At a recent Excel Center graduation, 55 adults walked across the stage in caps and gowns to receive their high school diplomas. After the ceremony, the father of one of the graduates approached me to express his gratitude for the Excel Center. Not long after she dropped out of school, his daughter realized she had made a mistake, but was not able to find a way to return to school that would fit her life situation. Then she found out about the Excel Center. She not only earned a diploma; she also began post-secondary studies, which she is continuing at IUPUI.

Her father kept repeating to me how much he appreciated Goodwill for starting a school like the Excel Center. But then his wife entered the conversation and said that there was another reason why her family appreciated Goodwill. Over a year earlier, both she and her husband lost their jobs. They had gone through their savings and were on the verge of losing their house. Fortunately, they were also aware of Goodwill’s Outlet Stores, which sell merchandise that did not sell in Goodwill’s other stores. Most of the merchandise is sold by the pound, and the stores have been incredibly popular.

Many of the customers who frequent the Outlet Stores buy goods they then try to resell. The family of the Excel Center graduate began doing this – buying merchandise in large quantities and reselling much of it online. They were able to make enough money to keep their family fed and to make their house payments. As the mother said to me, “Goodwill helped us keep our house.”

As I thought about my conversation with the parents of that graduate, it struck me that both the Outlet Stores and the Excel Centers are relatively recent innovations at Goodwill. And while they operate in separate divisions of Goodwill, both have had a significant direct positive impact on that graduate and her family.

Another recent development at Goodwill is also beginning to have multidimensional impact. Early in 2012 we began operating Nurse-Family Partnership, a highly effective nurse-led home visitation program for first-time mothers in low income households. Registered nurses make weekly or biweekly visits with the mom and baby until the child is two years old. Their main areas of focus are on health related matters and the development of good parenting skills. Some of the moms are students in an Excel Center, and some are employed by Goodwill. Again, a multidimensional impact.

A few years ago we made a conscious decision to take a more holistic, whole family approach in our work. We also recognized the importance of long term relationships for lasting impact. Accordingly, we have made a commitment to maintain an active, supportive relationship with every graduate of our schools until he or she obtains a post-secondary credential, becomes employed, and remains in the workforce for at least one year. We have also developed a data warehouse that will help us track the progress of every graduate indefinitely. This, in turn, will help maximize positive outcomes for our graduates and help us continue to improve the effectiveness of the services we offer.

Every innovation – in fact, every major step we have taken – especially over the last twenty years – has built on what we had learned from earlier experiences. Constant learning, wonderfully talented staff, and a strong financial position made possible largely by donors of goods, retail customers, and donors of money to the Goodwill Foundation have produced a recipe that is yielding increasingly positive, often multidimensional, long term benefits for many individuals and their families and for the communities in which we operate.