Virtual Event
Women in Manufacturing
May 13, 2021 at 1:00pm ET

Moderator: Nour Hachem-Fawaz, MBA

Nour Hachem-Fawaz is president and founder of Build a Dream, a mom, entrepreneur and passionate equity advocate, and the host of the Perfectly Unfiltered podcast.

Nour wants to change global perspectives on women’s contribution to society. Inspired by her mother’s perseverance to excel in a male-dominated field, Nour dug deep into the ‘why’ behind the lack of women in skilled trades. She realized that the barriers keeping women out of these rewarding careers were common to other male-dominated paths and created a non-profit to encourage and empower young women to explore careers they may never have considered.

Nour’s challenge to audiences is that one must first address internal preconceptions before being capable of making significant strides that transform our work and world. A brilliant connector and facilitator, audiences are drawn to her candor and unique perspective from an extensive career in workforce development and her lived experiences as a woman of colour. She shares energetic stories of what leaders are doing right and offers real-world examples of how embracing diverse workplaces accelerates success.

Nour earned her Bachelor of Arts from the University of Windsor and expanded Build a Dream across Canada while completing her MBA, raising children, and earning many awards and accolades. She spends each day following her passion: creating equity not just in the workplace, but in all of the spaces around us.

Meet our Panelists:

Irene Sterian, PEng, Founder, President & CEO, REMAP Network
Director, Technology & Innovation, Celestica

Irene is a strategic technology leader with over 30 years of experience in electronics. Irene has an entrepreneurial spirit and is a driving force in the future of manufacturing in Canada. Irene presents significant accomplishments in engineering management and pioneered environmentally safe, sustainable manufacturing technologies. Irene is a Professional Engineer in Ontario and holds a patent in high-density, high-performance memory circuit packaging.

As a successful engineering executive, Irene has demonstrated incredible creative vision with the ability to forge successful large-scale, cross-sector partnerships. Her work has resulted in unprecedented investments in Canadian commercial R&D in electronics manufacturing. These investments support start-ups and small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs) in the healthcare, energy, ICT and aerospace sectors.

Irene continues to give back to the engineering community as a regular contributor to global manufacturing standards at international associations through several board membership and steering committee appointments, including Canada’s first advanced manufacturing supercluster, NGen Canada. Irene is a regular contributor to the World Manufacturing Forum Report and many other industry publications.

As a frequent industry expert and conference speaker, Irene co-hosted the 2018 Ontario Economic Forum (Future of Work) and was a Canada 2020 Future of Work panelist. Irene delivers “Smart Manufacturing for a Connected World” seminars and workshops from coast-to-coast to increase the adoption of Industry X.0 in Canada – a strategy for Canadian businesses to navigate the digital economy, accelerate growth, and increase global competitiveness.

Among Irene’s key accomplishments are three-time GOLD winner at the 2020 Stevie® International Business Awards (Innovator of the Year, Executive of the Year – Manufacturing and Executive of the Year – NFP) and the 2019 Medal for Management from Ontario Professional Engineers. As architect and founder of a $50-million business-led NCE with over 400 participants, Irene has reached upward of 10,000 mentoring hours. She has also managed large 50+ engineering teams (Thailand, Malaysia, China, United States & Canada), led an engineering team to implement first five SMT / flip chip assembly lines, and leveraged the Ontario Green Energy Act legislation for a new solar factory.

Diane Reko, Chief Executive Officer, Reko International

Diane Reko is the Chief Executive Officer of Reko International Group Inc., a diversified, technology-driven manufacturing company located in Lakeshore, Ont. The company utilizes technology combined with a long history of manufacturing to supply innovative automation solutions, tooling, prototype parts and precision machining of large critical components to its customers in the automotive, transportation, power generation, aerospace and more recently food and other industries. Diane is proud to lead this woman-owned company with a team of skilled and innovative people and is passionate about the importance of manufacturing success and independence in North America.

Peng-Sang Cau, Vice-President LS Emerging Markets and Symphoni™, ATS Automation

Peng is a dynamic, charismatic and innovative executive who co-founded Transformix Engineering Inc. and was its president and CEO for 21 years. ATS acquired Transformix’s IP in 2018. After spinning off a new company called Nuformex, where Peng is board chair, she joined ATS as VP Emerging Markets and Symphoni™ in March 2020.

Peng has served on a number of boards and committees in Kingston, Ottawa and Toronto.

She is an entrepreneur coach with L-Spark, an accelerator in Ottawa, and We-Can with Queen’s University, and is a regular speaker at conferences. She has been featured in local and national TV, radio and print media.

Peng’s greatest accomplishment is being a mother to two wonderful teenagers. Her other awards include being named Canada’s Top 19 Tech Titans in 2019 by IBM, OWIT’s Women Exporter of the Year, Kingston Business Hall of Fame inductee, Kingston’s Business Woman of the Year, Queens University’s Jim Bennett Award Recipient, St. Lawrence Honorary Diploma and the Kingston Chamber of Commerce Young Entrepreneur Award.

The highlight of her career was travelling with Prime Minister Stephen Harper on two trade missions to the Netherlands and China to represent Canada.

Peng and her family came to Canada in 1980 from Cambodia as refugees.

Kristle Bautista, Author, Course Director and HR Advisory, Magellan Aerospace

Kristle Bautista, MHRM, CHRL, is the author of The Pivotal Moment, course director at York University and an HR advisor within the aerospace industry. Her global HR advisory, mentorship and training experience spans across the aerospace, business consulting, not-for-profit, food and consumer packaged goods industries. She is a natural introvert and a true champion for the quiet ones too.