Close family bonds and animals are what have kept CEO of the Animal Rescue League (ARL) of Berks County Ashley Mikulsky, MBA, in the area. She’s made challenging decisions regarding both in her professional journey as her original intention was to take over the family business. Her soul had other plans.
Q: How did your adoration for animals take shape?
There's something about animals: their inability to speak for themselves requires you to be so much more in tune with their body language and to earn respect and love from something because you can't verbally convince them to love you. As a little girl, I fell in love with horses first, and then it was cats. I wanted to work in zoos and aquariums.
Q: When did you start your journey with the ARL?
The ARL is only 10 minutes from my parents’ house. My mom was like, ‘Go ask them for a part-time job.’ I was 15 years old, nervous, and didn't know how to talk to professionals. But I went and asked them for a job, and they gave me one.
Q: How has the ARL changed since you were 15?
It was a very high euthanasia shelter at that time. That experience made me incredibly resilient. We had an onsite crematorium to handle a large amount of euthanasia cases. Since we went no-kill in 2018, we decommissioned the onsite crematorium and are transforming it into a medical isolation space for sick animals to be segregated from the general population and get a second chance at life.
Q: Your role has evolved a lot at the ARL — what has that process been like?
When I graduated college, I didn’t have any professional experience, and the executive director (ED) and the board president at the time gave me the shot of a lifetime. They needed someone to be their director of development. They gave me a role that I had no business being in at 21 years old. My career exploded from there. That opened the door for so many other roles after that and for me to be able to come back and be CEO at 35.
Q: What prompted your transition from the ARL in 2015?
I wanted to get my MBA because the goal originally was to take over my parents' business. It’s in the railroad industry, which isn't a passion for me but women being successful, especially in business, is. My mom is the primary owner, and my dad has his own LLC, but they work together a lot. While I was getting my MBA, the ED at the ARL asked what it was going to take to have me back. It took a lot of soulsearching. I felt like I moved on from the organization from an employee perspective, but I was kind of kidding myself. My soul couldn’t part from nonprofits.
Q: How did your parents influence your professional journey?
From a career perspective, my parents were great. I still help them [with their business], I'm still the treasurer, but I need to be in nonprofits every single day…and they knew that. I’m extremely close with my family and everybody says this, but I have the best parents in the world. They instilled such beautiful values in my brothers and me. They taught us how to be good people. I think I found a home in nonprofits because I loved animals. Then, when I found ARL, I was like ‘Oh my God,’ I can have animals and do good and then I just became obsessed.
Learn More
Saving More Lives.
Join the ARL for a ribbon cutting ceremony to celebrate the grand opening of their isolation space. Follow @arlofberksco on Instagram for details.
Accessibility.
Sponsor an adoption day or host the ARL’s adoption van to help make veterinary care and adoptions accessible to underserved communities. Visit berksarl.org to learn more.
