Issue 005, 2016 q3

Community spotlight

Caring countssm for Sedgwick colleagues in Greater Dubuque

BY Tim Axtell Senior Operations Manager, Sedgwick

Caring counts at Sedgwick, and in the heartland, our Greater Dubuque offices (two in Dubuque, Iowa; one in Bellevue, Iowa; and one in Platteville, Wisconsin) have demonstrated their heart by teaming up with Resources Unite (RU), a non-profit organization that partners with other companies to provide time, talent, money and supplies to those in need both locally and nationally. RU’s goal is to strengthen the Dubuque community by creating connections between people and volunteer opportunities and resources that lead to a happier and more engaged way of life. In recognition of their volunteer efforts and commitment to caring, in April, our Greater Dubuque offices received the Resources Unite Outstanding Volunteer Corporate Award.   

In the past year, working with RU, Dubuque-area colleagues have completed approximately 4,000 hours of volunteer work. Through periodic food drives, they have donated about 2,500 pounds of food to missions, food banks and non-profit organizations. Local Sedgwick colleagues volunteered their service at approximately 150 organizations, projects or events, and they devoted many hours to writing postcards to veterans.

A major collaboration between RU and Sedgwick in 2016 was the “Just Add Water” campaign. When Sedgwick colleagues engaged in a little friendly competition between account teams to collect water to send to Flint, Michigan, they far exceeded anyone’s expectations. Michelle Winter, leave of absence coordinator in Dubuque, set a goal for the area offices to collect 60 cases (one pallet) of bottled water to send along with RU’s community collection effort.

Bottle caps spelling 700

The driving force behind this effort, Winter set up some challenges at Sedgwick that resulted in 339 cases of water being donated. “The campaign was awesome,” Winter says. “We started out with 23 cases of water brought in by one of our dedicated teams with help from the Dubuque claims assistants. After that, we decided it was time for a good old-fashioned challenge with the other Sedgwick teams at the Dubuque area offices.

The Platteville office and the Dubuque call center quickly accepted the challenge, and we collected 252 cases of water between the two teams! Then between the Dubuque and Platteville offices, we collected 339 cases of water. Of course, we were doubly honored when Sedgwick generously matched our donations!”

Sedgwick’s two Dubuque offices and the Platteville office teamed up to contribute about 11.5 pallets of water. Our company matched the effort, to send a total of 700 cases of water to Flint. In all, the RU community effort sent nine semi-trucks of water to Flint in April.

“Partnering with RU has been the perfect way to take our core values out into the community and ‘do the right thing,’” Robin Hammill, service center team lead in Dubuque, says. “This is what we do every day, while working with our clients and their employees, but now we are able to do that side-by-side with our colleagues while providing support to the non-profits that desperately need assistance – some of which we didn’t even know existed until RU brought them forward. We are proud that our Sedgwick colleagues stepped up to help the Flint community during their time of need.”

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