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Servant Leadership Snapshot

Devereux’s talented and hard-working team members lead to serve, while inspiring others to learn and grow. Our “Servant Leadership Snapshot” series shines a light on exemplary servant leaders across our organization who empower all those around them to be their best selves. Look below to read features written by these compassionate collaborators as they help their teams, programs, departments and centers reach even greater heights through Servant Leadership.

Dawn Schutz, Assistant Director of People Operations

Center/office location: Devereux Florida/Statewide (based in Orlando, Fla.)

Length of service: 1996

How do you embed an inclusive, Servant Leadership mindset into your daily processes?

I begin work each day with the mindset of helping others, whether it be by assisting a manager with a challenge, answering questions from an employee or brainstorming ideas of how to do things more efficiently. I approach my role in a similar manner. I am here to help our People Operations team succeed, and I will do everything I can to train and mentor our employees.

How do you inspire others to embrace Servant Leadership practices?

I try to model what it means to be a servant leader, and I hope to inspire my team to act as servant leaders as well. Our staff, our programs and our individuals all come first. When that is your focus, you will be successful.

Share an example or story of how you demonstrated compassion or delivered quality customer service at your center.

I remain focused on employee retention and recognizing the many ways our team members dedicate themselves to our organization and those in our care. I help coordinate events to acknowledge service anniversaries and encourage colleagues to celebrate milestones (e.g., 90 days, annual service anniversaries). I also have planned larger events to honor our team members. I believe it only takes a few minutes to genuinely show appreciation for others.