As many as 200 million people across the world live with intellectual disabilities. Canopy Support Services’s main mission is to empower individuals to learn new skills and overcome obstacles through their many programs and services. They rely on Rise for recruiting, payroll, people management, onboarding, time off, and performance.
As Allison Bowes, Human Resources Coordinator at Canopy Support Services, explains: “Our name change is a statement to how our organization has evolved over the years. We’ve been operating for nearly 50 years and we started out in the small community of Peterborough, Ontario with a focus on children with disabilities”.
“Our mission is really about community,” Allison continues. “It’s what makes life worthwhile. It's our relationships. It's our identity. It's how we interact with the world. People should be able to experience community and let others experience their world, their viewpoints, through sharing. So we have a lot of corporate values that branch from our mission.”
I’ve used very basic dinosaur systems for tracking time off, information, staff documentation. I don't like using them anymore, because there’s so much better out there.
Canopy Support’s transition to Rise was a long time coming—but very welcome.
“I was intimidated at first. I didn’t need to be. Rise’s software is something that I didn’t need any training on; I instantly knew what to do with it,” explains Allison. “And I don’t consider myself a techie.”
The entire recruitment story is in one place. When moving throughout the system, it becomes the employee's story, one that I can read and interpret and share.
Allison emphasizes the ease of use as well: “This is not only a software I can use, but it's one I understand. And I think that just adds so much value.”
Whereas, previously, Canopy Support Services was doing most of the employee data entry themselves, they now do everything within Rise. “Data entry sounds like it would be such a small part of our job. It’s not, and when we're in our busy season, we don’t have the time to be doing any of that,” Allison explains.
She goes on to describe how much Rise has also changed their recruitment process. “I’m not chronically buried in emails anymore. Everything goes into Rise. The way we have our process setup now, it’s perfectly tailored to how we work, which is lovely.”
“The Indeed integration is great too,” Allison continues, “because I don’t have to reach out to people and say, ‘can you please send in your application?’ They come directly to us, which I can't tell you how much time that saves; I could spend hours a day just going back and forth with people. So having them go directly into our pipeline is just amazing.”
One thing I would be absolutely remiss about is if I didn't mention just how appreciative I am of the engineers’ attention and time.
In the past, Allison admits to feeling like a nuisance when asking questions or needing help with previous software she’s used. As she explains: “I've dealt with other implementations before and I have never experienced it where engineers are not only available and willing to speak with you, but actually saying, ‘Hey, we want your opinion’”.
Allison continues: “I thought from the very beginning that the engineers wanted to make the product work in as many ways as I wanted, basically telling me to dream big. As a not-for-profit, I've never had anyone say that. They have really just made it such a great process”.
If you’d like to learn more about Canopy Support Services, please visit their website.
