Yahara House
BIZ !


Business Department

Business Dept. (BIZ) is the “heart and soul” of Yahara House. All members, staff and visitors arrive and leave the program through our department. Everyone is greeted and must sign in and out with our receptionists, centrally located in the BIZ hallway. BIZ proper, “the big room,” is often a beehive of activity. It’s a well appointed area with many large windows, letting in much natural light - a very pleasant environment for work. And work we do.... ALL the work done here is Clubhouse work, not outside work.

BIZ members and staff work side by side. Many members know their jobs well and prefer to work independently, using staff only as needed. Members play key roles in teaching others the intricacies of our statistical system, phones, computers, banking, etc. Mentoring, advocacy, peer support and humor are all part of the daily flow in BIZ. Recently the Administrative Financial Services (AFS) team, and it's bankers have become partners in the BIZ Dept. The check cashing bank which had been located in the lower level, now resides in a deluxe space that used to be the members’ den. The AFS staff works daily with members on auditing the loan fund database, and assisting members in their personal accounts, thus giving members more experience with real world financial opportunities.

BIZ has a weekly department meeting every Wednesday, 11 am - noon. This meeting includes personal check-ins, house issues, and BIZ issues and plans.
Our key tasks include:  
Receptionist - All incoming calls, often 150 per day, are handled by our receptionists. They do a superb job of providing information and trying to connect all calls to members and staff - often a difficult task given the size of our building, lack of paging system, and general business of all in the clubhouse. The receptionist job is probably one of the most difficult jobs at YH to do well. Yet, there is sometimes heated competition to get more shifts or to fill in when someone is gone. Our receptionists are the BEST, keeping track of everyone and playing a key role as “ambassadors” to the community.

Statistics - BIZ’s “meat and potatoes” are all of the statistics. Daily we crunch the numbers from the previous day - member attendance and participation, department and task-oriented group hours, individual attendance, averages, and cumulative summaries of participation hours. This very real job provides needed information for our funding sources, and important concrete feedback for members and staff re: recovery goals.

Banking - Our member bankers do am & pm shifts that provide a valuable resource to the clubhouse. They handle all individual accounts, 30-40 per week, for members who need or want assistance with their personal budgets. Every week they review and replenish the individual envelopes for individual budgets. The bankers also give no-interest loans, make change, sell stamps, bus tickets and meal tickets. They are busy (and accurate) folks. BIZ also sends out monthly loan balance notices to all borrowers.

 
Tours - BIZ members give 300-500 tours annually. These include potential members, families, professionals, neighbors, politicians, students, people from other countries, etc. We carefully schedule tours so we can spend time with our visitors, explaining the philosophy and how the clubhouse works. When possible, visitors join their tour guides for lunch in Cafe Yahara. Members often share their personal experiences/successes at YH with our guests, as this is a direct and powerful way to get real information about mental illness to the community. Our tour guides are great, and very user friendly.  
BIZ Strengths:
  
• Members feeling they can do things on their own  
• Tours/hosting visits  
• Good, strong, & helpful relationships with neighbors/community  
• Nice working environment  
• Feels like a team  
• Weekly meetings allow group decision-making & lots of member input  
• Well-trained receptionist/greeting of visitors  
• Members checking in with other members  
• We have great rapport with one another (fun, sharing of work and personal lives)  
• Members & staff are almost always willing to help others, and learn from them as well  
• Lots of opportunities to learn new skills & grow in safe environment  
• Jobs vary skill level-wise  
• Very recovery oriented, business like, friendly atmosphere, with look towards future  
• Members take lead responsibility for many roles in BIZ  
 

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for more information contact:
BIZ
Yahara House
608-280-4700
802 East Gorham
Madison,WI. 53703
website: mhcdc.org/yaharahouse