Recognizing Our Best: Ana Estrada Guajardo

Going the extra mile. That means different things for different roles at Cox. For Ana Estrada Guajardo, it means treating her place of business like her home, and every customer like her guest. 

This was on full display at the Manheim Auto Auction in San Antonio one day as Ana was mopping the lane each time a car passed through. This wasn’t anything new to Ana or her team — she does this regularly with no prompting — but on this day, she had no idea an important guest was taking note. 

That’s Just Ana
 President and CEO Alex Taylor was touring the facility and admired Ana’s dedication to maintaining a clean and safe environment for customers and employees alike. He asked Mike Browning, general manager at the location, if this clean-up between cars was a new procedure at all the auctions.

“Oh no,” Mike told him. “That’s just Ana.”

"Every Little Bit Is Important”
 Ana’s pride in her work earned her Cox Enterprises’ highest honor, the Gov. James M. Cox Award. Ana and her family joined Alex on stage to receive the award at the all-employee InSideCox Live meeting on Oct. 22. The award is named after our company’s founder and three-term governor of Ohio (and Alex’s great-grandfather).

Ana’s dedication reminded Alex of a story from his great-grandfather’s biography. When Gov. Cox became the publisher of the Dayton Daily newspaper at 28 years old, he said he treated every aspect of the business with equal importance. That was a big reason he became successful.

“It’s that drive to take everything seriously. It doesn’t matter if you’re negotiating a billion-dollar deal or if you’re mopping the floor at a Manheim auto auction, every little bit is important,” he said. “And you can not only do a great job and work very hard, you can actually enjoy it.”

Reasons to Smile
This year has already been a momentous one for Ana. A native of the small town of San Buenaventura, Mexico, Ana earned her American citizenship in February. It took 10 months of intensive study to pass the test — another area of her life where her hard work and determination has paid off.

Co-workers say Ana’s warm smile and positive attitude inspires each of them.

“She’s always happy,” said Assistant General Manager Sandra Santas. “There’s always a smile on her face and she genuinely cares and takes pride in what she does.”

Ana said she felt “excited, happy, nervous … everything” upon learning that she was a Gov. James M. Cox Award winner — though she wasn’t used to receiving so much attention.

“For me, it's an honor to work for Cox and they make me feel like I'm family,” said Ana. “It was an honor to receive the award.”

Please watch Ana’s video below. To read about more Gov. James M. Cox Winners click here. To learn how to nominate a co-worker who exemplifies our Purpose through their actions at work, follow this link.