Karen Sell: Hello, I’m Karen Sell, Director of the Arizona WIC Program, and I want to thank you for taking the next step in WIC and becoming an Arizona WIC Champion. Being a champion is a special role and one that means a lot to our program and the families we serve. Through the support of Champions we meet the needs of our clients, influence healthy behaviors and change lives. Throughout this course you will learn how Together We Can support participant centered services. You may find that becoming a Champion is a small step but has a big affect on your clients, your clinic, your colleagues and even on yourself. Click on a picture of one your fellow Arizona WIC Champions to hear more about what being an Arizona WIC Champion means to them.
First Champion (top pic):
Q: What has it meant to you to be a Champion?
A: Well, it’s like a reward to me, because I feel I’ve been able to help somebody. And I get that feeling of when you’ve accomplished something. It’s almost like a goal where we tell where our clients are, “I’m able to do this”, so then you tell them “oh, you’ve been doing good”. So it makes me feel good that I can help somebody, whether it’s a client or a co-worker. If somebody comes to you and you are able to help them then it’s kind of like a feeling of satisfaction I think.
Q: What advice would you give to future Champions?
A: I think listening to the person in front of you, whether it’s a client or a co-worker and getting to know what they’re meaning, where they’re coming from and what they really have on their mind or their heart, because sometimes they come out and say something and you might not understand them, but when you’ve learned to listen – and you kind of want to say listen from the heart, or really, really listen and know what they mean. Then again you get that satisfaction, “Oh, OK. This is what you mean. This is what you’re telling me.” I think that’s the biggest change. I’ve learned that with the skills that they’ve taught us or with the PCS skills – it’s to learn to listen to them and to know what they’re talking about and where they’re coming from. I think that’s the biggest change because before you didn’t realize how important that was, and now you realize that it is important because then you make that connection.
Second Champion (middle pic):
Q: What has it meant to you to be a Champion?
A: To be a Champion to me means being inspirational to others. What gets me day to day is helping people make changes in their own lives and meet them where they are to help them be even better, be it for their families, or for themselves. So I think the biggest thing is to be inspirational.
Q: What has been the biggest change for you?
A: The biggest change for me is putting everything I learned in school out into the real world setting. I collected a lot of things into my toolbox, but now I have to figure out how to use them. And so you have to be very flexible and resourceful in any setting, in any environment that you’re in.
Q: What advice would you give to future Champions?
A: My advice to future Champions is to be yourself. If you’re not yourself then you’re not going to be looked at as genuine or trustworthy, and the biggest way to connect with people is to be yourself and then you can be inspirational from there.
Third Champion (bottom pic)
Q: What has it meant to you to be a Champion?
A: Becoming a Champion, for myself was a breath of fresh air, because I had worked here for so long it was being computer driven, and being hand-out driven, and just being able to talk to the clients made a difference in how the whole appointment went.
Q: What has been the biggest change for you?
A: The biggest change for me as being a Champion is how the appointment is going. The clients are more willing to give information, and to seek information that they need. There’s open communication between myself and the clients, the kids seem more at ease in the office, even going into the lab the kids are quieter – there’s not a lot of crying going on anymore. The families seem much calmer.
Q: What advice would you give to future Champions?
A: I would recommend to anybody who wants to be a PCS Champion to go for it. That it’s a whole different approach to your job.