Humanitarian Aid Journey to Poland – Kevin Ward

“It goes without saying that the devastating events that are taking place in Ukraine have affected us all in some way or another, and as a business, we want to do whatever we can to help those in need……”

That was the challenge to #TeamWard and the response was typically astounding, I never expect anything different but……wow!

At Ward, we hold the security, safety and wellbeing of people at the heart of everything we do, from within the workplace, to the community, and globally. This is part of the culture and DNA of Team Ward – these are not just words, we live and breathe our values and we are not too proud to ‘get our hands dirty’ helping, in fact the opposite – we strive to.

So when I was asked if we could, should, can do something to help – my answer was an immediate yes – go for it and our people did!

A few weeks on, four members of #TeamWard are leaving at midnight on a Sunday evening on what became a hugely emotional 18 hour, door-to-door journey, arriving at a Polish refugee centre at 8pm the same day. But for me we stole the limelight, so much work, effort, planning and care had already taken place collecting goods, packaging and labelling everything to ensure this could be shared as efficiently as possible when we arrived. The support from so many amazing people, partners and even random members of the public was phenomenal – I genuinely cannot thank EVERYONE enough.

What we found on our arrival at the Warsaw Exhibition Centre brought us down to earth pretty quickly – this was not a ‘nice’ environment. We met desperate people in an extremely poorly run establishment, one designed to hold 20,000 people – holding possibly 3,000 when we arrived, that is when the reality set in for me.

We had made a promise, we are going to help, we are Ward, we fix things. But we are also representing our business, our people, our family so it has to be right and what we saw wasn’t right. So four very despondent, tired ‘Wardies’ went to our hotel feeling like failures.

At 6am the following day (and after some late night research and a better appreciation of Google-translate) we have a simple plan. We are not getting this wrong, we will find a well-managed support centre, we will get this right and if not we keep driving until we do, because we absolutely will not let the people of Ukraine down, or our Ward family.

The Plan:
Train Station, Bus Station, re-visit the Expo Centre and if that doesn’t work, we are driving to the Ukrainian border – at this point we are tired and the team is worried. But I know ‘us’ and I know what we do, so my simple words over a quick breakfast are “have confidence, we are #TeamWard, we have this” – and I absolutely believed it (I won’t lie, I was a little worried).

And we found it – we found the right place, the right people – four hours later we are unloading the supplies, the food (for kids, adults and pets), the medicines, the amazing donations, the hand-made toys… what an absolute high after the biggest low. This was, and always will be, such an emotional experience.

I went on a journey, so did the three other drivers (it could have been thirty people, such was the desire) and it wasn’t just a geographical one it was an emotional one too. I think we have all learnt a very valuable lesson.

Be nice, never judge anyone and appreciate what you have because one day it could be you on a camp bed, surrounded by thousands of people you don’t know with your whole life in a couple of holdalls.

And in closure – are we doing this again? I leave this to you, everyone at Ward – what is your appetite, because this tragedy isn’t ending soon.