International Women's Month Series

Debbie Benadiba is the CEO of Talon Outdoor Canada, the largest independent out of home planning and buying agency in the world. She's spent 25 years in the industry building teams, mentoring women, and serving on the boards of DPAA and COMMB. She chairs WE.DOOH—Women's Empowerment Digital Out of Home. She's a certified spin instructor. A mother of two teenagers. And a recent breast cancer survivor.

Little Debbie had jazz hands in every family photo. Her grade five teacher told her parents they had a dynamo on their hands. She wanted to be a backup dancer for Janet Jackson. What led her to advertising was watching Heather Locklear on Melrose Place in the 90s—she saw that powerhouse account executive and thought, I need to be her.

In this conversation, Debbie talks about working in a male-dominated industry and feeling like she always had to prove her ideas with a business case while men in the room didn't. In 2016, she went back to school for an MBA because she felt she needed those credentials to get to the next level. The moment she updated her LinkedIn, she got recruited for a presidency role.

She's honest about getting packaged out of a company 15 years ago. The embarrassment. The fear. And the mentor who called and said, I got you girl—you've got a job in eight weeks. That call changed the next 15 years of her career.

And then she talks about this year. The breast cancer diagnosis. Being at her worst. Coming out the other side. She used to feel like she was running for 26 years straight. Now she takes 10 minutes every morning before reaching for her phone. She wakes up and says: today, something wonderful is going to happen to me.

She just turned 50 in Costa Rica surrounded by 25 women from every chapter of her life. Her advice: be open, be curious, be accepting. Those three words have carried her through everything.

Connect with Debbie

Debbie’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/debbiebenadiba/?originalSubdomain=ca

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