Customer Service Agents and Employees Support This Year’s SU2C Event

The takeaway—the take-your-breath-away—of the recent Stand Up To Cancer® (SU2C) fundraiser comes down to this: Every call matters.

Ask any Working Solutions customer service agent or employee who answered those calls, stayed on the line, sometimes just to listen, keeping their own emotions in check. For many, SU2C is a lifeline.

More than 425 Working Solutions contact center agents and employees participated in the SU2C fundraiser on August 21, taking in $200,000 in donations. Together, they handled 3,500+ calls—contributing to the “more than $143.18 million… pledged collectively in connection with its seventh biennial roadblock televised fundraising special.”

“Everyone knows someone stricken by cancer,” said Working Solutions chief executive Kim Houlne. “And it’s in this spirit of community, of watching out for one another, that we come together to raise funds and to find cures.” Started in 2008 by media and entertainment leaders, the charitable organization formed “a new, collaborative model of cancer research,” according to its website.

Almost Made Me Cry

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From the televised event’s kickoff at 7 p.m. until almost midnight, agents and employees took to the phones, talking with donors and cancer survivors. Working Solutions team members identified with callers who told them their stories.

Said Melissa, an agent: “This lady almost made me cry. I know what they are going through. My mom has liver cancer right now and it’s going to her lungs. Medicare won’t pay for all the treatment. So, I definitely feel for these people, for sure.”

Donations, Big and Small

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Throughout the evening and into the night, agents and employees listened and empathized as they collected donations, big and small. Tara, an agent, took a call from an 86-year-old woman living in a nursing home. “She had 10 dollars to her name and wanted it to go to our cause.”

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And those suffering from cancer called, some not having any money to give, but wanting to share their appreciation for those fighting the good fight. One woman told an agent that her cancer wasn’t in remission. “She said her belief in God alone sustains her. She was unable to make a donation. But wanted to thank everyone who is working, and who are donating.”

A Most Personal Event

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For some at Working Solutions, the fundraiser proved to be ever-so personal.

“I never realized how hard taking these calls would be,” said Shuba, an agent. “I am here because my 12-year-old son just had his second brain tumor removed on 6/25/2021. (The first one was when he was 8). I thought: ‘I need to be a part of this.’ And it is hard to hold back the tears with these stories.”