Our Women in Manufacturing series highlights the innovative, skilled, and dedicated women who have chosen a manufacturing career. Women hold less than 30% of the global manufacturing jobs, yet represent nearly half of the global workforce. We hope our series encourages more women to consider a career in manufacturing.
As an adult, Debra (Deb) Starr Evers hasn’t thought much about her childhood cancer, but she is who she is, in part, because of it. JELD-WEN’s director of financial reporting and analysis listens closely and follows rules.
“I’ve always been supportive of my bosses and teachers,” she said. “Every word they said, I took as gold. My parents think I’m like this because they told me to listen carefully to my doctors and do everything they say. I think that played a big part in shaping how I operate.”
Deb was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia when she was three years old. Her life depended on listening to the experts – her doctors.
Beyond becoming hyper-attentive and understanding the value of compliance, Deb’s cancer experience led her “to know that there are always going to be times that are dark. But you’re going to get through those times. Things will get stressful, but you’ll live and grow through it,” she said.
Raised in Delaware, Deb said cancer made her a more compassionate and empathetic leader. The experience also gave her a perspective she still holds onto today.
“I try to keep a positive attitude,” she said. “Things will get tough. But unless it’s truly a matter of life or death, then it’s not a matter of life or death.”
After enduring chemotherapy and extended hospital stays, she was in remission by age five.
“I remember certain events and I recall some procedures where I was really uncomfortable,” she said. “But my parents – they remember every second of it. I was too young to understand how serious it was.”
Being a cancer survivor isn’t something Deb typically talks about – unless she’s raising money for cancer research, as she’s done since high school. Most recently, she participated in Atrium Health’s Keep Pounding Campaign with JELD-WEN.
“You don’t know about Deb’s cancer until you get to know her well,” said her manager and JELD-WEN’s chief accounting officer, Mike Leon. “As she reflected on being pregnant, it’s come up. She’s grateful that she was able to get pregnant because a doctor made her aware of the potential complications. She does not take this for granted. Once you know what she’s been through and see where she is now, you can’t help but think: Good for her.”
Surviving cancer gave young Deb a second chance at life. What would she do with it? She decided at a very early age she wanted to be an accountant. She laughs, knowing it’s not a dream most kids share.
In contrast, Mike – also a CPA – wanted to play major league baseball. He admits: “I’ll often say, ‘As a kid, I wanted to pitch for the Mets and now I do this.’”
Deb explained how the unlikely dream originated.
“I remember my dad, who was an accountant, taking me to ‘Take Your Daughter to Work Day,’” she said. “After that, I knew I wanted to be a controller. At school, we had to write down what we wanted to be when we grew up and I wrote that I either wanted to be a global controller or a dolphin trainer. The first choice was a little more realistic.”
Deb worked hard to make her dream come true. She pursued a degree in accounting at the University of Delaware. After graduation, she was an auditor for about six years in PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Philadelphia office.
She and her father still talk “shop.” Coincidentally, the job Deb landed at
JELD-WEN in 2019 – manager of financial reporting and consolidation – is the exact job her dad had during his career for another company.
“In my role at JELD-WEN, I’m basically the last line of defense between the financials we put together and what’s submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC),” she said. “We have certain hard deadlines we have to meet and during SEC reporting time; the work can get intensive, but I know I have my family, team and colleagues that support me.”
Deb was already at JELD-WEN when Mike joined, but he helped facilitate her promotion earlier in the year. After the promotion was announced, she sent “heartfelt emails” to thank people, Mike said.
“She said this was her dream job, that she’s working for her dream company and that her childhood dream had been made manifest.”
Mike is effusive in his praise of Deb.
“I call her a generational talent,” he said. “You’d have to wait another whole generation to encounter a talent like Deb.” Her greatest professional strengths, according to him: “Her positivity, intelligence, her work ethic – it’s second to none. She has a strong moral compass. She looks at everything through an ‘is-this-the-right-thing-to-do?' lens.”
While you typically hear that accounting and finance are male dominated, all of Mike’s direct reports are women. So much for conventional wisdom. Deb has seen a gender shift in her field in recent years.
“When I started my career, I was literally the only female on the audit team,” she said. “But companies have gotten a lot better about focusing on diversity and inclusion. And my company is doing a great job of prioritizing that.”
Deb has always studied people she works with to see “what skills they have that I need to develop,” she said. “It’s not just about gender. As I’ve tried to grow my career, I’ve looked to people I’ve worked for and admire – both women and men – and tried to mirror their behavior.”
After Deb got pregnant, she began studying working moms to see how they balanced work and family.
“I’ve been wondering how working moms do it all,” she said before she became one herself. “And I think: How am I going to do this? When I see women leaders at JELD-WEN and across various industries who have a successful career and family, that makes me a little less intimidated. Our CFO is a woman who has a successful professional life and manages to take time to be with her family. So, I know it’s possible.”
Deb had yearly follow-ups with a pediatric oncologist until she was 21. One of the last things she recalls the doctor telling her was that chemo could impact her fertility.
“That’s always been in the back of my mind,” she said. “Another dream of mine – besides being an accountant – was to be a mother. As an adult, I haven’t thought about cancer much. That is until I got pregnant. And now, I think about my future child and the possibility of that happening to her. I hate the thought of it, but I know it’s something my husband and I would get through together – like my parents and I did," she said.
Deb gave birth to a baby girl named Caroline on June 26, 2023. She arrived almost four weeks early, but Evers and her team had prepared for that possibility.
“JELD-WEN was great about my pregnancy. Right after I told people in January, they hired a consultant to assist in the transition and to cover my tasks. The leaders of my company are really action oriented. So, from a preparation standpoint, I was never concerned. We’re all working to make sure there are no issues when I leave and none when I come back,” she said before maternity leave.
Deb took the standard three months’ leave, and her husband, Michael Evers, took six weeks of parental leave from his job.
When she returned on September 18, 2023, she was excited to reconnect with her team and others in the organization as well as work collaboratively with her JELD-WEN team to complete certain external deliverables. She looked forward to seeing her daughter’s smiles when she went home after work each day.
Deb is extremely close to her parents, who are also her role models.
“They say a lot of couples get divorced when they have a child with a serious illness,” she said. “The fact that my parents have stayed together all these years has given me a great appreciation for their relationship. They went through hard times and stuck together. I think part of whatever success I’ve had is that I’ve always wanted to make my parents proud. They were there for me throughout something difficult, and I live every day hoping I’m making them proud.”
She clearly is. Mike said, “I’ve met Deb’s parents, who just beam with love for her. The whole family seems to know that every day is a gift.”
Deb has now achieved both her childhood dreams – becoming an accountant and becoming a mom.
“Surviving cancer has meant I have a life where I get to pursue my passions,” she said. “If I hadn’t been cured, I wouldn’t be able to work in my dream job. I’m so appreciative of even the hard times. My work can get demanding, but I sit back and think how lucky I am to love what I do and to have the physical ability to do this job.”
