(MADM) was born out of an idea by two local , AB residents. At MADM, James Darby and Tony Moores offer “worthy work to individuals facing day-to-day life barriers”.
MADM was formed in 2020 with three staff; they currently currently employ six staff and are continuing to grow. Their goal is to offer community service work to residents in Cochrane.
So far, they have completed projects such as: snow and ice clearing/removal, grass cutting, weed whacking, garbage removal, yard cleaning, grass aerating, power raking, painting, and household chores.
Read James and Tony’s experience in their own words:
“Our mission is to provide positive change for those individuals in our community that need it most. Our aim is to change lives through the power of working, offering projects to discover hope and self-sufficiency!
“We found the on the internet. We were recommended to look for a non-for-profit organization who could help support us, who also had the passion to empower people with disabilities. The Working Together program is absolutely the key to helping our staff to build on their self-sufficiency and hope for the future.
“We were extremely impressed with the correspondence and excellent communication from Shanelle Waiting [Service Coordinator, Alberta] as we worked through the hiring process. We were able to interview clients to ensure they would be a good fit for our team. All our staff identify with a disability, and Make a Difference Maintenance has been extremely fortunate to hire four unique staff through the Working Together program.
“We can see the confidence it is providing. Our staff are unique, motivated, give 100% and try their absolute best all the time. We are already starting to see, in our short time in partnership, the effect of Working Together!
“Currently, we do not need any workplace accommodation for our teams, but Neil Squire did provide resources on safety at work as well as apps on managing and work tasks.
“Having the support of ճԹ51 and its Working Together program is two-fold. It will empower our staff as we plan to build their self-sufficiency. The wage subsidy also enables small businesses of the same nature to plan strategically, knowing they have total support of an organization with the same mission.
“The Working Together wage subsidy has allowed MADM to build a solid work schedule for our team. We are already looking at how we can employ more supervisors and, more importantly, more staff at MADM.
“I would like to thank Shanelle Waiting and her team for making the process simple and straight forward. Small businesses of this nature have lots of administration in the early weeks, but your team kept the process easy and achievable. Thank you, Neil Squire!”