Hello

I can remember being on the phone with an employee and urgently untangling the phone cord so I may resume the call with my head lowered as far as I could without drawing un-welcomed attention. I was a leave of absence administrator speaking with a distraught employee of a fortune 200 company. This employee was overwhelmed by sadness over the fact that she had to submit a request for a leave of absence. I supported her as she worked through tears to place her full request in. She was a nurse of 40+ years who devoted her life to caring for patients and now she was hit with the reality that her medical condition was taking her away from the job she loved. During this call, she didn't need an HR representative who shoved paperwork in her inbox with little to no explanation of what everything meant. She needed a friend to encourage her and uplift her as best as possible. In this moment, I realized that my day to day role held much more meaningullness than bringing a paycheck home. I was the individual who held the honor of keeping the employee connected to their livilihood at a time where health or family repsonsibilities were overwheliming. Leave of absence and disability administration is not the shuffle of paperwork, determining leave elgibility, or updating system records of absence statuses. It is, extending the HR heart by supporting the human FIRST. At Mount Up Consulting we strive to support your organization with meaningful procedural modifications that will not only maintain compliance but ensure your employees experience a process that is easy to follow and built with compassion.