A Note from CEO Becky Davenport to Bloom Staff
Over the past 20 years, Bloom has grown at an average compounded rate of approximately 20 percent a year—nearly 4,000 percent cumulative growth. With that extraordinary growth has come greater complexity. Our days are now filled with budgets and spreadsheets, reports and databases, grant applications, compliance requirements, meetings, training, inventory, paperwork, emails and what sometimes feels like an endless list of deadlines. Our roles have become more specialized, and many of us spend our days focused on just one piece of a much bigger picture.
And when we are busy—and we are very busy—it can be easy to become focused on the task in front of us and lose sight of why that task exists in the first place.
There is a child at the end of every task.
When our Finance team processes a DFCS payment or reconciles our bank statement, there is a child at the end of that work.
When our Development team writes a grant, meets with a donor or plans an event, they aren’t simply raising dollars. Those dollars will become clothing, a safe foster home, support for a young adult, training for a foster parent or help for a family in crisis.
When HR works to find the right person for Bloom, there is ultimately a child depending on us to get that decision right.
When someone sorts a bag of clothing or tidies a shelf at the Bloom Closet, it may feel like a routine task. But soon a child may walk through those doors during one of the most uncertain times in their life. That child deserves to enter a beautiful space, choose things they love and be treated with dignity and kindness.
When our Foster Care team completes documentation, recruits a foster family, answers a late phone call or helps a parent navigate a difficult situation, there is a child who needs stability and someone willing to stand beside them.
When our Bloom Beyond team works through applications, transportation issues, education funding, housing challenges and all the other details that come with helping a young adult move toward independence, there is a young person at the end of every one of those tasks who is trying to build a future.
When our Marketing team creates a post, tells a story or promotes Bloom in our community, someone may see it who becomes our next donor, volunteer, foster parent or community partner.
When our Family Resource Center team provides a referral for housing support to a family in need, there is a child who is able to stay with their family.
The truth is, not every day at Bloom feels inspirational. Some days are frustrating. Sometimes the paperwork really is tedious. Sometimes the inbox is overwhelming, the spreadsheet won’t balance, the deadline feels impossible, or the problem in front of us doesn’t have an easy answer.
Those may be the days when it is most important to remember why we are here.
We don’t all work directly with children or get to see the moment when a child receives a new pair of shoes, settles into a safe foster home, celebrates an accomplishment or realizes that someone believes in them. Sometimes it may take years for the seeds we have planted to grow.
That’s one of the things I hope we never lose as Bloom continues to grow. We need systems. We need accountability. We need policies, budgets, measurements and goals. We need to be excellent at what we do.
But those things aren’t our mission. They are the tools that allow us to accomplish our mission.
So, when your inbox is overflowing, the paperwork seems endless or you’re simply having one of those days, I hope you’ll stop for just a moment and remember:
There is a child at the end of what you are doing.
A child who needs you more than you will ever know.
That’s why the details matter. That’s why your work matters.
And that’s why I am so grateful that you have chosen to do that work here at Bloom.
Becky
