Staff Spot­light: Hon­or­ing KYC’s Longest Employ­ee Relationship

January 29, 2021

In 1980, Wayne Jozwiak walked into Elk Grove-Schaum­burg Town­ship Men­tal Health Ser­vices, the newest hire of a small agency of about 70 staff with a brand new build­ing on the cor­ner of Nerge and Rohlwing Road in Elk Grove Vil­lage. Pro­vid­ing out­pa­tient ther­a­py to youth, adults, and fam­i­lies, it was a small, close­ly knit team of clin­i­cians with a spark of antic­i­pa­tion and growth after a suc­cess­ful decade of ser­vice to the community.

“Every­thing was new” explained Wayne, ​“and it was excit­ing to be part of some­thing at its begin­ning.” Just a few years lat­er, the agency would change its name to Ken­neth Young Center. 

Wayne’s role with­in the orga­ni­za­tion grew, start­ing as an out­pa­tient ther­a­pist for youth and then tran­si­tion­ing to pro­vid­ing cri­sis sup­port to indi­vid­u­als expe­ri­enc­ing psy­chi­atric emer­gen­cies in the ​‘90s. Wayne was pro­mot­ed to work as a senior clin­i­cian, super­vis­ing oth­er ther­a­pists as the team con­tin­ued to grow, build­ing strong inter­per­son­al bonds between team mem­bers – many of whom also stayed at KYC for decades of service.

“Our staff is incred­i­ble and invest­ed in ​‘the help­ing pro­fes­sion’,” explained Wayne.

When KYC opened its res­i­den­tial liv­ing pro­gram, Wayne was at the helm, ready to take on new chal­lenges and estab­lish new ser­vice areas that would meet the needs of the clients he’d ded­i­cat­ed him­self to supporting. 

For years, he was the Man­ag­er of Adult Ser­vices, over­see­ing all of the clin­i­cal pro­grams pro­vid­ing sup­port to adults. By this point in his KYC career, the brand new build­ing in Elk Grove where he start­ed had been added onto twice, and mul­ti­ple teams estab­lished addi­tion­al off­site offices as the agency con­tin­ued to grow. 

“Seniors was off­site. PSR was off­site. SASS was off­site. There was no room!” shared Wayne with a smile. ​“And yet even now, our hay day is yet to come.”

For decades, the slen­der, tall gen­tle­man known for his warm per­son­al­i­ty, quick wit, wise advice, ear­ly morn­ing cup of cof­fee, and music that always drifts into the hall­way from his office as he sips that ear­ly morn­ing cup of cof­fee, jug­gled mul­ti­ple roles while lead­ing with a smile. He knew every staff person’s name and put clients at ease with his gen­tle demeanor. He played on the staff soft­ball team and attend­ed KYC’s din­ner dances and fash­ion shows, and even has illu­mi­nat­ing sto­ries of attend­ing fel­low staff mem­bers’ wed­dings and fam­i­ly gath­er­ings as a fix­ture in the lives of his teammates.

Want­i­ng to spend more time with fam­i­ly, Wayne attempt­ed to retire in 2008, but after a few months, it became clear his time with KYC wasn’t done yet.

Although retire­ment had plen­ty of perks, Wayne missed being of ser­vice to oth­ers and the com­mu­ni­ty he had built at KYC. He returned to the agency part-time, fill­ing a vacan­cy on the Old­er Adults’ CHOIC­ES Team, vis­it­ing old­er adults as they dis­charged from hos­pi­tals to com­plete screen­ing ques­tion­naires and assist with tran­si­tion planning. 

“I was thrilled to have Wayne on our team!” shared KYC’s Direc­tor of Old­er Adult Ser­vices, Crissy Castil­lo. He knew every­thing about KYC and every­one on the team…he didn’t start [his KYC career] on the OA [Old­er Adults] Team, but now I hon­est­ly don’t know what we’d do with­out him!”

More than five years after com­ing out of retire­ment, Wayne now flex­es between part-time and full-time roles as client needs evolve and staffing changes. In Novem­ber 2020, he cel­e­brat­ed his 40^th anniver­sary with KYC, offi­cial­ly mak­ing him the longest tenured staff per­son in KYC’s history.

“KYC is lucky to have ded­i­cat­ed staff with long-tenures of ser­vice to the agency. No one embod­ies that com­mit­ment and care for oth­ers more than Wayne. He ensures every per­son he encoun­ters feels val­ued, heard, sup­port­ed, and empow­ered. I’m proud to cel­e­brate him and rec­og­nize his incred­i­ble ser­vice to our com­mu­ni­ty” said KYC’s CEO, Grace Hong Duffin. 

“You don’t know any­thing until you learn it” said Wayne. ​“Your kind­ness will be for­ward­ed to oth­ers and that impact is our responsibility.”

Con­grat­u­la­tions and thank you, Wayne, for 40 years of ser­vice and count­ing. Cheers to many, many more.

If you’re look­ing for a reward­ing career like Wayne’s, view our open posi­tions today.

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