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New Years is a great time to reflect on the past year. We often reminisce on major events that happened, what direction our careers went, how our relationships with friends and loved ones has either grown or diminished, our health, our finances, and our happiness. Of course, this tends to bring up feelings of accomplishment as well as feelings of discouragement, and more often than not we focus on what we need to change.
Like many of you Willis Dady has been taking time to reflect. Over the past year we have been evaluating our strengths, our weaknesses, our values, our mission, and most important our vision of what the future should look like. The culmination of this evaluation has produced a strategic plan that will be our guide in the coming years. This will be a step-by-step map to take us from where we are to where we want to be to best serve our clients.
Along with a new strategic plan also comes a new mission and vision statement. We took time to really consider what it is we do and how we best serve our clients. We didn’t try to reinvent the wheel, but we were thoughtful of who we are when we're doing our best work. Our new mission statement reads: “Willis Dady empowers all experiencing homelessness to build futures of self-sufficiency through advocacy, housing, and employment.” We cannot build our client’s futures, but we can do everything we can to give them the tools they need to build their own.
Our new vision statement is more ambitious: “A community where everyone has housing, stability, and opportunity.” This is the future we want to see, and this is what we are fighting for every day. This is the vision that moves us forward and encourages us to grow.
During these reflective conversations, we decided value statements (as opposed to standalone values) would better communicate our passions. These seven core values share the heart of Willis Dady.
Support, Stability, Opportunity: We consistently provide the opportunity, motivation, and needed supports to address barriers and encourage all to work towards stability.
Empowerment: We understand that the first step to empowerment is through compassion and empathy. We believe in promoting autonomy to build confidence for everyone to take charge of their future.
Equity and Inclusion: We believe that equity and inclusion are the cornerstone of creating an accepting community. All people are worthy of dignity and respect no matter their background or experiences. We aim to be an example for the community to provide fair treatment, access, opportunity, and advancement while striving to eliminate barriers.
Meet People Where They’re At: We build relationships by meeting people where they are physically, mentally, and emotionally. Working as a team through various programs, we strive to provide individualized case management to support clients in working towards self-sufficiency and self-reliance.
Energy, Enthusiasm, and the Courage to Lead: We show up every day committed to encourage clients, staff, and our community partners to affect change through self-advocacy, education, persistence, and cooperation. We strive to lead our community towards a brighter future with forward thinking and innovative ideas when faced with new challenges.
Acting with Integrity: We are open and honest about the decisions we make as an organization. In the face of adversity, we act with patience and reliability. We trust each other to be responsible for our actions, words, and performance to ensure equity in our services.
Community: We understand the impact our services have on our broader community and we strive to maximize the participation of partners, businesses, volunteers, donors, and neighbors in our efforts. We know that with compassion and engagement we can have a greater impact on those we serve and in turn create a better space for all.
We’re excited for 2023 and look forward to sharing more about our values each month! If a specific value resonates with you, we’d love to hear from you. How can we work together as a community to empower all experiencing homelessness to build futures of self-sufficiency through advocacy, housing, and employment?
