Spring 2008 issue of Terry Magazine - (Page 25)

Headlines buzz with speculations on how Columbus will handle all the new families headed south. Projections say the city will need nine new public schools in short order to keep as many as one in five kids out of portable trailer classrooms . . . never mind the new urban demands for housing, sewage, roads, and other infrastructure. So many communities would love to have such problems. Whatever happens in Columbus, the Aflac duck and Dan Amos will keep a benevolent watch over the city from up on the hill. And when push comes to shove, you can bet that this decent and capable leader will gather his decent and capable team around him, the “family” of his unique company, and find a way to persuade Columbus to realize its destiny. After all, Dan Amos has that black belt. Terry College of BuSineSS Spring 2008 • 25 photos Courtesy oF aFLaC hildren’s healthcare of atlanta, the organization comprising egleston Children’s hospital and scottish rite Children’s hospital, came to aflac in 1995 with a modest request — $25,000 to help kids with cancer and rare blood diseases like sickle cell anemia and hemophilia. treatments. As a tribute to Joseph — instead, Dan amos gave Children’s and other cancer-related patients like the little girl at right — Amos dressed healthcare $3 million — and he refocused the up as Superman. Aflac has donated philanthropic energy of his entire organization $40 million to Children’s Healthcare. on the atlanta-based hospitals. thirteen years later, aflac has given Children’s healthcare $40 million. Nearly 10,000 employees make payroll donations, raising more than $225,000 a month, and a busload of aflac’s Columbus-based employees routinely head up i-185 to play bingo with hospitalized children. the aflac Cancer Center at Children’s healthcare of atlanta has used this benevolence to become one of the nation’s top five childhood cancer and hematology treatment centers. hospitals have added state-of-the-art inpatient and outpatient facilities, plus world-class staff and research capabilities. the center treats more than 300 new cancer cases a year — and 80 percent of the kids survive the disease. one of those survivors, a little boy named joseph, dressed in a superhero costume each time he came to the hospital for his treatments. when his cancer went into remission, he was invited to a huge annual meeting of aflac sales employees. as joseph walked onstage in his costume, he was greeted by Dan amos . . . who was dressed as superman. “that was so cool, such a symbolic moment. Folks like Dan amos and all those aflac sales people really have made the difference in life or death for a lot of children,” says Dr. william woods, head of Children’s healthcare. “what they’ve meant to our organization is incalculable. they really care.” you’ll hear the same from edna King. her daughter, Mary evelyn, was diagnosed at age two with a large tumor in her abdomen. she had six rounds of chemotherapy, major surgery to remove the tumor, two tandem bone marrow transplants, plus radiation and drug therapy. edna King appeared with Mary evelyn in 2006 at an aflac function. employees wept as she told how her daughter had once posed at the Cancer Center for what could have been a final photograph, bald-headed . . . on top of a big aflac duck. today? Mary evelyn is a happy, robust kindergartner who takes gymnastics Aflac VP Audrey Tillman says of her and ballet. (see below for new post-treatment boss, “There’s not an aloof bone in his body.” There’s evidence of that in this photo of her hugging the aflac duck!) photo of Amos with a little boy named “i represented a lot of people when i told Joseph, who celebrated his cancer going into remission by being invited Dan amos and the aflac sales force thanks for to an Aflac sales meeting. Joseph what they’ve done,” said edna King. “i felt like had kept up his courage by dressing the lucky one, because i was the one who got up as a super hero when he came to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta for to thank them.”

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Terry School of Business - Spring 2008

Terry School of Business - Spring 2008 Contents Quick Bites Research & Innovation Gatherings Best CEO in America An Unlikely Rock Star Fire & Flavor Beyond the Bench Terry Memo Economic Scorekeeper Class Notes

Terry School of Business - Spring 2008

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