Why I Do What I Do

I had been laid off for about 4 months when I first found out about Career Path Services from an ad in the Sunday Newspaper. I didn’t know anything about the company, but knew I could benefit from some additional help and support with my job search.

I set up my first meeting with a job counselor, and was very impressed with the range of services and assistance I was offered.   I immediately began formulating ideas of how I could use my skills to help other people in a similar way.  I set up an informational meeting with Bill Marchioro, the CEO at the time, to further explore the social services field.   I wanted to find out how someone with my skills and work history might fit in.

My expectations were for a short conversation; I was amazed that Bill spent almost an hour out of his busy day talking to me and giving me advice. At the end of the meeting, he let me know that Career Path Services had an opening for an Employment Associate and that I should apply.

During the past 12 years, I’ve been fortunate to work for an organization that I love and in a job that I love doing. Throughout these years, I’ve discovered some of the realities hidden by the numbers and statistics we give as a measure of success in the work we do. Behind each number is a face, and behind each face is a family that is impacted by what we do. The act of giving someone hope today can have a great impact on the future of that individual and his (or her) family.

I do what I do because it gives me an opportunity to give back to others:  to giving hope and belief to a former prostitute who had been told all her life that “I am worthless and will never amount to anything”; to giving hope to a former bouncer whose dream job is to become a caregiver, but who also thought that he “wouldn’t live to see 21 because of the people I mixed with and the things I was involved in”;  to the simple act of giving someone a cup of coffee because “my cup of coffee smelt so good and I haven’t been able to afford coffee in such a long time“. 

Thanks to Nick Hughes, one of our Career Path Services’ Employment Associates, for sharing his story this month.