POMONA – Rockland County Social Services Commissioner Joan Silvestri spoke to a Zoom gathering of the Women’s Leadership Council Thursday, and she talked about running an agency, which serves people, during a global pandemic.
“Was I ready, was my agency ready?” she said. “They needed our services, and we need to move forward.”
Technology and tenacity helped Silvestri and her staff navigate through the pandemic as homes, wired with computer hardware and software, became workplaces.
“If the building was destroyed, how would we deliver services?” she said. “Did we envision the workplace of the future would be somebody’s home, probably not.”
Experiencing the pandemic makes planning for a future crisis a surmountable task, and Silvestri said technology and a dedicated staff were bulwarks during COVID, and this will prepare them for the future. Social workers worked remotely and others who were willing to make personal visits with personal protection equipment.
“I had a group of workers who were willing to do that,” she said. “As the pandemic continued, we did everything possible the best we could.”
And that experience gave her the insight to see how staff could respond to adversity in the field and working remotely.
“I am looking for the person who has resiliency,” she said. “I need to people who can move on dime.”
And the future Silvestri sees is one where employers, who work better at home, can do so and where technology can bring people together and ensure the efficiency of time to help any organization.
“Make sure you are recruiting employees that are resilient,” she said. “Zoom was once for kids, now we’re on all on Zoom. This virtual work, think about what it does for your organization.”
