When we arrived back onto the Global Mercy six weeks ago, I (Jeff) already knew the hospital teams were busy. People would say things like, “They’ve got too much,” or “That team is working until 8:00 at night.” I heard those comments last field service too.
But here’s what I didn’t know: why. Why were they staying so late? Why did it feel like the hospital was always underwater? And honestly, even if I did figure out the why, I wasn’t sure if I had anything to offer. After all, I’m the finance guy. My day job was on Deck 8 — spreadsheets, budgets, bank accounts, petty cash. Important, but not exactly what you picture when you think of “bringing hope and healing.”
Still, if there was a way I could help, I wanted to.
It Started With Excel
So I tried something simple. I put out a message to the crew along the lines of:
The Finance Office is going to be open on Thursdays and Fridays this month to host Excel Office Hours. Stop by if you’ve got Excel questions. We won’t do the work for you, but if your spreadsheet isn’t working the way you want, or you’ve inherited one that is hard to understand, or you’re just stuck — we’ll help you think it through.
Honestly, I figured a handful of people might stop in with random questions. What I didn’t expect was that this would be a doorway into the hospital.
One day, a nursing manager showed up. She told me about a spreadsheet her team used and how it was slowing them down more than it was helping. I said, “Sure, I’d be happy to take a look.”
Now, I already knew her team was slammed. They were leaving late almost every night, trying to juggle too much. I’d also heard from others about some of the challenges they were facing. But this was the first time I was pulled directly into it.
Calling in Reinforcements
I’ll be honest: I’m not the best Excel person on the ship. Not even close. Thankfully, my team includes people who are much, much, much better than I am. So I pulled them in, and together we started working with the nurse manager.
It wasn’t glamorous. It wasn’t some shiny new cloud system. (By the way, cloud systems don’t always work well here anyway — internet and cell service can be spotty when you’re up country. Offline spreadsheets are often the most reliable tool in West Africa.) It was still Excel. Still rows and columns. Still formulas and cells. But these got the job done.
Small Wins That Weren’t Small
The changes we made don’t sound huge on paper.
- An admin assistant saving about 30 minutes a day on reporting.
- A system that flagged 80+ duplicate entries with one click.
- Restructuring sheets so it was easier to track patients coming in from up‑country.
- Cutting patient transportation planning from one month to one week.
It all sounds pretty nerdy. And, well, it is. But here’s the thing: it mattered.
Those 30 minutes meant one less task at the end of an already long day. Catching errors early meant fewer late‑night scrambles to fix mistakes. Restructuring meant less time trying to piece things together and more time focusing on patients.
And maybe most importantly, it showed the hospital volunteers that a completely different team noticed their struggle — and cared enough to do something about it.
Why This Matters
If you’ve never been around hospital work on a Mercy Ship, it’s easy to think the mission is only about the big things: surgeries, training local doctors, equipping hospitals. And yes, that’s true. But those big things are built on thousands of small things.
For the hospital team, it’s the small things that pile up: reports, rosters, bed tracking, scheduling. When those processes are slow or messy, the stress builds. When they’re made just a little easier, the difference is felt immediately.
That’s why we’ve come to believe that even something as nerdy as an Excel formula can play a part in “hope and healing.” It frees up time. It lowers stress. It gets people back to what matters most (the patients).
Open Eyes, Listening Ears
I didn’t have a master plan for helping the hospital. I just noticed that people were stretched. I listened when they said, “We’ve got too much.” And then I offered what I had, even though it didn’t feel like much. It started with just one thing, then became another, then another.
Sometimes service looks like someone from Finance sitting with a tired nurse manager, opening a spreadsheet, and asking, “What if we tried this?” It might not look like much, but when you see the relief on their face, or when they realize they can leave work 30 minutes earlier, you understand: it’s not small at all.