“ALL OF THE JOBS that we've introduced Bill to, he just always says, ‘Yep, I can do it,’ and tries it. I think that's part of his success,” said Goodwill Job Placement Supervisor J.D. Holmes.

Bill has been a part of the Goodwill family for many years. As a person with autism, he was originally referred to Goodwill from HealthWest for assistance with job skills training in Goodwill’s Industrial Services Center where he excelled and outperformed most of his coworkers doing packaging and assembly work. Bill also trained and worked in Goodwill’s Janitorial Services department fulfilling contracted cleaning services in the community. Over the years, Goodwill placed Bill in several jobs in the food service industry but the chaotic work environment was not a good fit.

Bill excels at complex, independent, repetitive, detail-oriented work so when a position for a general assembly worker opened up at RAMI last summer, J.D. approached Bill about applying. “I made the connection with RAMI and told them about Bill’s skills and experience,” J.D. said. “They gave us a tour and Bill was able to see the jobs they needed help with, and he was pretty confident he could do those jobs.”

Goodwill Job Coach Leann Broughton worked shoulder-to-shoulder job shadowing Bill at RAMI to help him learn the many facets of his job.

“The only thing that really surprised me was how much of a fast learner he is,” said RAMI Team Lead Michelle Batka. “That is something that just blew my mind. He's just so smart; he's a sponge. He absorbs everything that you tell him and retains it. Even for us who have worked and built these parts before, for him to pick it up as fast as he did almost put us to shame in a sense because he picked it up like he’d been doing it his entire life.”

“Bill had to build relationships with new coworkers, learn a whole new routine — breaks, lunchtime, you know, things like that,” J.D. said. “Goodwill staff was able to help support him through a lot of the changes he went through, but it also speaks volumes about Bill for being able to work through that adversity and always have an attitude that he can do it.”

“Everybody loves him,” Michelle said. “He’s got such a great personality. He's so friendly, easy to get along with, easy to talk to."

Bill is thriving at RAMI and has made lots of friends. In his spare time he likes watching wrestling on TV, bowling with friends, and going out to eat with his housemates