Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Amy Saffell. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Amy, thanks for joining us today. What were some of the most unexpected problems you’ve faced in your business and how did you resolve those issues?

2024 was full of unexpected issues! For the wheelchair basketball tournament we hosted in February, the printing company we have worked with for years where we had our tournament tshirts printed for all of our participants (around 200 athletes from around the country) closed suddenly, and our shirts had not yet been printed with time running out before the tournament. Then, we had a team who told us they might drop out about a week before the tournament with the schedule made, which would impact playoff rankings for other teams, the schedule signage already at the printer and no opportunity to change it, and tshirts and food paid for. In September, our golf tournament, which is our largest annual fundraiser, and something some people come in from out of town for, happened on the same and only day that the hurricane came through Nashville. In October for our Independence Camp, we struggled getting our typical volunteers because of changes with their organization that we were not made aware of. At the very last minute, we had to have our Christmas Party for all of our kids and families in a different venue than usual. It was quite the year! In all of those cases, we didn’t really do anything wrong, and it was so unexpected. In most of the cases, time was running extremely low, so we didn’t have much time to wallow. We just had to get down to business fixing it.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

ABLE Youth, based in Nashville, helps kids with physical disabilities learn independence skills through adaptive sports. Through our programs, our kids learn just how much they can do in life, even when others try to tell them what they can’t do, and they make friends with lots of kids who are just like them, when oftentimes they don’t see anyone else their age with a physical disability in their everyday life except at ABLE Youth. It’s amazing to see their belief in themselves grow in all areas of life just by first learning that they can play sports. Because our kids have physical disabilities, almost all are not eligible for Special Olympics, so we are a one-of-a-kind organization in Tennessee giving kids with physical disabilities the opportunity to participate in adaptive sports while learning just how bright of a future they have. I have been the Executive Director of ABLE Youth for 8 years after working for 12 years in the music industry. I was born with spina bifida and have used a wheelchair for my whole life. I grew up playing sports from a young age and experienced first hand how adaptive sports helped me learn how much I could do in life, helped me make lots of friends, and helped me have a fun childhood playing sports just like my friends without disabilities. I want to take what I learned and experienced playing adaptive sports and pass that on to the kids I work with in ABLE Youth so that they can experience the same benefits of adaptive sports that I did.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

Having been born with a disability, it has been necessary from the beginning of my life for me to believe that there are many different ways to accomplish something and that the key is persevering long enough to figure out what works best, which might take some out of the box thinking. That belief has been a huge asset in my career. ABLE Youth has a yearly golf tournament that is our biggest fundraiser of the year. Many of the golfers are colleagues of one of our Board members, and some even come from out of town. We’ve been doing it for over 20 years. We schedule it nearly a year in advance, and it turned out this past year when the date drew near, we realized that a hurricane would be passing through Nashville, not just the same day but at the exact time as our tournament. We ended up working with the course to allow people to play if the course ended up being playable early in the day, which it wasn’t, but then we had games set up in the clubhouse and the food that we had planned on. We ended up having a great turnout, and because many of the golfers still donated to us, even if they couldn’t travel to get here, and because the course only charged us for the use of the clubhouse and not for the rounds of golf, we saved a lot of money putting on the event and ended up having a more profitable event than usual. The weather has typically cooperated in previous years, so we never had to have a plan B, but the other good thing that came out of the scenario is that we now have an alternate plan laid out if something like this happens again.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

When I got my job as the Executive Director of ABLE Youth, I was on the younger side and had not been an Executive Director before, so I was eager to put my best foot forward and show why I was hired. I thought I had to come up with all of the ideas myself and wanted all of those ideas to be successful. Now I know that a big key to success is having a good team around you and reaching out to others. One person isn’t and really shouldn’t have to have all of the answers. There are always people with more experience in certain areas and more contacts and resources for certain things, and there is a wealth of knowledge in tapping into those resources. Not everything is going to be successful, but many times, reaching out to other people for ideas raises the chances of success.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.ableyouth.org
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ableyouthtn/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ABLEYouthInc
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@ABLEYouthTN