This year has been the year of PRIDE at the Bedford Regional Water
Authority (“Authority”). PRIDE, in this case, being an acronym for the theme of
the year at the Authority: Personal
Responsibility
In Delivering Excellence.
Each month, one department of the Authority has the chance to spread their team
PRIDE in whatever way feels natural for that team. This allows the whole
organization to celebrate the unique skills and role each particular department
brings to the organization – and the community.
"This is the first year for the Authority to have a consistent theme for
our employee events, training, and development to focus around," said
Brian Key, Executive Director of the Authority. "It's been inspiring to
see each department share in such a unique way that invokes even more PRIDE in
our work force."
This month the Maintenance Department did what they do best – using their hands
to express their creativity and skill by cutting out letter boards for PRIDE
and decorating them to express the unique elements of what is important to
their department and what it does for the community.
The “P” represents “Cancer Awareness” month, the “R” is pipe in the ground
(sewer and water), the “I” is a wrench in traffic control gear, the “D”
represents the safety shirts worn by the crews, and the “E” represents a safety
cone. This sign sits in front of the main office buildings on Falling Creek
road for all to view.
Earlier this year, the customer service team hosted a breakfast with a picture
slideshow of the team working (from meter readers to the representatives who
answer phone calls and take payments) with Dolly Parton’s song “9 to 5” playing
as photos of the team at work streamed by.
Water operations had departments play their own BINGO creation, using PRIDE
instead of BINGO, which each of the squares listing an item the team was proud
of participating in and providing for the area.
Wastewater operations had a video presentation along with an edible chocolate
fountain as an ode to wastewater. They also performed a visual water quality
test with attendees, passing around three bottles of water (tap, bottled, and
water from the wastewater plant at the end of the treatment cycle) to see if
employees could differentiate between the three. This turned out to be incredibly
difficult as there was virtually no visual difference between the three.
The finance department did another play on the acronym, giving each employee a
bag of candy with a tag listing items they were proud of for every letter in
PRIDE. The candy, of course, also had a financial theme, with Paydays and mints
encased in a fake money wrapper being part of their PRIDE.
There are still a few departments to go this year: Engineering, Human
Resources, and Information Systems. This has been a fun event that has
helped employees better understand what each department does while also
allowing each team to flex their creativity and show their skills to the entire
organization.