Name: Allison McGill
Hometown: Broomall, PA
Company: Values Into Action PA & Values Into Action NJ
Position: Director of Culture & Talent
Length of time you have been with you company: 8 ½ years
Briefly describe your journey, noting both personal milestones and obstacles you may have faced along the way. I was raised in rural Indiana, and I always knew I wanted to experience life outside of the small Midwest town I grew up in. I moved to SE PA for college and stayed for grad school. In my first professional roles I worked directly with children with disabilities or mental health diagnoses. Eventually, I was promoted to a supervisory role that allowed for me to do hiring for the programs I was supervising. And something just clicked, I enjoyed meeting new people and finding the right fit for the positions we had opened. It lead me to reevaluate what I wanted to do and I decided I wanted to gain more experience in the human resource side of human services. I took a leap and applied for an entry level HR position with my current organization and they took the leap with me! Since then, I’ve gotten the opportunity to learn and grow and am now at a director level, leading our Culture & Talent team. 

​ 
On election day in November, the House Democrats surprised most observers and won enough seats to take over the majority for the first time in a dozen years. However, three of those seats were won by incumbent legislators who will not be serving in the new session. Two resigned in December to take higher offices, and one, long-time Allegheny County Rep. Anthony DeLuca, passed away. This left the Dems back on the short end of the majority, though they did not concede that in the weeks that followed, and confusion ensued. In the absence of an elected Speaker, both Democrat Leader Joanna McClinton (D-Philadelphia) and Republican Leader Bryan Cutler (R-Lancaster) claimed the majority leading up to the three special elections which were eventually held on February 7th. As expected the Democrat candidates swept all three seats in these heavily Democrat districts all within Allegheny County. 

Name: Theresa Cicalese
Hometown: Swarthmore (Ridley Township)
Company: AmeriHealth Caritas
Position: Manager, Clinical Training Team
Length of time you have been with you company: 14 years​
​Briefly describe your journey, noting both personal milestones and obstacles you may have faced along the way: I have always felt my calling was to help people in need, and I have been lucky to be able to do that throughout my career as an RN, whether working in the hospital, primary care setting, or working for AmeriHealth Caritas. I have been with AmeriHealth Caritas since 2009, first working as a Case Manager for medically fragile children and more recently as a Manager for one of the new hire training teams. I have always been amazed at how much I learned about the "business" of Healthcare and Medicaid Managed Care. I have never gone a day in my work where I have not learned something new! I transitioned from Case Management to training new hires, and realized that I loved getting to know people and tapping into their strengths to help them grow personally and professionally. I have also learned to be truly thankful for every day, because you never know what can happen, and you especially never know what someone else is going through. I don't think I have had obstacles so much as I have had challenges or learning opportunities. The job is extremely busy, but I don't like to be bored, so it suits me!