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Top 10 Under 40: Meet Taneal Brucks from Meadow Lake Pulp, Paper Excellence

The next generation of leaders in Canada’s pulp and paper industry are striving hard to build a resilient future. The winners of the 2023 Top 10 Under 40 program are constantly raising the bar for their peers with their forward-thinking initiatives and their zeal to make a lasting difference. The future of the industry is in the secure hands of these young professionals. They not only take ownership of their responsibilities but contribute beyond what is expected of them.

The winners this year work in different roles and capacities within the industry, but share some key characteristics – strong work ethic, commitment to their roles and a desire to innovate and improve.

Today, we introduce Taneal Brucks, management systems coordinator, Meadow Lake Pulp, Meadow Lake, Sask.

Taneal Brucks is known for bringing a creative touch to the meticulous process of auditing, according to her colleagues at Paper Excellence. As the management systems coordinator for Meadow Lake Mechanical Pulp, Brucks’ responsibilities include ensuring the mill maintains ISO certification for quality and environmental processes. In 2022, she was instrumental in the success of a new initiative for a multi-mill FSC/PEFC certification.

She possesses an innate ability to appreciate and evaluate the creative aspects of a company’s operations, such as design and branding, while also assessing the organization’s adherence to ISO and FSC guidelines, share her colleagues. This duality of skills allows her to evaluate the company’s compliance with standards while considering the impact on the overall image.

Brucks serves as a catalyst for positive change, which enables the pulp mill to thrive while upholding the highest standards of quality and environmental stewardship. She identifies areas for growth and helps her coworkers think outside the box. She inspires the rest of the company to embrace continuous improvement.

Brucks is also an essential member of the MLMP Community Engagement Team. Her focus is on the non-profit community groups of Meadow Lake. She regularly attends community events that range from the annual rodeo to job fairs.

Brucks is always willing to improve mill communication channels – whether it’s designing slides for the mill-wide television information system or writing an article for the Paper Excellence newsletter. She also completed an internal professional development project on internal communications at the mill.