Moya Greene's Kitchen Fetish
The Report on Business from the Globe and Mail
It all began with a paperback copy of Julia Child's classic cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Moya Greene was leaving home and heading to university, and, as she envisioned her new life in an undergraduate apartment, she realized she lacked a critical skill. "I had to learn to feed myself," says the CEO of Canada Post, laughing now at her younger self. During her student years at Memorial University of Newfoundland, she worked her way through that cookbook until it was tattered and torn, not to mention stained.
Growing up on the Rock, one of four children to a mother who was a seriously good cook, Greene learned to appreciate food early on. But it was in her own apartment in St. John's that she came to enjoy the process of preparing it. Friends came over regularly on Friday evenings for a home-cooked meal. "I used to do very complicated dishes," Greene says. "I was very adventuresome. Soufflés were a regular, and I used to be very creative with my sauces...by the time I got to law school [at Osgoode Hall in Toronto] I was pretty good."
On this night, Greene is doing what she loves to do: Gather a few good friends together at her condo in Toronto, make some fabulous food and set a beautiful table. The menu, printed on little cards adorned with-what else?-Canada Post stamps, is simple but hearty. The entrée is a dish she calls "Mark and Cindy's chicken," named after long-time friend Mark Daniels (the former deputy minister of labour with whom she worked during the early years of her career) and his wife. The recipe calls for a heavy dose of salt and paprika, sprinkled on the skin to keep it crisp and seal in the meat's juices, and sprigs of thyme tucked under the skin. On the side: roasted Tuscan vegetables and fingerling potatoes with olives and tomatoes. And as an appetizer: scallops cooked to perfection in a little butter.
Greene moves around the kitchen with ease, chic in a silk shift, not a hair out of place. She isn't particular about what kind of kitchen she works in-she splits her cooking between two homes, in Toronto and Ottawa-and has no snobbery when it comes to pots or other implements, though she admits to a bias for gas ranges. The social aspect of her cooking has led to the only mealtime disasters she can recall, usually having something to do with forgetting food in the oven. "People come, you start chatting, and you burn things," she explains, her somewhat impish sense of humour in evidence. "But I never pretend that nothing has happened. I just explain and go to plan B, which is to throw something easy together."
Greene is no stranger to thinking on her feet; her talent for doing so will come in handy as she strives to grow Canada Post at a challenging time in the Crown corporation's history. She joined the post office in 2005, with a CV that clearly brought Bay Street savvy to the business (although she began her career in the federal public service, her extensive background in banking includes stints as a managing director at TD Securities and as a senior vice-president at Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce).
Since she assumed her position at Canada Post, the corporation has consistently turned a profit: In 2007, it generated $7.5 billion in revenue, for a profit of $54 million; last year, it made $90 million on revenues of $7.7 billion. To keep the post office profitable, Greene has implemented a number of cost-cutting initiatives, such as reducing company travel and using Purolator Courier (of which Canada Post is a majority owner) to handle mail cargo.
And while Canadians' increased use of e-mail might suggest Canada Post's business will shrink, Greene isn't worried. Of its $7.5 billion in annual revenue, only about $600 million comes from personal mail. Its electronic product-ePost, a digital bill-delivery system-showed growth of 20% in the past year, and broke even for the first time. And Greene clearly views Canada Post as a solutions company for corporate customers: "We help businesses-help them deliver on their promises, help them get paid," she says, animatedly describing some of the new products that Canada Post has designed for its customers, including document management.
Still, Greene says that Canada Post will need to invest in new equipment, and that may require new capital in the form of a bond issuance. "Some of the equipment we still use is in the postal museum in the U.S.," she says.
Back at the Friday night dinner, her mother Angela's specialty is on the menu for dessert-whatever fruit is on hand, baked in the oven and served hot with ice cream. "Sometimes it was pears and apples," Greene recalls, "but it was always delicious." Tonight, rhubarb is featured, along with peaches. The rhubarb is the secret, Greene says. "You need that bit of tartness to bring out the sweet."
As Greene's professional life has grown in complexity, her cooking has become ever simpler. Practical and efficient, she focuses her energy where it's most needed. "I can't remember the last time I made a Béarnaise sauce," she says. "I don't want to fuss with things any more-simple is good now." CTVglobemedia Publishing, Inc