Osheaga Festival so that he is always available to help our Montreal depot with their largest event. Even following the birth of his first child, Etienne was regularly commuting from Quebec City to Montreal to fill in while we dealt with some staffing changes.

After Etienne took it upon himself to learn English so that he could better communicate with the rest of the company, he became a frequent translator of internal documents. In this way, Etienne makes sure that our francophone employees are never left out. He has also become involved with our Modu-vation Committee, which sends out semimonthly email newsletters to help motivate and inspire our employees.

As one of Etienne’s peers said, “He is always promoting a positive work environment through pep talks, immediately addressing concerns, and lending a helping hand to whomever needs it”.

Deirdre Bauer (Stability & Dependability)

Another long-term employee, Deirdre (or “Dee”, as she is known among friends and peers) has worked for Modu-Loc for 13 years. As one of our Accounts Receivable specialists, Dee is our go-to expert for any invoicing or administrative issues, and has also been known to moonlight as a Fence Girl by unloading customers when they drop by the Kelowna yard unannounced!

Dee is a crucial team member and a technical expert in our billing system, and Modu-Loc greatly benefits from her years of service, knowledge, positive attitude, and sheer will to get the job done and done right. Similarly, our customers enjoy working with Deirdre, as she will go above and beyond to get them exactly what they need. As a member of our Western Regional Steering Committee, she is a great contributor of content and can be relied upon to bring forward best practices on an administrative and operational level.

As one employee recently said, “Dee perennially brings a great attitude and you can feel her smile through the phone, even on the most frustrating of days”.

Bobby Chenier (Integrity & Trust)

As our London Depot Supervisor for the last few years, Bobby is trusted to run a fairly remote branch while always adhering to our core values. Bobby takes his role very seriously, and holds himself accountable for his team’s safety and professionalism, always ensuring that his team is compliant and trained.

Bobby has been known to load up his personal car with u-bolts or whatever is required to finish a job site to perfection, and will deliver and install products on his personal time if the material wasn’t initially ordered ahead of time. He goes above and beyond to satisfy our customers’ requirements and maintain a high level of integrity.

Bobby can always be trusted to come through, and if he ever feels he can’t deliver on an expectation, he is always up-front about it – again demonstrating integrity. He doesn’t shy away from sharing bad news if people need to hear it or be made aware, and he asks for help if he needs it. As his Manager says, “Bobby wears the core values like a superhero cape”.

Darlene Sparrow (Family & Well-being)

An employee for more than 10 years, Darlene is known for having created a tight-knit team in her home branch of Kelowna. She has built an environment within the depot that fosters a sense of family and belonging, and is always empathetic to the needs of our customers and employees. As our Accounts Receivable Manager, Darlene takes it upon herself to get to know each and every one of her team members on a personal level.

She has held her team together through the trials and tribulations of switching accounting systems, and regularly organizes team-building activities outside of work. Her commitment to her team is so strong, that one employee believed that the core value of Family & Well-being was added thanks to Darlene.

As they put it, “When the core value ‘Family & Well-Being’ was added, my first thought was that this is because of Darlene and what she has created within our office; that others wanted to follow her lead in making our days here more than just ‘a day at work’”.

Kate O’Hearn (Vision & Innovation)

Kate started her career with Modu-Loc as an Inside Sales Representative, but her exceptional organizational abilities and passion for improvement led her along a different path. In her current role as Project Manager, Kate has led the charge on initiatives like our Admin training plan, online customer portal, and Sign & Rent.

While Modu-Loc is known for innovative products, Kate perfectly exemplifies how our core value of “Vision & Innovation” can be also demonstrated through the improvement of internal processes. She serves as an inspiration to her peers who may not have an opportunity to directly influence our product lineup, but who have the ability to enhance our procedures, workflows, processes or systems.

Kate has demonstrated over and over again that she believes we are capable of great things here at Modu-Loc, and that she is willing to be one of the people to help us achieve that vision. She is a passionate advocate for improvement and continued progression, and a worthy recipient of this award!

Terrence Campbell (Excellent, Reliable Service)

With 11 years of service under his belt, Terrence is one of Modu-Loc’s most experienced Fence Guys. He is known for his amazing work ethic, regularly going the extra mile for customers on site. Terrence takes a tremendous amount of pride in everything that he does, and it doesn’t go unnoticed by our clients. He is frequently praised by our customers for the excellent service he provides.

Terrence is known to be a perfectionist, and is always committed to getting the job done right. This means he is a stickler for following proper procedure – especially when it comes to safety. He is equally as passionate about passing his wisdom and experience on to more junior employees, who often look up to him as a mentor.

When asked to describe him, his peers use words like intelligent, responsible, dedicated, dependable, hard-working, professional, polite, talented, funny, and caring. Possibly the most refreshing thing about Terrence is that he treats all clients – regardless of size – with the same level of respect. He is truly a walking example of Excellent, Reliable Service.

Colton Cook (Safety & Accountability)

As a new Operations Manager, Colton has grown with the company throughout our increasing focus on safety. In fact, he is seen as someone who is really driving that change by creating a culture of safety within his home branch of Calgary. Colton always fulfills his responsibility of making sure his crews have the information and training required to be able to safely perform their duties. He is very serious about ensuring his team members leave work in the same shape in which they showed up.

Colton is a JHSC representative, and is known for being unyielding when it comes to safety. Though others may want to cut corners to save time or effort, Colton will always stick to his guns to ensure we are operating in the safest possible manner. He is now spearheading an internal campaign, “Take a Minute”, to remind our Operations staff to pause and properly assess whether something they’re about to do is unsafe.

Colton’s daily commitment to health and safety has created increased awareness and an environment of accountability. Our Calgary branch has greatly benefited from this commitment, and it is the reason that Colton is deserving of the Safety & Accountability award.