Helping people prepare for, find, and keep good jobs is what Goodwill is about.

Hi Everyone –

This letter is about gratitude. Although our staff who have been consistently at work over the last two months are constantly on my mind, I have not expressed my thanks nearly enough. While we have had to temporarily lay off many people during this crisis, we have also had many who continued to work in order to keep Goodwill of West Michigan operational and moving toward our future. 

Our HR team has been amazing, from start to finish. Their primary concern is all of you, and they have shown that in the way they have thought through all of new rules and regulations, in the production of the weekly newsletter, and in the way they have walked through the unemployment process with so many. I know that they have worked exceptionally hard during this time, and that they carry the hardships and grief that all of you have felt along the way with them.

Workforce Development staff members have continued contact with our clients with disabilities throughout the last two months. They have worked to develop remote service options, continued the work of VITA with a mobile application, served our employees through access to the employee assistance fund, and continued to help those returning from prison and jail. Sharlisa has been out in the community with these folks to help them find housing, employment, and to fill basic needs.

The finance team has kept all of our systems running exceptionally well from home. They are some of the first people we safeguarded, as we needed them to be able to continue the work seamlessly. They have done so with what looks like ease, but we know it only looks that way because they are so good at what they do.

Our IT staff has had to carry us into this new remote work, in addition to all of the other projects they have continued and fires they have put out. Somehow they managed to get those of us who needed laptops, cameras, or phones the equipment needed to continue working, at a time when everyone needed more equipment and things were sometimes hard to come by. Our data and systems have remained safe because of their work. 

Harold has been single-handedly performing all of our maintenance needs over the last six weeks. While keeping an eye on our corporate office he has been able to do a number of things including re-hanging the photographs taken down during the flip at corporate. He was also instrumental in designing our new sneeze guards and installing them at the cash stands in our stores.

Store managers and retail leadership were the very first to embrace the use of PPE and social distancing to continue to bring in donations safely as people left them when they were not supposed to. Having them available allowed us to say yes to collecting PPE for Spectrum and Mercy, to pull scrubs off our floor to donate to Pioneer Resources, to quickly and safely open back up for Goodwill donations, and to get product flowing to e-commerce so that we could begin bringing in some revenue.

Transportation has been the other leg to the work we have done in retail. Keeping a truck moving has allowed us to get PPE donations deployed, provided staff members working from home with some of the things they have needed, and the stores able to continue taking in donations.

Janitorial has continued to work to keep everyone safe, both on-site at Goodwill and with all of our corporate contacts. They have been keeping up with and enhancing our cleaning protocols. Kathy created new safety kits for sites and people as they come back to work, has looked toward our future in providing our own rug and window service, and has made sure that any new product we need we have on hand.

Industrial has continued their work with contracts for businesses considered essential. They have ended up being the test site for lots of processes as we have continued to develop and enhance safety protocols. Industrial has also helped us think through everything related to staff during this time, and we are so grateful for the flexibility and level of change they have endured in the last months.

Our continued work in sustainability means that our partnerships have strengthened during this time, and our grant writing capacity has ensured that funding requests and program development have continued.

There is so much work that has continued, and I am endlessly grateful. I intentionally only mentioned a few names as there are more than 100 people who have continued to work! Know that I am aware of what all of you are doing – your supervisors let me know – and our collective gratitude goes out to each of you. 

The Governor just announced that two regions in Michigan will be able to open with restrictions starting Friday. The upper peninsula and the counties at the tip of lower Michigan have met the requirements of Phase 4 of the Governor’s plan that I outlined last week.  My hope is that West Michigan will follow suit, and that the rest of our business will be operational soon. Our work is so important and will continue to be even more so. When we are successful, not only can we continue to employ more people, but we support all of the workforce development efforts for our community. Our retail efforts allow us to realize our mission to change the lives through the power of work and ensures that everyone has a pathway to sustainable and meaningful work. 

My best –
Jeanette