The Annual Meeting

We had our annual meeting last week and it was an amazingly positive experience. The annual meeting is the one time every year that the entire company gathers to review past accomplishments and chart the strategy for the year ahead. With every team member in the room it is always a lively meeting with diverse opinions and ideas about the past as well as the future.

A few notable items from this years meeting:

1. Everyone was happy to put 2009 in the past – it was a difficult year for the nation’s economy and particularly our industry, which weathered major reimbursement cuts throughout the year. 09 saw many companies in our space disappear and we are all thankful that we were well positioned to succeed in a very difficult environment.
2. There is a strong sense of optimism for 2010 – finding success in a challenging year breeds a sense of need to work hard to find greater successes in the future, and our team is highly energized to continue to deliver the highest levels of service and care possible and continue to find new and exciting ways to reduce operational expenses and streamline our back office operations.
3. There is tremendous pride amongst team members – our team understands that we enter the lives of those we serve at a difficult time and that the work we do can go a long way to simplifying their lives and putting them at ease. The team takes a tremendous amount of pride in a job well done and is fueled by the positive feedback they receive on a regular basis from patients, referral sources, family members, etc. I played a tearful voicemail at the meeting that we had received just before the Christmas holiday, someone we helped get home in time to be with their family…it was deeply touching for everyone to hear and truly a validation of the hard work they do.
4. We are chock full of ideas for improvement – we aggressively engage team members at every level for their ideas on how to improve our performance and our service levels and the feedback I see on a regular basis goes a long way to making us a better company. Patients and professional partners are equally engaged in sharing ideas for improvement, but over the years we have found the team members who live and breathe the job and the responsibility are the best positioned to contribute ideas for improvement; when you create an environment that welcomes their feedback and pushes for their input you would be amazed at the great ideas that bubble to the surface.
5. The final item on our short list of notables, are people are happy – they like where they work, they take pride in what we do, they see us growing, they feel valued, they are listened to…you combine all of this and you find a very happy and lighthearted group of team members who are excited about working together to get the job done. These people are our company and we are tremendously proud of the people that report for work everyday to our offices across the region – they are happy, engaged, and ready to go above and beyond for every customer they meet.

In a challenging environment it pays to have the best people on your side – in 2009 we continued to aggressively seek out the very best talent we could find and we are putting them to good work in 2010 as we look to continue a strong track record of growth, success and service to our community.