Giving back – Scouts Canada

Year round camping in temperatures as low as negative twenty-five degrees Celsius, lodging in shelters that you build with your own hands. It is no wonder that among the Scouts Canada’s mottos are “Be Prepared”, “Do Your Best”, and “Challenge”. The latter refers to an attitude that embodies the principle that everything you do should be a challenge, because from challenges, we learn and from challenges, we grow. These simple ideas trickle down throughout a person’s life, building character and discipline in youth, and are what drives two of The Answer Company’s top senior consultants, Scott Sommerfeldt and Tony Yip, to spend a large portion of the past two decades volunteering for Scouts Canada.

Scott Sommerfeldt, Senior Consultant for CRM solutions has volunteered with Scouts Canada for the last nineteen years in a variety of roles. Today he is an Adventure Leader, responsible for leading a group of Rangers – boys from fourteen to eighteen years of age – in fun and amazing adventures that drive young men to be contributing members of society. A scout himself from a young age, Scott wanted to give back to an institution that contributed in large to the person he is today. He is proud to live and work with Rangers very close to where the Scouts began in Canada in 1907, in Aetna, Alberta. A father of eight, including five boys, Scott has already had the joy of seeing three of his children become Scouts, with another one joining next year.

Tony Yip, Senior Consultant for the Sage 300 product line, finds the same kind of fulfillment  through volunteer administrative positions with Scouts Canada. Tony sees in Scouts Canada a key institution in helping youth think for themselves, solve problems, and become self reliant and creative in the work they perform. A volunteer for Scouts Canada for the last ten years, based out of 1st Walnut Grove Scout Group, Tony has served as Treasurer and Scout Master for the Scout Section. He is responsible for ensuring the program is delivered to all youth (arranged in five age groups from five to twenty-six years old) in a safe, cost effective, and fun manner. For both Scott and Tony, fun is an important aspect of the experience they share with the Scouts.

In 2012, Scott got to take a group of Scouts to hike the West Coast Train, one of the top three hikes in North America in terms of challenge and beauty. The fun didn’t begin right away, as the boys had to prepare proposals on how they would raise funds, prepare physically, and plan out every detail for the project. This is where Scott had key experience and was able to help the boys. When he was a seventeen-year-old Ranger himself, Scott’s troop had wished to hike the West Coast Trail but, unfortunately, the project wasn’t approved. He got to use that rejection experience decades later, as an Adventure Leader, to help young Rangers embark on their own adventure as he helped them prepare and get their proposal for the hike approved.

Adult volunteers like Scott and Tony are essential to keep Scouts Canada going. Currently as Group Commissioner for the 1st Walnut Grove Scout Group, Tony works as a Trainer for Scouts Canada, helping in the training of new adult volunteers that fulfill a variety of roles. He oversees Quality Standards that are in place to ensure youth are appropriately challenged in their program, much like Scouts’ founder Lt. General Robert Baden-Powell set out to do in 1907. For over one hundred years, volunteers like Scott and Tony have played a key positive role in contributing to the life of Canadian youth to be prepared and do their best in Alberta and British Columbia.

Answering the Call

Giving back is a key element of The Answer Company’s culture, and involvement of employees in different organizations such as Scouts Canada helped lead to the creation of our “Answering the Call” program. Our staff is dedicated to volunteering and working with the community, and with the Answering the Call program team members receive 4 days off per year to focus on community work. Additionally, the team embarks on company-wide volunteer days and with the support of our clients, The Answer Company makes yearly contributions to various charitable organizations. For more information on the program visit www.theanswerco.com/giving-back