They took shelter in their company’s warehouse when a tornado hit. Then the layoffs came. Many workers at Garner Industries are finally landing on their feet

Garner Industries was reduced to a destroyed warehouse with collapsed walls and no roof after an EF3 tornado decimated the building, as 70 people took shelter inside.

Although nobody inside the Lincoln warehouse died when the tornado hit in April, there were many physical and emotional injuries. Ellisa Mendoza was in the building when the tornado tore through.

“I was walking, and I just heard things on the roof, the ceiling,” she recalled. “It sounded like, hail, rain, [I’m] used to it, you know, working there. Then all of a sudden, the lights burst, I look up and I see the sky.”

Mendoza is a single mother of four. And with no building to work in, Garner announced a massive lay off.

“It was horrifying, very horrifying," she said. "But I mean, for them to let go of a lot of people. I mean, I understood that."

Officials with Garner Industries said in a press release the company did offer laid off employees support—including hosting a job fair to connected them with new opportunities. That’s where Mendoza and many other former Garner employees got connected with Hexagon Agility. The company is actively working on hiring and welcoming those who lost their jobs.

Training Manager David Jacobs said the company first noticed the effect on their business, but quickly realized the human impact.

“Garner Industries is actually one of our vendors," Jacobs said. "So as soon as we heard something, one, we started looking at it from a business standpoint and going, OK, how's that going to impact us?” he said. “But as soon as we started having those conversations even a little bit further, it was like, OK, wow. How about the employees?”

And those new employees came with their own cultural traditions, their own languages and their own heritage. All of which Jacobs and his team are trying to blend into a new work environment at Hexagon Agility.

Ongoing Recovery Efforts

Hexagon Agility started a program to train the new employees in not only how to accept diversity, but how to embrace it.

It partnered with the nonprofit Lincoln Literacy to host two language classes. One for people learning English and another for the employees to learn workplace phrases like ‘be careful!’ or ‘which health plan is best?’ as well as how benefits and insurance work. The employees get paid for their time to take these classes during their regular work hours. Both Hexagon Agility and Garner Industries are members of the Workplace English program with Greater Lincoln Workforce Development Board. Jacobs estimated there are at least 15 different spoken languages at Hexagon Agility.

“The barrier, nine times out of 10, is the language," he said. "So, if we can help address that piece of it, we know that we're going to be able to get those individuals in the door, start teaching them the things that we need them to know to be able to be a good team member."

Mohamed Aresou moved to the U.S. from Sudan. He completed the foundational English class and is one of the first graduates of the workplace English class. The first graduation ceremonies for that class took place this summer.

“Before this class, we don't know about even our area," he said. "We don't know a lot of things like the real name of the parts, and how [we] just would try to point and describe the thing. But now we know. Everything now is better."

Aresou added the classes have helped him feel more confident at work, and his two daughters have told him they’re proud of his efforts to learn. He's developed many friendships with the people he works with from Africa, the Middle East and South America.

And that’s good news for Erica Birky Rios. She teaches the classes as the workplace English instructional coordinator. Although she’s employed through Lincoln Literacy, she has a Hexagon Agility ID to allow her access to the early morning and afternoon classes.

“It is incredibly profound," she said. "The students in these classes feel seen. They have a chance to be empowered by their workplace who's giving them this space to develop their skills, and that brings team members together across languages."

Value in diversity

Jacobs said many of the employees laid off from Garner were Vietnamese, and Hexagon Agility is working to bring different cultures together.

“You’ve got a particular employee that she's a single mom, and she's lost her job by no fault of her own," he said. "Mother Nature decided that tornado needed to happen. And then you start talking to individuals from Sudan, from Vietnam. And to me, that's the melting pot piece of it.”

Even though it uses additional resources, Jacobs and his team said the additional costs and classes offered to the new employees is worth it.

“It ends up becoming not an asset just for us, but it becomes an asset to the whole entire Lincoln community,” he added. “Because now they can go to the doctor, and they can have a conversation. They can go talk to a teacher at a parent's teachers conference and have some confidence in having those conversations.”

Sinan Alaslami works on Jacobs’ training team. He is originally from Iraq and has lived in various countries. Part of his responsibility was to help create the curriculum for the workplace English class. He is especially proud to know about 95% of the approximately 300 employees at the Lincoln campus.

“I like the diversity because, you know, I used to live in different places and I used to see the other side," he said. "I learned a lot of cultures. It makes me feel more comfortable, like we're all human being."

But that doesn’t mean the new employees have forgotten what they lived through. Dung Ngyuen sheltered in Garner’s restroom during the tornado. He was laid off shortly after. He's still affected by his near-death experience. He started at Hexagon Agility after two months of being afraid to leave his home. He’s now in training to be an operator.

“Sometimes I think I can't believe I am here, you know?" he said. "Yeah, that's still scary, [the] tornado. Sometimes I think I still work at Garner. I like to work here, but I don't want anything to happen. You know that's scary. That's why I don't want something to happen again to me.”

Mendoza knows what it’s like to survive through tough times, but still feels uneasy sometimes during storms. She tries to stay strong for her kids to show them how to use past trauma to help feed compassion. Mendoza now makes an effort to help her community any time it’s hit by severe weather.

“[I hope] my kids know that they have a fantastic mom that will never give up,” she said while wiping away tears.

As for what’s next, Jacobs said he has started conversations about what Hexagon Agility can do to add new support systems for its recently hired employees. Like resources for how to recover from a traumatic event.