EMEA Recruitment Podcast #166 - Kathy Magee – Helping the World Smile

Hello, everybody. Welcome to the next episode of the EMEA Recruitment Podcast, sponsored in partnership as ever with our good partners over at Operation Smile. Delighted to welcome Kathy Magee onto the show. So, a very, very special guest we have today. So, hopefully, you can still hear and see me. Okay, Kathy. Yes, I can. I'm so excited to be here. Just looking at what all you do for people and clients to make sure things are in order, in different offices. So, kind of that's

what Operation Smile does. We take care of people, but we have to make sure it's quality, it's the right procedure, and we're very safe. We're very strong on safety with these children, because they've never been to a hospital. The families have never been in a... So, they're afraid of what's going to happen, and that our teams are so great. We put our arms around these children and their families, and take care of them to the best of our ability. So, I'm so glad to be here

today. All right, thanks. And I've got to say, we're probably on our 200th episode of the podcast show, and I'm never normally nervous before coming into a podcast. But today, I think I am a bit. I mean, obviously, a little bit in awe of what yourself and your husband have done, with the charity and how you've all started it and where it is today. And these are obviously all things that will come up in the line of questions today. So, I'm really looking forward to it. And again, huge

thanks for spending the time with us today to go through these. And I think that the first question that I ask every guest coming onto the podcast, given that the show is in partnership with your Operation Smile, is that what was the last thing that made people smile? So, I thought, actually, it would be a bit crazy not to ask you this question, given the company you founded and so on. So, what was the last thing that made you smile, Kathy? Well, you know, I always, I have lots of

grandchildren, and we deal a lot with children, and I have a pediatric nursing background. So, for me to have a child giggle and smile when I hold them, for me, that's the best thing that can ever happen. And when we bring them in and out of surgery, and to see that change in that child and that smile on that child's face, after different years of not being able to do that, then that makes my day, honestly.

And then my family and staff ask me, what keeps me up at night? And I say, we just need to take care of our

children. They're out there, and we need to do this. So, that smiling on that child's face is so important to me. That's, it's great to sit here. And I know, obviously, coming up here, there's a few questions aligned to the missions that you guys do and the great work you do, but also some of the challenges associated. With this as well. And I mean, I know, obviously, this is looking back quite a while ago now, when you started to Operation Smile, but today, you look and see what

it's like, what you've achieved. And I thought I'd ask you what it feels like to be in this position now in the business. Well, we slowly have taken steps forward, right? We see a problem. How do we address the problem? And so, for me now, I can actually address the problem and say, we're going to take care of that problem, whatever that may be. And I, we are talking more about getting closer to the patient. This is so important because we see families all the time. They don't have any shoes on

their feet, and they will walk for miles and miles and days to get to us. So, I can make these decisions saying, okay, let's take a look, not just at doing the surgery for that child, let's look at that

whole family and look at the needs and get out to where the people are. So, I can make decisions now that I could suggest before, but now I can say, all right, let's get the team and let's see how we're going to make it happen. So, that's been a great thing. You know, it's a lot of responsibility because you know it's a life that you're actually changing. You know, how many times do we get to be

able to change a child's life? Not so many. And so, people are willing to commit and help us to do that. So, I feel like those decisions now and those responsibilities are on me, and I have to make this move for the future to take care of more people and more children. So, yeah, it's been a lot, but yeah,

we're just going to do it. That's the way it is, you know? We know what we can do. We have a certain ability to be able to do this surgery, and we know there are lots of children out there with, you know, a cleft lip and cleft palate. It can be changed. They can have a life. They can eat. They can speak. They can go to school. They can, you know, have friends and not be made fun of. This is a big deal for a child. So, I feel like we have that. I now have taken the responsibility to make sure we

do more and we get to more children. No, and as I was saying, obviously, someone who was born with cleft lip and palate myself, you know, in the UK here, you know, I mean, obviously, you know, we take it for granted that these operations are available and don't really think too much about them in the developed world, but in the developing countries, you know, the skills that just isn't there largely. And I think, as you mentioned there, someone's life can be quite a

miserable existence if they don't get this situation worked on. And so, yeah, I think, as you mentioned in the answer to the first question, you know, what makes you smile is seeing, you know, the smile and laughter of the children and that you're helping the people around you. And it's so giving the gift to the smile of children. I mean, it's, you know, it doesn't get much better than that, I guess, you know, for in terms of job satisfaction, I suppose, if you put it

that way. You know, I agree with you. We take certain things for granted, you know, in our developed countries in Europe, in the United States, you, you know, get an appointment, you go to a doctor. That is not happening out there in probably 85% of the world. And so, you know, we feel like we're privileged to be able to help to change that ability to get some medical attention, to

have a healthier life. It's a lot going on, but we're going to try to do it so we train the people, whether it's anesthesia, pediatricians, we train, change the whole team and train them so that they can do more in that district hospital we're calling it. And I mean, I guess, you know, taking you back to 1982, when you decided to start the business. So, you know, I think, you know, obviously, starting business with you, with your husband, Dr. Bill Magee, and I guess, you know, the

question that I had is why specifically cleft lip and palate? Was there any reason behind this specialism at that time? Well, I have a pediatric nursing background and my husband is a pediatric plastic surgeon. And he has a dental and a medical degree plus his plastic surgery. So, he concentrates on this area of the face and he knows the dental, he knows all that area from having the dental background. And so, he started, you know, here in the United States with a practice. So, he

got very good at, you know, taking care of cleft lip, cleft palate, not as many as we see every day in the, you know, middle countries that don't have this ability. So, we went for the first time and were asked to go to the Philippines. We had no idea, no idea what we were about to see. And we jumped islands, there's 7,000 islands in the Philippines. So, we jumped islands, so, care kids, cleft lip, cleft

palate, and it was fast. And the last island we were in, honestly, there was 15 of us, we were overwhelmed. 300 children surrounded us and their families, 15 of us in the middle of this lecture hall. And, you know, we were literally in tears with 15 of us because we knew we couldn't touch it, couldn't even touch it. So, he said, well, let's organize, let's do the best we can and take care as many as we can. And that trip alone, we just did 40 out of all those kids. So, you know, for

us to leave, it just didn't feel good because we knew we could take care of it. And that's where we really started saying, on the plane back, what could we do to really go back, we thought, and just finish those children. And here we are 40 years later. I mean, we had no idea all this, all of the cleft lip and cleft palate all over this world. So, that really got us started. And also, at that time, because I have the five children, I took our oldest daughter out, Bridget. And I taught her how to

scrub in an OR. I have no idea she was 13 years old. So, I just say to everybody, get your kids moving, because they're so capable. And my husband said, okay, good, put another table on, and I'll have Bridget be my scrub nurse. And so, we were able to do instead of three tables, we could do four. And we did an extra 15 children at that time. So, kids, they've got it. They will do what you show them how

it can be done. And they do it very, very well. So, I say, get your kids involved. It was so important for us. Because now, schools started clubs in country, in the US, in Europe. And those students are very important to us. They are, first of all, they're the future. Second of all, they're very capable on these teams. And they teach these kids important things. How do you take care of your teeth? What do you do if you're dehydrated? All these things, what do you eat so you're healthy?

They are very capable. And we say, just get those students involved. So anyway, that trip, we learned a lot the first time and tried to move forward. And then people started asking us, could we go to Kenya? Could we go to South America? And we kept saying, oh, okay. We never said no. No is not an answer in here. We would always say, well, let's find some friends. Let's see. Because we networked with the Plastic Surgery Society worldwide. And we had friends from living all over

the world. So, we started really pushing on these different countries and saying here. And once somebody else went, they told their friends, they said, hey, this is the best thing to do. You're very good at club cleft lip and palate. Let's go. You can go to this other country with me. So now we have 6,000 volunteers ready to go. And so for us, that's so important. Best volunteers, we credential them, whether it's the surgeon, the anesthesia, the intensivist, all those people, Biomed.

Nobody thinks about them. But if we don't have our equipment working, we're in trouble. So we always have a Biomed person on our teams. So anyway, it's a team of a strong five that we always put on these sites and make sure it works to the best of the ability for these kids. And then you mentioned there the benefits that the children get from being on these missions. And I think that's even

more exaggerated in the modern world that we're in now. Because obviously, there's so much emphasis now in front of the screen, taking people away from really building what he classes real relationships. It's very easy for children to stay in front of the screen all day and not really notice that they're not communicating with real people. But this way, it's not only they're communicating with people, it's very emotional as well. And it kind of builds their strength on the

emotional side and the empathy side and gratitude as well, I would say. It's been great for what they have. So there's a lot that children are going to get from this. And kind of this is leading me on to my next question, because I know that as you mentioned earlier, your family and children are very involved in operation smile. I mean, you have five children, 14 grandchildren, and largely all

of them are pretty active in the Operation Smile business. And I was going to say, what impact has, I guess, being a mother, being a grandmother, had on how you shaped Operation Smile as business? Because I imagine it's had quite a large impact on that. You're working with children every day, your family a big part of it. But do you think there's anything specific that jumps out? The impact that five children having this large family is and being involved in the family

business has really had on the company and so on? Yes, we never really thought about saying, oh, hey, to our kids, hey, maybe in the future, you'll come in and help us out. But what we did was we had patients, if we had a larger craniofacial case, we couldn't do it in country, we had to bring

it to the US or to Europe. So we would have those patients living in our house. And so my kids would say, well, where are they going to sleep? I'd say, well, how about your bed? And they would have to get out of their bed, I'd give them the room, I said, don't worry about it, we'll fix everything later. And then a couple of them, I said, well, take them to school with you. They were like, whoa, what are you

kidding me? And because they had, you know, either tubes in their nose or something like that. And they were, no, I'm not. Oh, yes, you're just going to be fine. I called the headmaster, they're totally fine. Bring that student. Some of them were, you know, like 14 years old, some of them were younger. And they took them to school with them. And the school was excited, the kids, they were

excited. So actually, they were rewarded for doing that. And so just having patients in our house, having them live with it, and, you know, and then taking them out with us, very important. That's what I'm saying. Maybe you can go with your son, because what happened, and I'll tell you this one story, my daughter took out her took her oldest son. And I think they were in Colombia. And they went to a village. So they had to cross a river to get to this child's house or hut. And they were doing

some speech therapy to follow the surgery. And on the way back, my grandson turned around, he's not small, he's he's like almost six feet. He's a sophomore in high school. And he just threw his arms around my daughter and said, started crying. And said, I had no idea people lived like this. I had no idea, mom. And so that's what exposure did for them. They learned to be grateful for what they have every day. They can do, you know, have fun, have ability to do all sorts of things, maybe ski,

maybe hike. And these kids have nothing. So they learned to appreciate what they had, and to also give back. That was the one thing I wanted, like, we should share what we have, you'll never lose. Just share with what you have. You have talents, you have time, share those things with people. And so it got to be a big family piece. And everybody is involved. And I have never asked my kids to take a position or do something. They have always volunteered to do it because they live with it. I

think they just lived with it. And they just got involved and saw the needs. And they took special things that they could do to make those changes. My oldest one that went the first time, she handles all the student programs worldwide. That was 40 years ago. So she's 50s. And she's still doing it. So you realize what you can do, and you realize you can give back, and you realize you're changing a child's life. But you're also changing this world to be a better place to be. So we learned a lot by

doing this. And yeah, it's a great family activity. No, it's really interesting because I suppose, you know, I suppose when looking more at the career path of, let's say, a standard individual, if they're moving around careers, or they start a business in a, in the private sector, they might, the public sector, they may say, well, you know, working with husbands, wives, family members is something to, to potentially avoid, you know, there's not many

people that would recommend it. But obviously for yourselves, it seems to have gone extremely well. I mean, do you think that you could you imagine Operation Smile without having your family involved? I really, I don't, I really think it was something that we could all do together, right? There are some things you can do together. I don't know, it could be cooking, it'd be hiking, but this thing we can do together. And, you know, my kids are everywhere. They're, one is in LA, one is

in Colorado, one is in Utah. So we can still all do something together. And so, you know, we, we did learn a lot by doing this. And I have to say, you have to realize what your talent is, right? My husband is a visionary, he'll say, and one of the things we can talk about different things we did to get involvement from others. And he, he has a vision and he, but the vision is big. And I'm like, okay,

that's a great idea, but who's going to make it happen? So I'm on the other side of this and saying, okay, so the way we could implement this, because ideas are only ideas, if you implement them. And so I'd say, well, let me get the team together, let's sit down, you can share your ideas, we have to have

the people to make it possible. So I'll just give you one example, which was a big one for us. We said, we have to do something to make noise, to get some ideas out there for these countries so they could get more corporate involved, raise money to do more, more volunteers involved. And so we read this chapter called, it's called BHAG, a big, hairy, audacious goal. And we read that chapter

and we're like, hi, what are you gonna do? So we said we could go around the world. And I mean, this was not happening in a day, but we could go around the world to 18 countries, we were already in them, nine weeks, and we would operate on 5,000 children. And then my husband had another idea because Pat Robertson is here, Christian Broadcasting, they're all over the world. We went

over and met with Pat, he'd been a donor, but he had a plane that was a medical plane. So it had ORs on it, had post op, pre op, and training seats in the front where they could video the surgery from the back. And so we asked Pat Robertson if we could use the plane. Because let us think about that. That's a big item. You know, it's a, what is it, a seven, 727 or seven, the big aircraft. So he finally

came to us. He said, you've got it. I'm like, oh, okay, that's, that's cute. That's what I said to my husband. That's a good idea. How, how, because they gave us nothing. Where's the steps? Where's the landing rights? Where's the everything that goes with the plane? How about the gas? So we, we had to figure those things out. But at the end, I think it brings everybody together. Everybody's got to have a part of that. You know, we were working with some of ExxonMobil, Chevron. So we're like, all

right, you guys start calling them and see if they'll give us gas when we land. And, you know, then landing rights. So our countries are very connected. So they helped us get all that. I mean, it was a lot, but in the end, it was very successful because what happened? We did get that noise. We wanted the presidents of the countries came on. They want to see what was going on. We were like, this is great because they should know the needs of these children in their country. So we have

presidents, a country coming on. We had press. The corporate came on. So they gave us more money. It was called the journey of hope. And so that was in 1999. It was a lot. It was an idea, like I say, an idea is only an idea until it's implemented. And so we were able to do that. I have, I like the getting into the nitty gritty and my husband likes the ideas. So different personalities can work together. And

that that works in families. And our kids had different, you know, exercises to perform. My one son is a surgeon out in LA. So he does cleft lip and cleft palate. You know, he can join my other sons of business, man, my other sons are surgeon. The girls have their backgrounds in nursing and psychology. So everybody could join and make this possible. It was extraordinary. Actually, we can send you the clip on that and you might pop that clip on because you can see the presidents coming on or

people lining up to get on. We landed, but we also worked in that hospital in that country. So we were able to do five thousand surgeries in those nine weeks. So do those big hairy, big goals. Yeah, yeah, big goals. That was a big one. Yeah, that's it. It's because I mean, I think, you know, you mentioned a bit about having these these big goals and present working with presidents in different countries.

And I think I guess if you needed any any clarification that you were doing the right thing, you know, obviously 2009 winning one of the America's best leaders from President George W. Bush at that time. I mean, that must have been a pretty pretty crazy year for you, I guess. You know, I mean, it's kind of just proof that you're doing the right thing if you like. Yeah, I mean, the awards are something. I mean, it was a pleasure being with the Bushes because, you know, they're a

family. Senior Bush, Junior, they're they're a nice family and they work together. So, you know, I think maybe them seeing this and seeing how we're bringing the world together was the credit that we

were able to get that award. So it was everybody, though, I can tell you that created a ruckus around the world, but everybody jumped in and it was great. Everybody felt good about it, right? We took care of five thousand children in those nine weeks. It's it's a lot of surgery and we have to be very careful. It was all safe, quality work. And that's what we're we're really focused on that. We will not just take anyone on these teams. They are searched out and they have definitely had

experience with doing a lot of club flip and club tablets. I mean, is it quite challenging to keep managing the emotions and the emotional side of things? Because, well, I know I've heard I've watched an interview with yourself and Bill talking about the strong emotions you go through,

you know, when you're going on the missions, but also running the business. And I think, you know, obviously, because it's something you're very passionate about, it's something where there's so many emotions, not just for you, your family, but the the patients, their families, when everybody involves such emotions that, you know, when you're looking at the business side, you know, you mentioned it. It's not not easy to get these things going, you know, these kind of things

you've done, you know, you've given the highlights of what you achieve. But I guess getting up to that point, there's a lot of things that don't work out. You know, you want things to get from A to B as quickly as possible. And if it was easy, everybody would do it, but it's not easy to do

it. So does it make the emotions even it magnifies the emotions because you're working in the most business anyway, you start at the company, you can see you've got this massive vision and then something goes wrong. And there's nothing you can do to control and think, well, yeah, I've got to either change my goal or we've got to, yeah, re re re re re revaluate things. So does it how do you manage

those emotions as part of this really? Well, I just do a little story because there's a lot of emotion on all these programs, all these missions, because it's a mother that's or a father that's just desperate where it or there it's not going to happen. So I was this was one of our first trips to Vietnam. We were the first Americans in after the war. And I'm walking through the hallway and this mother motions to me. Of course, I'm not speaking that language, but I know she wants something. Go

in the room. The child is about seven days old and she's trying to spoon feed it with some water, little milk and I'm like, oh, boy, that child is not going to make it. And that's very emotional for us to say that is that child is going to die right in front of our face. And we do not want that. So I went to the team and they were like, what are you talking about? We can never put that child on her

anesthesia. That child is not going to it's not going to work. Child is not going to make it. So I was like, hi, well, this is think about it was think. And so the whole team is emotional around one child. But at the end of the day, the dentist, we have dentists on all our teams because a lot of structure with the team. And so the dentist said, I have an idea. But OK, but it's here you. And he said,

I'm going to make an obturator. And that's a little appliance that you put in the roof of the mouth. So it blocks the hole if you have a pallet so the child can eat. I was like, well, OK, that's great. And so he said, I don't know what else to do. And the team said, I don't know what else either. So he said, I'm doing it a seven day old. You're making you have to put, you know, an appliance in. You have to it's

very small. Anyway, fast forward. We're finishing that trip. And he said, I've got it. I've got the obturator. OK, so that's going to block so hopefully that child can eat. We'll block the roof of the mouth. So the whole team think how emotional this is. The whole team forms around this bed as he puts this obturator in the child's mouth. It fits perfectly. And the mom can really start feeding that child, you know, with a bottle. And we're like, well, that is the best we can do. So we hope

that child will be fed and we can finally do the surgery. And guess what? One year later, when we went back. The first people on that line with that mother and that fat little one year old. And we did that surgery. It's very emotional because it's a life. It doesn't matter if it's just one. It's a life that was saved because of one person's ability to make a change and what that child needed so that surgery could be done. Amazing. It was amazing for all of us because the surgeons were

like, that's not working for us. But the dentist said, I've got an idea. So like I said, you have an idea, but can you implement it? And he did. He made that obturator and made it fit that child eight all year. We were able to do the surgery. Boom, you don't need that obturator anymore. So anyway, it's a full team, a full emotion that goes on every day during these trips. I really want you to join

Paul. Yeah. I'm yeah. I'm I'm in. It was one of those things that I was speaking to your team in the UK about about three or four months ago, saying, OK, I want to try and get involved in this. So yeah, I'm definitely definitely in with that. And as I say, if I can get my my son along as well, that would be

that would be awesome. I think that it'd be just brilliant to see. You know, I've heard a lot about the the work that is done over there and through obviously the different people, operations, files from the surgeons there. And it just sounds like a really amazing thing to go and see. But also very very very emotional. I think I'm going to need to take plenty of tissues with me. I think on those trips, I think I've written down everyone really. But but yeah, but I suppose that that's the kind of

thing that you've explained there that just keeps you wanting to push and do more. You know, I mean, I think that that's yeah, every time you see that, there is extra motivation to keep taking things to the next level really, I guess. And and you know, it shows that it's not it's a surgery. It's a dental. We do also follow those kids with speech, you know, and also nutrition to make sure they're eating

properly. And you know, it's you know, the moms are eating properly so they don't, you know, have issues with malnutrition. That's very important to us. So we follow through with these kids. It's not just we do surgery and we're done. Those every one of those countries have clinics where those kids come back to and they do the follow up on them. So so important to just follow up and make sure they're going to be OK for life. And I mean, obviously you mentioned earlier on about the the

great team that you have the volunteers that are involved. But I mean, I'm guessing here, but I guess there's you could always do it more volunteers, you know? I mean, I suppose on every mission you go on, you know, I suppose, unfortunately, you can't help everybody on every mission. There's always going to be people that you run out of time or resources to be able to help. So the more the more volunteers, the skills that you have in and from raising so on, it's always

going to be beneficially, you know, to keep that that mission moving forward, really. Yeah, I'm the volunteers are their key. If you when we take, say yourself and any donors on a trip, they look at the surgery that's being done, right? That child has a life. But they say your volunteers are

incredible. They take care of their children like their their own. They pick them up, they hug them, they make sure they're comfortable. This is a scary spot. Handing your child into an operating room that you've never seen before. And they trust it's a lot of trust that they give us. And so we have to do it the correct way. Volunteers are always necessary. And we're really having volunteers. We have different programs now. And one of one of them is called the champions. These are

volunteers that have been with us for many, many years. We've asked them to come in and help train now the medical people that are in these district hospitals because they need the training. So excellent trainers coming to our district hospital, medical people training, training, training so that we have the best that we are going to give that so people have good health care. It's about health care. Like I said, 85 percent of people have no health care in the world. So that and

then we have had another program because we see a lot of women are in health care and we need more. If we're really going to, you know, address 85 percent of the world, you need more. So we're pushing on women in medicine. And we've had four all women in medicine trips, missions. We were able to find them from everywhere, a surgeon, San Ysidia biomedical, and we did for one in Africa, one in South America, in Peru, one in the Philippines. And let's see, we did Malawi. Yeah.

So, you know, we were able to get them there there. And now we're driving on more education. We've gotten some scholarship money to train more women to go into medicine and to take leadership possessions that they can take positions that help lead and guide the rest. So we're really pushing on that women in medicine, the champions. These are new programs that we're moving forward

so that we can really expand what we're doing for the future. And it's great to see. I mean, obviously the the subject of diversity and inclusion is well spoken about in different companies and on platforms like LinkedIn and so on. And I think, yeah, the more that companies like yourselves and others can do to highlight that and get more women involved in these positions then.

And I think it's good. It's good to see because, you know, it's, yeah, I think as soon as a few people start doing it, then the ball starts rolling and people realise why I can do that and try to learn the skills in order to get involved as well. And I mean, the question was going to we would just before we hit record today, we were talking a bit off air about about yourself really, you were talking

about inspirational women in in their roles. And, you know, I was asking you, you're still doing a lot of travel. And I think the answer is definitely yes. So you're still as motivated, driven and the full energy as ever. We're going back to 1982, so that's fully driven and motivated as you were then. Yeah, no, it's it's interesting because, you know, we took here originally the one child, we were so happy to do that, to get the volunteers, the commitment for training, the equipment. But then

when I I was in Rwanda lately, amazing what this country has done, you know, for their people. And I had a meeting with the president, President Kagame, and he said, all I want for my people is best

health care. Well, that's easy then for him. He'll have an economy because people can work, they're healthy. They can take care of things. And, you know, we learn things from these trips. They have a day where they do cleaning one day a week, one day a month. I'm sorry, we got there on cleaning day. What's that? I don't know what that is. OK, so we went to the hospital and they handed us mops and, you know, dusting rags and we clean the ORs. Everybody in that country stops for one day and

cleans. They don't care what you clean. So there's no, you know, there's no papers on the street. The tree, everything is trimmed. Honestly, I was like, this is amazing that what people can do together to make their country the best. So that's a great example of what people can do. And I think the US ought to try that one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's trying to get kids cleaning in the US that have been interesting. Right. Yeah. I like the idea, though. I like that in the UK as well. I'd like that

in our house. Yeah, yeah, in our house. That's right. But, you know, that inspires me to meet with the president of a country and say, oh, I want his health care. And then when I met with the Minister of Health, he said, could you help us? We have no intensive care. Yes, we can. So we'll drive to get new things in that country so they have better medical care and the training that goes with that. So that and the students, I was just with these high school students that trained for trips that are

going on. India, Malawi, Madagascar, Peru, they're Morocco, they're going all over the place. They were so excited. These are kids, high school students that have now instead of doing something else, right, using your phone all day, they've committed to go on these trips, but they have to do a lot before they go. We have a conference every summer. They were part of the conference. They have a club in their school. So these kids are committed to give back and to really share what

they have, their talents to a child in a country. And it'll be so beneficial to them and to the child they touch. We had a staff who was in one of our countries and she got in. We have a child life area.

We get the kids to start playing because they've never played before. So they and we get them calm so they're ready for the or and then when the child was ready to go to the or this staff spent so much time with this child instead of taking the mother's hand to walk to the or he turned to the staff and took her hand and they walked in and she handed that child into that operating room. So, you know, lots

of emotion, like to say, but important to be part of the team and to give back. People have so many talents these days and we can connect. This phone is a connector worldwide. So, yeah, we do a lot with emotion. We do a lot with talent, time, you know, and the treasure you have to share with others. I think I think it's really a great way to end the show really. I think I can't think of other quotes to

finish on really, Kathy. I think and just to say a huge thank you for your your time today. I know that you're really busy. There's a lot of things going on and I really appreciate the time you spent with myself. I know the network will take a lot from it and and clearly, you know, we're helping to promote the book, the Sloathar the Sloth book as well, which I've written for Operation Smile. And I know you've written some really nice words for the book as well, which are

really grateful for. So a huge thank you for going through this. But more importantly, a huge thank you for really everything you've done, you know, since starting Operation Smile. I mean, the the lives you've changed and the impact you've had on on their families and and people in general. I mean, it can't be it can't be calculated, really, the impact you've had. So a huge thank you to self andto Bill, obviously, for for starting all up and for the impact that you've made across the

world. So, yeah, just massive thanks for that. Yeah, we say it's been an honor for us. You know, we have met so many people. So many lives changed. So many students who started with us 40 years ago have come back to us to do things either surgically, you know, or a lot of these students go into public health after that. So it's helpful to the future. We see a lot from what what we have done, but we are honored to be a part of this whole thing.