An Interview with Penny, Professional of the Year

Penny Adams is the Executive Director of AFL-CIO Community Services in St. Joseph, MO and the 2012 recipient of the MAK-AIRS Information and Referral Professional of the Year award! She received this honor at the 2012 MAK-AIRS Annual Conference, and was nominated by co-workers and chosen by a panel of affiliate members. Below is a short interview about Penny’s life in I&R.

Tell us a little about your I&R background.

Penny (right) receives PotY award

I got into the I&R business by accident.  It was a Thursday evening in the spring of 1987.  I had gone to play bingo that night.  The organization that sponsored it was the Northwest Missouri Central Labor Council and Community Services (at that time a department of United Way).  The executive director of Community Services was a friend of mine and he asked me what I was doing that summer and if I would consider volunteering in the Community Services office of United Way for a few hours a week.  I explained that I had just quit my job to be a stay-at-home mom with my three kids so we could enjoy our summer together.  I said sure I'd volunteer but when I turned away from him I immediately was cussing myself for saying yes!  I held up my commitment and started volunteering but it was for more than just a few hours a week.  It was more like 20 hours a week.  It was the CS director, the program director and myself all working in a 14' x 14' room.  We each had a desk and a phone.  Both of them (men) were doing the I&R.  I was working on the resource database which was a printed directory way back then.  By being in such small quarters I was able to learn first hand about the I&R business.  However back then our program had no formal training on the art of I&R.   In 1989, I came on-board as an employee working as the secretary/substitute I&R person.  In 1999 I was promoted to the Program Director with I&R as our core program.  Soon after I worked to earn my CIRS accreditation and worked as the only I&R person for the next several years.  We were a small but very mighty agency which earned the respect of all the agencies community wide for our ability to help individuals with either referrals or finding alternative resources to address their needs.  Eventually in 2011 I was promoted to the Executive Director of the AFL-CIO Community Services Agency.  We soon had two other I&R people and have just recently added a soon-to-be resource specialist.

What is your favorite thing about I&R?
It's a simple but genuine answer - helping people.  It's very rewarding knowing that a person in crisis has gained the knowledge of how to resolve their issue just by talking to you.  I hear back from people all the time thanking me for listening to them and helping them to work through their problems.

How do you stay connected with your community?
Well... sometimes not so much by choice but rather by invite.  Our agency and myself are asked to serve on numerous boards and committees.  Agencies in our community have great respect for our agency and for our opinion on what is happening and what needs to happen in our community.  They tell us they believe we need to be at the table when plans are in the works for all kinds of things happening in our community.  Our agency also provides a mass email service to area social service agencies, government offices, institutions, and churches about a variety of issues in the community.  Plus we forward informational emails on to these groups from one another.  We have a vast email list that reaches out to Northwest Missouri keeping people connected to us and to what's happening.  We attend various meetings in an attempt to gather information that may be valuable to our I&R services.  But as well known as we are, we still hear fairly often that people don't know we are out there for them.  Or many times they know of the service but not our agency.  Many times we are confused for United Way.  We are currently working on a re-branding plan for our I&R services and hope to launch it in April.

What did winning I&R Professional of the Year mean to you?
Personally, it has meant a great deal to me.  I can honestly say that I have worked very hard at my I&R job.  More than any other job I have ever had.  I know I was very lucky to have "walked" into this field.  I&R seems to be right up my alley.  I take great pride in knowing with each caller I have done my very best in attempting to help them and for that I can sleep better at night.  A long time ago I was working on a particularly difficult call and just about to give up on finding a solution but then I thought what if this person was my grandmother or my mom.  I would want the person helping them to give it all they had to help them.  I dug in and got busy and went outside the box eventually finding hidden resources to help the caller.  And that is what I still do today.  I always try to put myself in their shoes to understand their situation and what they are going through.  But even though I am sharing this with you I never do it for the recognition.   I know in actuality I, we, I&R is just the "middle man" in most cases.  But I also know without us/I&R, a person's crisis could be so much more.  Needless to say...I love my job, and to be recognized by my MAK-AIRS colleagues is a true honor!