New this year: The Buffalo Niagara Partnership is pleased to introduce you to the finalists for the 2021 ATHENA Organizational Award®, which will recognize two organizations that support, develop, and honor women leaders, inspiring women to achieve their full potential and creating balance in leadership throughout Buffalo Niagara.
The award will be presented to one for-profit organization and one non-profit organization. Nominations were reviewed for the organization’s culture, community engagement, and leadership in supporting women.
If you’d like to attend the 30th annual ATHENA Awards®, the region’s most prestigious event dedicated to the professional accomplishments of those who work to advance women, you can get tickets here.
Meet This Week’s ATHENA Organizational Award® Finalist
Evergreen Health
Evergreen Health fosters healthy communities by providing medical, supportive and behavioral services to individuals and families in Western New York — especially those who are living with chronic illness or who are underserved by the healthcare system. Evergreen provides medical, pharmacy, housing, mental health, nutrition, transportation and syringe exchange services, as well as health education, health promotion and disease-specific prevention programs to over 14,308 individuals throughout eight facilities located in Buffalo and Jamestown, NY.
Company Culture
Evergreen operates and succeeds because of its core values. Evergreen’s employees welcome everyone, celebrate diversity, are authentic and down-to-earth, collaborate with patients, use a harm reduction model and celebrate all successes. The organization respects everyone’s life differences and does not judge. Evergreen’s workforce is about 419 employees and 279 of those employees are female.
Evergreen has a variety of Employee Resource Groups and a few target women specifically:
- Lean In, created for employees who identify as women to talk about issues in the workplace that affect them. The group was created to encourage and empower Evergreen’s female employees to succeed in the workplace.
- Evergreen offers year-round learning and training opportunities to female staff. This training program is designed to equip our current and future female leaders with key knowledge, skills and abilities to build upon the success of the organization.
Community Engagement
Evergreen provides women’s health services to female patients in a unique and comprehensive health care setting. The agency provides non-judgmental care to females in a safe and comfortable environment.
Evergreen also provides supportive services to women and offers multiple support groups led by female employees at Evergreen, which focus on the well–being of its female patients. These groups include:
- Anchored in Hope – A support group for women living with a chronic illness.
- Warrior Women’s Group – For anyone who is pregnant or within one year postpartum.
- Women’s Group – This group offers space for patients to check-in and process current life stressors during the early stages of recovery.
- Women Seeking Safety – designed for women that use substances and identify with some form of trauma.
Evergreen hosts an annual event called “Women to Women.“ Open to all women, this free wellness event is dedicated to helping women achieve health outcomes by providing complimentary food, community resources, and entertainment.
Leadership
Female employees make up almost 70% of the workforce at Evergreen. A deeper look into the employee demographics shows that the organization currently has 99 management and leadership positions. Of those 99 positions, 66 of them are held by women. Evergreen has a large female demographic and has more female leaders than male.
On the Evergreen Health Executive Team, five of the 13 members are female. The Evergreen Health board is made up of 12 members and 6 of those members identify as a female, including the Chair.
The Buffalo Niagara Partnership is pleased to welcome Evergreen Health as a finalist for this year’s ATHENA Organizational Award in the not for profit category.
Attend the ATHENA Awards® Luncheon
The ATHENA Awards® Luncheon is the region’s most prestigious event recognizing the professional accomplishments of exceptional individuals who are dedicated to the advancement of women. Be there when the winners are announced.
