Former Badger Wood’s Team Rubicon reaches into LSU’s back yard
September 02, 2016 | Football, Andy Baggot
Fast-growing disaster response group headed by UW alum is on the ground in Louisiana
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BY ANDY BAGGOT
UWBadgers.com Insider
MADISON, Wis. – One of the career highlights for Jake Wood is seeing how irrelevant he's become.
While the one-time Wisconsin football player-turned-Marine has been on vacation in Africa, the noble, non-profit enterprise he helped create provided relief in disaster zones here and abroad.
While Wood hiked in a Ugandan jungle, crawling within five feet of an 800-pound silverback mountain gorilla, his team of mostly volunteers was serving humanitarian causes in the U.S. -- floods in Colorado, Indiana, Kansas and Louisiana; storm damage in Michigan; a forest fire in California -- as well as the refugee dilemma in Greece.
While Wood visited a nongovernmental organization doing selfless work in the heart of Kibera, the world's largest slum, his coordinated, proactive message of crisis management was being carried forth.
During a recent email exchange, Wood said one of the high points of his vacation was seeing eight concurrent response operations – each driven by veterans from all ranks of the military -- spring to life while the president and co-founder of Team Rubicon was 10,000 miles away.
"It's a record for us and shows that the investments we've made in the organization are paying off and helping us help others on their worst day," Wood wrote. "I think one of the things we've done best is recruit and put in place a world-class team. We've empowered those in roles to make decisions and execute without looking over their shoulder.
"It used to be harder for me to leave, but one of the most incredible things to watch is how irrelevant I've become -- and that's not lip service.
"I read my daily updates from my COO (Chief Operating Officer) and CFO (Chief Financial Officer) and weigh in on things that need action. My team knows that I'm available when I'm away, but it's rarely needed.
""I think that there are few things in life that build bridges in communities and bring us closer together. Sports is certainly one and I think one would be hard-pressed to find two fan bases as crazy about their teams as Wisconsin and LSU. These teams provide us a distraction from daily life, something to rally behind and find hope -- and sometimes despair -- in.
"Unfortunately, disasters often bring the same things. Tragedy helps us put aside our differences and realize that we all have more in common than we have different. It often brings out the best in people."
"It goes with one of our philosophies about the integration of life and work. We give staff broad liberty to take the time away that they need. We don't track vacation days. We let people work from home. But we expect people to always be available to execute the mission."
One of those current operations is especially relevant.
While fifth-ranked LSU prepped to open the college football season facing Wood's alma mater at Lambeau Field in Green Bay on Saturday, many of its followers back in Louisiana are dealing with effects of record deadly flooding.
According to Team Rubicon officials, 136 volunteer members were deployed to the Baton Rouge area, logging over 5,500 hours in the field. The work will continue indefinitely.
Wood said the Lambeau Field College Classic and Operation Geaux ("Go") Big have similar emotional traits.
"I think that there are few things in life that build bridges in communities and bring us closer together," he wrote. "Sports is certainly one and I think one would be hard-pressed to find two fan bases as crazy about their teams as Wisconsin and LSU. These teams provide us a distraction from daily life, something to rally behind and find hope -- and sometimes despair -- in.
"Unfortunately, disasters often bring the same things. Tragedy helps us put aside our differences and realize that we all have more in common than we have different. It often brings out the best in people.
"We see this all the all the time at TR. People learning neighbor's names for the first time. Going over to the other side of the figurative tracks and helping in neighborhoods they've never been in. If we acted every day of our lives as we do after disasters we'd have a much better society."
Wood, from Bettendorf, Iowa, was an offensive lineman for the Badgers who lettered in 2003 and '04. He graduated with degrees in business and political science.
Prior to helping found Team Rubicon in 2010 -- the move came in response to a major earthquake in Haiti -- Wood spent four years in the U.S. Marine Corps and was deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan.
"I wouldn't be doing this work if I hadn't made the decision to my senior year at UW to join the Marines and head off to war," he wrote. "That changed me at the core in many ways, mostly good.
"But there have been a hundred moments over the past six years that have inspired us, usually when we see a veteran rediscover who they are while bringing hope amid devastation to someone that's lost everything."
Wood, 33, has a grand vision for Team Rubicon, one built on the work it does in places like flood-ravaged Louisiana and fire-damaged California.
"We want to become the best disaster response organization in the world, period," he wrote. "We see no reason why we can't do that.
"We aspire to increase the resilience of every community in the U.S. by providing an outlet for transitioning veterans to repurpose their skills for good.
"It's the equivalent of building out a nationwide volunteer fire department. If we can do that then we can weave Team Rubicon into the fabric of America, at which point we'll be here to stay."
