Valerie Loughrige, the first person you meet when you walk into our offices, told me a story that inspired me.

When Val worked at a call center for a credit card company taking inbound calls from people who dial the number on the back of the card. One day she took a call regarding a “found card.” Apparently someone had completed a transaction at the San Francisco airport gift shop and left their card behind.

Val looked at this persons credit card history and saw that they had charged a flight to Eastern Asia—that flight was why they were at the airport. She then checked the flight schedule and saw that the flight hadn’t left yet. She then contacted the airport and asked them to connect her with the gate. They did. The gate agent then paged the flier who got on the phone with Val so she could tell him that he’d left his credit card behind at the gift shop.

It turns out that this was THE credit card this flier used for everything, and was the only way he had to pay his expenses once he arrived at his destination. Imagine the pain that Val saved this man by going the extra mile to serve him. It would have been easier for her to have just disabled the credit card (and protect her employer, the card issuer), but Val understood that she really wasn’t there for the card issuer. Her greater purpose was to help her company serve its customers, the card users. Her noble service came to light when the card member wrote a letter to the employer thanking Val for saving his trip.

The funny part of the story is that the whole time Val was concerned she’d get in trouble for making an outgoing phone call—remember, she was on the inbound call desk. She was TAKING calls and wasn’t authorized to be MAKING calls. But she understood the bigger truth of making a difference in the world. Val didn’t get any awards (well, besides a $10 starbucks certificate–WoooWhooo!) or ticker tape parades, but she bought perpetual good will for her company from one of its clients, all because she went the extra mile.

Way to go Val. I’m proud you are on my team. You’re a Linchpin!