2021 Influential Businesswoman Awards

66 Acquisition International - Influential Businesswoman Awards 2021 Workspace Business Leader of the Year (Canada): Deborah Foster-Stahle fficeInc! Corp. is an office suites facility with a commercial kitchen incubator called FORK (the Food Opportunities Resource Kitchen). The 5,800sqft facility has 17 offices, accommodating 1-30 occupants, with some serving as satellite offices for large national firms, while others are occupied by local franchises and entrepreneurs, along with occasional spaces available by the hour, half day, full day, week, or month. The larger spaces accommodate four to 30 people and may be licensed for an array of uses: a temporary photo or filming studio, pop-up retail market, weekly co-working for project teams, or meetings and events such as non-profit AGMs. Hybrid meeting options are available. Other occasional offices are well-suited to individual or family counselling, financial consultation, or mediation. The “Inc!” in OfficeInc! Corp. stands for Incubator! When the commercial kitchen isn’t being utilised for the facility’s own in-house catering, it is available for FORK Members to license at affordable rates, fostering growth of local food business start-ups. The entire facility is the culmination of a 20-year dream-come-true for founder Deborah Foster-Stahle. Her first plan for a business resource centre was penned in 1997, and when Deborah and her husband and partner, Kurt Stahle, purchased the BNI Ontario Central North franchise in 2007, their business plan included opening an office suites and incubation centre in Barrie by 2017. OfficeInc! Corp. officially opened on November 30th, 2017. Deborah sold the BNI franchise in Summer 2020 to focus exclusively on building OfficeInc! “Opening our doors was a big accomplishment and investment,” explains Deborah, who has a background in corporate consulting, training and marketing. “I held corporate management, training and business development roles in my early career, and in the late 90s stepped out on my own as a consultant in Community Economic Development, then moved into organisational development consulting. The tools used in my consultancy have been invaluable in the development and growth of my facility.” Deborah’s role as a community catalyst to the Opportunities2000 (OP2000) initiative in the late-90s through Year 2000 assisted over 2000 households exit poverty in Waterloo Region through dozens of projects across the community aimed at job or business development, customised training, and more. OP2000 was recognized by the UN as one of the top poverty reduction initiatives in the world. Flying the flag for female entrepreneurs, Deborah tells us that many of the independent office suites and meeting facilities in the area are women-owned and lead. O “Plus, most of the ‘foodpreneurs’ – what I’ve coined to describe the start- up food business entrepreneurs – that we support through our commercial kitchen incubator are women-owned and operated. In addition to providing affordable access to a certified kitchen, so that foodpreneurs can produce their fare for market, home delivery or curbside pick-up, we offer guidance and informal mentoring, along with some social media marketing support.” Over the last 20 months, the pandemic has significantly shifted the way people work and where. With many companies having their teams work-from-home, large commercial properties have sat empty and leases not renewed. This has opened- up new opportunities for Deborah and OfficeInc! Corp. “Not everyone can work at home effectively due to distractions, lack of reliable internet access, or the mental health impacts of isolation,” she says. “Our offices are an ideal option, whether taken on full-time, rotated amongst staff or licensed as needed. Wide-open coworking or workstation spaces, once all the rage in office design, are no longer in vogue. This has made our private, fully-enclosed office spaces more desirable.” When companies need to bring their teams together, the facility has state-of-the-art conference spaces purpose-designed to enhance the meeting experience for better collaboration, planning and learning, with extensive contagion mitigation measures in place, such as physical distancing, to help ensure safety. OfficeInc! can also facilitate hybrid connections via Zoom to bring remote workers into meetings, using multiple camera angles, an omni-directional microphone and speakers. Recently, Deborah was awarded the prestigious accolade of Workspace Business Leader of the Year (Canada) in the Influential Businesswoman Awards for her work at OfficeInc! Corp, and she has some words of advice for women looking to get into business and become entrepreneurs, as she has. “Confidence and belief in self is key,” she enthuses. “The six core values of OfficeInc! Corp. are my own, as well: Drive, Inspiration, Clarity, Focus, Passion and Connection. These are in my heart and form the foundation of my business, figuratively and literally – the corporate values are etched in the cement beneath our flooring! True values show themselves through our actions and behaviours, and I’ve found that successful entrepreneurs live these six values in conducting business and leading others.” Playing an important role in the local business ecosystem, OfficeInc! Corp. provides its OfficeMembers with licensed full-time and occasional access to private, professional, furnished offices of various sizes. Founder, Deborah Foster-Stahle, tells us more about the company. Jul21862 Contact: Deborah Foster-Stahle Company: OfficeInc! Corp. Web Address: www.growwithofficeinc.com OfficeInc! Corp.