December was an exciting month for Tender Heart as we prepared for the holidays with our group members, spent time together at our bi-annual company meeting (and holiday party!), and celebrated our employee & company achievements.
A look at our year: Tender Heart expanded with our East & Frankenmuth branches and served more clients than ever before!
Our Bay City/Saginaw team served an average of 180 clients per week
Our Clarkston team served an average of 170 clients per week
Our Detroit team served an average of 210 clients per week
Our East team served an average of 160 clients per week
Our Frankenmuth team served an average of 90 clients per week
Our Grand Blanc team served an average of 200 clients per week
In 2019, we worked with an average of 1,010 clients a week!
Our staff have a variety of responsibilities besides what you may see in groups! In addition to group time, we also take care of creating the activity calendars and deciding what and how we are going to do in group (putting therapeutic thought behind everything we do), getting supplies organized and maintaining documentation. Starting this year, Tender Heart identified an Employee of the Year and Team of the Year! These achievers are presented with an award, the bragging rights for a year and cash.
Employee of the Year: Laura Williams
Laura has been with Tender Heart on the Clarkston team for 2 years. Creating fun, beautiful projects and caring for her group members is just part of what makes Laura magical. She has worked to create a wonderful team environment on her team, taken over our Tender Heart Facebook (check it out here!) and organized & cleaned the office with supplies (not once, but twice!). She created an inventory system to reduce waste and watched sales to ensure Tender Heart could get their supplies at a great price! She reached out to supervisors to let them know she believed a new team member was doing a good job and shared her praise. Laura has continued to problem-solve, organize and lead in a powerful way and Tender Heart is so happy to get to recognize her abilities and all of her hard work. Congratulations, Laura!
Team of the Year: Clarkston
The Clarkston team, that includes Laura Williams, Jessica Knopp, Allison Glasby, Sharon Glatfelter and Lisa Scott, won the Tender Heart 2019 Team of the Year award! They provided kind and compassionate care to their clients, and that’s only a portion of what made them great! Most of their team made it at least 18 weeks with ZERO mistakes in their paperwork, which is an incredibly difficult thing to do. Jessica shares Facebook posts, comments on how projects positively impact group members & shares Tender Heart’s mission, ensuring her corner of the internet is well-informed about the work Tender Heart does. When Team East came on board, they helped with the transition, providing training and support to new employees. They worked together as a team, even outside of work! When the snow fell and a team member needed assistance, the Clarkston team put their snow-boots on and shoveled her driveway. Jessica Knopp created a Tender Heart T-shirt for Alzheimer’s Awareness Month for the entire staff to wear.
Team Clarkston never stops at what simply needs to be done; they go above and beyond in every avenue of their work. Congratulations Team Clarkston!
And last but not least, we can’t forget our fearless leaders, Dawn Lupcke and Ashley Zair.
Dawn is the creator and owner of Tender Heart LLC, co-owner of Tender Heart East, Inc, and has led our teams throughout this year. Without Dawn, serving our clients, seeing their progress and working with wonderful facilities would not be possible. She works tirelessly behind the scenes; one thing you may not realize is how much Dawn cares for her employees. She increased benefits this year, coming at a cost to her. She calls her staff often to simply check in, wanting to make sure their personal lives are going well in addition as their professional ones. Where other bosses may shy away from doing something that would benefit their employees but make their job more difficult, Dawn takes this head-on, problem-solving quickly to ensure everyone and everything is taken care of. Dawn leads by example, getting into session and helping out, working together with her staff. In a profession full of quick turn-over and burn-out, Dawn invests in her employees’ mental health & training to ensure they are getting just as much out of life as they are out of work! We appreciate you, Dawn!
Ashley is the co-owner of Tender Heart East, Inc. and the supervisor for the Detroit team for Tender Heart LLC. She has helped Dawn bring her vision to fruition, working alongside Dawn behind the scenes to ensure staff have everything they need to not only provide great services, but to fully enjoy the work they do. Ashley assisted Dawn with creating a social worker’s “dream job,” increasing the efficiency of documentation so that staff can focus more on what they enjoy: spending time with clients. Ashley encourages staff to develop their strengths, allowing staff input and inviting them to bring their ideas to the table. Ashley has a keen ability to make anyone laugh, ensuring her staff, along with her clients, have a blast when she’s in the room. Always just a text or phone call away, Ashley has an open-door policy that is not restricted to work-related topics: she is always ready to recommend a good book or podcast, or to trade dog-mom pictures! Like Dawn, she leads by example, demonstrating her strength and ability to focus on caring for our clients despite any outside factors. We appreciate you Ashley!
2019 was a fantastic year for Tender Heart and we are so excited to see what 2020 brings! We are so happy you are along for the ride!
HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!
