Alive HR

As it’s Thanksgiving today, I’m thinking about things for which I’m grateful.

1. That my ex talked me into becoming a mom all those years ago.
2. Family, both the ones that live under my roof and around the country.
3. Friends, of course. My health. A roof over my head and food on the table.
4. The HR social media world that has so enriched my life.
5. A job I love (most days)  in an industry I’m passionate about.

Since this is an HR blog, I want to focus a little more on my job and organization. I’m the HR Director for Jubilee Association, a nonprofit provider of residential supports for people who have  developmental disabilities. In the last five weeks, five things have made me especially proud to work there:

• Housing partnerships. Jubilee is doing some extremely creative and cutting edge projects related to housing, as unveiled at a ribbon-cutting ceremony of our most recently opened house, which is a result of a partnership with the local housing authority. As one of the speakers mentioned, we are one of a tiny handful of organizations across the US with this accomplishment, drawing regional and even some national attention.
• We just celebrated the first anniversary of another house inhabited by three young men on the grounds of a Catholic Church, St. Rose of Lima. The result of eight years of planning and hard work, it’s another example of creative approaches and strategic partnerships. The anniversary dinner was a touching event, quite simply the most beautiful moment I have experienced in my career. Families spoke glowingly of their loved ones who have learned so much, bonded together and come to identify their new house as home to the extent that none of them want to stay at their parents or siblings places.  Also, staff received some pretty nice cash awards thanks to a grant the Archdiocese received, followed by a very thoughtful and gracious speech from the lead counselor thanking and recognizing all the different parties that come together to make the household work.
• Last month, we held an annual retreat and staff awards. Our awards are all based on our organizational values, such as dignity and respect or community, mutuality and service.  With each award, the person nominating read his/her nomination. Again it was a very touching and affirming event.  The recipients of one award received a standing ovation from their peers for providing exceptional, caring service to a woman who has dementia.
• In my own department, I am thrilled and happy to welcome my new HR Coordinator, Rose Mudd who is helping me crank out some work and fill some vacancies. One person we hired was Clay. The other day, I saw him and asked how things were going. He enthusiastically talked about how much he was enjoying it, how friendly people are, how much he respects and is learning from the senior staff at his group home, and that he promotes our agency when he attends training elsewhere. “You should be working at Jubilee,” he tells others. I know he’s in his honeymoon and eventually people do come down from the clouds, but it was gratifying to hear.
• And I’m thankful for little things, for example, several times recently interviewees have thanked me for making their interviews pleasant experiences.

Everything is not perfect at my organization and I’d venture to say we’ve had some tough times in the last year, including budget cuts, need to drastically reduce the overtimes on which staff had come to rely, as well as some higher than normal turnover. But at the same time, I think we’re doing some of the best, innovative, and most noteworthy work ever. We’re finding ways to position ourselves despite unfriendly financial realities. While other nonprofits are freezing wages or laying people off, we’ve done neither. Instead, several years ago we used our strategic planning process to identify potential niche markets (high functioning autism, for example), we created a position to manage our new initiatives and we cultivated the partnerships I mentioned earlier.

Today I am thankful for my job and so much more.