On Thursday I spoke at the annual planning meeting for the Miami Children’s Hospital (MCH). It was unbelievably moving. Yesterday I wrote about what I learned from from their mascot. Here’s my second day of lessons from MCH.

Lynnette was one of the employees honored at the event. While this is the first time she has been formally recognized by the hospital it is not her first time being recognized. Patient families regularly thank her and write letters to the hospital expressing their appreciation for how Lynnette has helped them through a difficult time. So what is her job?

Nurse? Doctor? Chaplain? Does she run the family care center? Is she the masseuse on staff?

No. Lynnette runs the checkout in the cafeteria. Her job description says her role is to ring up customers’ food and take their money. Provide change. That’s it.

But Lynnette doesn’t see herself as a checkout person. She sees herself as a member of a patient and family care system. Her job is to help families through the most difficult time of their lives. So she does something simple yet extraordinary.

Lynnette smiles and talks to people. When they show up in the cafeteria more than once she asks their names and the name of their child who is a patient at MCH. Then she remembers. The next time she sees them she greets them by name and asks about their child by name.

Lynnette’s cash register isn’t a location for food purchase transactions. It is a transformational space where welled-up emotions are released, where comfort and compassion are delivered, where what could be taken as a small part is turned into a powerful role.