Giving Thanks for Our Clients and Colleagues

At this time of the year, I hold dear the people and things for which I’m most grateful. Family, friends and good health—and the many clients and their customers that our company has served over 22 years.

I’ve devoted nearly half of my life to building this business. Employees and agents have given decades to Working Solutions’ success as well. Still, we know it’s a work-in-progress. Goals to reach. Milestones to achieve. Dreams not yet realized.

Not a day goes by, though, that I don’t remind myself of what we’ve accomplished as a team, the valued services we bring to clients and the benefits we can offer prospective ones. Many blessings to be counted—and more challenges to be faced, too.

With recent natural disasters, from blizzards to wildfires, the last few years have tested our resolve in delivering nonstop customer service. Winter after winter, snowstorms have buried the East Coast and Midwest. The devastation wrought by hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria in 2017 were compounded by the large-scale destruction of Florence and Michael this season.

With an on-demand workforce, we can virtually shift work and agents across the United States and into Canada out of a storm’s path. This happens when our remote agents find themselves in harm’s way or clients must evacuate workers from their brick-and-mortar call centers.

Riding Out the Storm

Sometimes, however, there’s no escaping the fury, as was the case with Rory, a Working Solutions program manager living in Panama City, Florida. Rory, an employee for seven years, and her family endured the wrath of Michael, a category 4 hurricane that hit with such intensity and speed it caught many by surprise. Six of them, along with a dog and two cats, rode out the storm in the master bathroom for three and a half hours.

In the aftermath and with support from coworkers, Rory and her family bought a portable generator for electricity and a chainsaw to cut up the 100-year-old heritage oak toppled in the front yard. That chainsaw later did double duty clearing debris from neighbors’ homes. Night and day, they stood guard as looters pillaged nearby abandoned buildings. They celebrated when the local Chick-fil-A reopened.

For Rory, who has given comfort so many customers in times of need, it was her turn to receive a helping hand.

“Pray for our little town.”

In an email to her team, she writes:

I miss you all and my work dreadfully and I want to thank you all for picking up the workload for me while I’m away. I can never repay what you all have done for me, so I will simply be first in line to pay it forward in the future. Please send good thoughts and prayers for our little town. We love it so.

For me and all of us here at Working Solutions, Rory’s story symbolizes the care and compassion we share not only with colleagues, but with our clients and their customers. Doing what matters when it matters most.

In appreciation for such generosity, I believe Thanksgiving should be celebrated every day of the year.