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2020 Distinguished Service AwardMargaret L. ZawackiThe FAPPS Distinguished Service Award is our association’s highest honor. It has been awarded 7 times. It can be bestowed for a long period of sustained achievement, or for individual acts of service that have a profound positive effect on private process servers. This year’s recipient has accomplished both. Our recipient started attending FAPPS meetings in the late 1990s, and was elected to the board for the first time in 1999 or 2000 (the ink on our parchment records for that period is faded). She served as a Director, then Treasurer, then President. She has served on the board continuously for the ensuing 20 something years, a feat that is unmatched in FAPPS history. She has taken on the particularly time consuming job of FAPPS President for a total of 6 years, another record. Just in board meeting time alone, she has donated over 80 weekends to the service of FAPPS. She has many accomplishments as President. She has championed enhancing the educational portion of our annual meetings. She was the first to push for a two day annual meeting to allow time for meaningful educational segments. She worked with the Elections Chair to come up with our current nomination and election system. FAPPS now has a smooth and transparent nomination and election procedure which allows for sufficient time for the members to get to know and understand the candidates. An important side benefit is additional time for education. She has served as our Treasurer many times. Reports were always accurate and timely, and no one cared more about making sure we didn’t overspend our resources. She was the first Treasurer to move FAPPS from a manual paper or spreadsheet system to a purpose built accounting program. She convinced the FAPPS Board to put some of our money into investment accounts to improve our savings performance. One of her strengths is finding good people, putting them in charge of important programs, and letting them run, while always checking on them. The FAPPS Formal Education program and the Process Server Appointment Committee are two very important programs that have grown more organized and stronger under her watch. For the 2020 FAPPS Distinguished Service Award, I present to you a woman that I have known and respected for more than two decades, a woman who has given more hours of personal time to keep private process serving a viable occupation than virtually anyone I know. FAPPS is a better organization, private process servers have a better association protecting their interests, because of our colleague, my friend, Margie Zawacki. From the Award itself: Spirit of a Leader A true leader has the confidence to stand alone, the courage to make tough decisions and the compassion to listen to the needs of others. She does not set out to be a leader, but becomes one by the quality of her actions and the integrity of her intent. Leaders, like eagles, don’t flock. You find them one at a time. 2020 FDSA For the Committee, |