What a Month!

Well, it has been a weird and wild month. I cannot even believe to catch you guys up so I won't attempt to. Below is a letter I emailed tonight. You will probably see in it that my job was short-lived. Please pray as we again make another transition. I am really okay with not working there anymore. I am FLOORED at how it transpired. I am glad to be able to focus on my kids again and Remembering Your Baby. I'll update again once we get through Easter.

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April 6, 2009

To Those It May Concern:

While I greatly appreciate the opportunity to serve in the area of hospice care, it is with a heavy heart that I send this correspondence.

I was hired on March 3, 2009. At that time, I was told that the volunteer program at Hospice Advantage-Athens had been unintentionally neglected for a period of approximately six months. As a result, the program was in need of a complete restart. I went through corporate orientation and training for two weeks, so as one would expect, no recruiting was done during my first two weeks of employment.

In my third week of employment, I met with Shari Koch, who I was told, had the most successful volunteer program in the entire company. That experience proved invaluable to me. It affirmed that the method and manner of recruiting and retaining volunteers that I have used for close to ten years in other organizations have worked successfully in the hospice setting and more specifically within the Hospice Advantage organization. However, I quickly found out that the Athens location had never done things that way. Ideas were met with skepticism. Methods were questioned.

In fact, in my fourth week of employment I was sent to fourteen different assisted living facilities on a marketing mission in order to assist in improving our census numbers. I willingly complied because I was certain a lack of volunteer recruiting during this period would not reflect negatively on my job performance. In fact, on the Monday of that week, I attempted to blend assigned task with recruiting responsibilities but was not encouraged to continue that process. I discontinued the practice in order to focus solely on my assigned task.

During my fourth and fifth week of employment, it was discovered that of the eight volunteers that I inherited when I was hired none were current on their TB tests and therefore were not allowed to see patients. I spent time informing them of these developments and helping them get current. As a result of this, my volunteer hours fell drastically short of the required 5%. However, focusing on this fact alone does not count recruiting presentations scheduled in the community that are certain to garner more volunteers and therefore increase volunteer hour percentages.

In summary, one partial month is not enough time to turn a program around. To evaluate my job performance without evaluating these facts is nonsensical and unjust. The unfortunate victims of this decision are the countless patients who will continue to be improperly served.

Sincerely,

Dawn Chandler