Building Great Leaders in Senior Living

In this episode of Into the Pines, we sit down with Tim Cook, Chief Operating Officer of Pines Senior Living, to discuss what it takes to become a great Executive Director. From leadership development and mentorship to building strong teams and creating exceptional communities, Tim shares insights on why investing in great leaders is essential to the success of senior living.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:11

Welcome to the Pines Podcast, Episode 8. We're so excited to share with you today what we believe really happens behind the scenes in building great leaders. Executive directors and leaders at communities often have multiple responsibilities, but often people wonder you know, what are their qualifications? What do they do to become a great leader? And so I'm joined here with my good friend Tim Cook, who's also our CEO at The Pine Senior Living. And we're going to talk about what makes a great executive director. So, Tim, tell me a little bit about, you know, you started out as an executive director way back when. You know, when you think about an executive director and why it's so important, what's the real reason that you see out there that that ED, there's an emphasis, whether you're an owner, investor, you know, what is important to the success of an executive director?

SPEAKER_00 1:03

So to me, they've got to surround themselves with great people. That's right. They've got to be able to select great team members to come on in and partner with them with their focus. And so when you um in our business, everybody always talks about kind of the three-legged stool of having a really good executive director, a good sales partner, a good clinician as well, because that's really what it what it takes to operate. But then you also got to surround yourself with good culinary, you've got to have great maintenance, great activities, and um life enrichment. And so it's a challenge to be able to work with all those different personalities on a day-to-day basis.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

And I think that's what really separates an executive director from a really good executive director. And what do I mean by that? You know, we see often that there's people that are good operators, but then there's some executive directors that are just truly a gem. You know, they just stand out from the rest of the crowd. And one common theme I see in that is their ability to communicate, their ability to truly lead others and understand their team and invest in that team. And, you know, those are some of the things I think of when I think of a really great leader. Um, but you know, you've had some great leaders over the years, and I think the other piece is you've had the opportunity to mentor those leaders. And as you think about mentorship and leadership, uh, what are some of the traits that you look for in those really good leaders?

SPEAKER_00 2:33

Yeah. So I think what I want to see is just, I like a I like somebody that's competitive. Yes. Right. Um, because I'll even ask them during an interview process, um, hey, tell me a little bit about your what you did in high school. And that kind of always throws people for a loop. They're like, we're going back to high school. Um, but hey, were you were you in the band? You you had a commitment. You know, you got up at six o'clock in the morning for practice. Were you a soccer player, were you a baseball player, were you a softball player, whatever. Were you a competitive cheerleader, right? Um, did you compete? And so, and then when you competed, were you a leader in that, right? Or were you maybe you were a role player, right? But it you learn about winning, losing, um, and and having that those competitive juices, but you know, finding somebody that can lead well um by exhibiting doing things that they're asking other people to do too.

SPEAKER_01 3:29

Makes sense, right? It does. Yeah. Do you find that you know, leaders, there's this theory out there that leaders are born leaders? Do you believe that that's really the case, or can leadership be taught?

SPEAKER_00 3:40

Yeah, I I think it's both, right? I think I think there are natural born leaders that you're like, wow, you can see it early and often, right? Um, and they can lead in a good way, and they can lead in a not so good way, yeah, right? That that whole peer pressure. Um, but it can definitely be taught. We can definitely spend time investing in our leaders um and and teaching them how to build relationships, how they can um establish trust by spending time with someone, right? You just can't use, you know, when I started with Pine Senior Living, I just couldn't come in right away and say you're doing this wrong, you're doing this wrong, you're doing this wrong. Right? I had to listen and I had to build rapport and build trust with people so that eventually I could have influence and say, hey, I've spent some time beside you. Now let's do this, let's let's look at changing this or doing this maybe a little bit differently.

SPEAKER_01 4:31

Love it. Yeah, I think that you know, when you're coaching an executive director, to your point, those traits are instilled. Some of those things are taught, but many of the good leaders have that instilled in them. And one of the challenges we have is we don't have a lot of young blood coming into the industry, right? We have leaders, you know, that are lifers like ours, they've been in the industry a long time. And then you have people that have kind of dabbled in it, come in and out. But we really need to think about, you know, what's the leadership in 2026 of helping generate enthusiasm into the leadership role? Because the reality is it is a 24-7 position. And people don't really understand that. And a lot of times, family members, especially. That's right. They come in and the ED happened to leave that day at five o'clock, and they're like, well, why isn't your executive director in the building? Right? And they may have worked all day Saturday, all day Sunday because of call outs. There might have been, you know, an emergency where they had to come in and mop up water, they might have had a norovirus, who knows? But the reality is those EDs work long hours, and you know, it's a special person that can even do that and keep pace. Um, when you find that you look in those buckets for those leaders, how important is education these days?

SPEAKER_00 5:44

Yeah. So I feel like there's now courses, obviously, and there's degrees that you can get in healthcare management. Um, but it's it's boots on the ground experience that I'm, you know, that I would prefer, right? Yeah. Um and then the the want to, right? And um, and so I happened to just speak to a young man this week, uh just fresh out of college, wanting to get into the industry, and somebody had passed along, you know, um him to me and said we should meet and talk. Um, I loved it, loved having that conversation. But um I said, at the end of the day, if this is something you really want to do, you may have to, you may have to relocate. You may have to go into a different market. Um, I know that we've had to do that during our careers. Uh my wife and I have moved over 14 times uh for you know for our during my senior living, you know, career. And we we've made those sacrifices and done those things because of different opportunities. And so, you know, love the idea of being able to take a new executive director, somebody wanting to, you know, learn the business and and teach them the right way to do it. Yes. Um, it's also good to be able to work with somebody that maybe hey, had some tough times through the first few years and stuff, but also show them a clear path forward, right? Um, and I think the cool thing with that is we've got some really good executive directors at Pine Senior Live In that want to be able to show what they can do too, right? And so they can have they can mentor each other and partner with each other because you know, I think we've we've been peer-to-peer before, sure and been able to go, hey, how are you doing that right? I think it's tough sometimes for an executive director to see a dashboard and go, why am I at the bottom of this dashboard? Right. Well, you and I would pick up the phone and go, hey, uh, how are you doing what you're doing? And by the way, I'm coming. I'm I'm coming for your spot, right? And so I think it's it's learning to share best practices, learning to see what's working for you and your market maybe in Texas, somebody else may be in South Carolina or Florida, but hey, what's what's working for you? Because I want to do that too. Right. And so I think um, you know, being able to share that, being able to um have you know sister properties that you're you you know you can pick up the phone with and say, hey, I do this on a day-to-day basis. They may hear from you know the CEO or the COO, um, but man, it's so good to hear that from a peer to say, hey, guess what? I I struggled with that too, and this is how I overcame it.

SPEAKER_01 8:18

Yep, I love it. You know, another piece is in many states now used to be when we started out, there wasn't the licensure need. And, you know, South Carolina is a great example. Not only do you have to have a specific license, you can't even sit for it without a college degree. And so, licensure, people don't realize there's a lot of components to that. Here in Texas, we have to take a certain level of CU credits. In Florida, it's the ACA program. And, you know, I think that that's becoming a little bit of a deterrent to people as they think about becoming an ED. But I always encourage them, I say, look, that's a step. Uh, you can study for it. We have programs to help our EDs pass those. Um, we have we have peers to your point, really thinking who's stronger at that. So I hope that that doesn't, you know, if there's someone out there that's interested in becoming an ED, don't let that deter you away. Um, I think the next thing I want to talk a little bit about is you know how important business knowledge is in the competitive nature that you're talking about, it's become important. And I think about budgeting, analytics, market studies, outreach plans, uh, expense controls. So maybe you can talk a little bit about that and share.

SPEAKER_00 9:31

Yeah. I, you know, I think um wanting to, as a young ED, what I would, my advice to them would be this when it comes to a PL, right? Hey, go to your accounting team, go to your CFO, go to your regional director of operations, take your budget in there and say, hey, what are the first things that do you look at whenever you get my PL, you know, and it's emailed across to you and you have access to it. And I would have them go through and highlight that for me. Um so you can start learning the buckets that they're looking at and the things that they're checking off, you know, each month. Because if those are important to your CFO, those are pointing to your accounting team, those are pointing to your you know, your RDOs, then those should be really important to you as well. And then being able to understand the, you know, hey, what levers can we pull to make those changes, right? And to really analyze, hey, these are opportunities to improve revenue, and then you can look at your expense control too. At the end of the day, we can only cut so many expenses and have a really good product. But to be able to show the value of your community and to be able to do that and manage your PL. And the other thing too is we have so many expenses in senior living that you you really need to manage on a daily basis. Yes, right. And so that's why we have a per resident day. Um, you know, that could be food cost, could be labor, right? Labor needs to be managed day and that's your number one, you know, biggest expense on any uh any uh budget. So I think um showing humility, making sure that you're partnering with the senior leadership to know, hey, what's important here? Um and partnering. And then, you know, it's like I think it's a being able to drill down and understand it and operate it like it was your home.

SPEAKER_01 11:24

Agreed.

SPEAKER_00 11:24

I like it, and your expenses.

SPEAKER_01 11:26

You know, one of the things I think that makes us special here at the Pines is the way that we're now onboarding EDs. We've learned over 30 plus years, you know, there's all kinds of training programs that people go through, and we often see they come from larger companies. But one thing for sure is that we're investing the time in the beginning. You know, I think the new updated classroom style training that we're doing that's more one-on-one, and having every department come in and making that connection and leading by example in what we want in each department, has been very beneficial. And I think that really helps us stand out, and we see that often in management contracts. A lot of times people will have executive directors in place, and we weigh that against what we can offer, and even they need to go through the training. So I'm really proud of that. I think that's something that as we look at mentorship and we look at owned and managed assets that we do really well. And we continue to invest in those programs. Um, in one of my episodes, we talked about senior analytics, and we designed that to help our EDs have analytics at their fingertips. So, all the things Tim's talking about, it's very easy to go on there now and one click of the button pull up your food uh management, your labor management, looking at our overall rent roles and cost comparison to market. And we're really designing things that will help these EDs be stronger, and that's really important too. Um, looking ahead, when you think about what's ahead with executive directors in 2030 and 2040, what do you think will be most important to them and to the industry in a decade?

SPEAKER_00 13:04

I I think expectations are on the rise, right? We've got uh we're preparing, you know, for the silver tsunami. Yes. And so we our our clientele is gonna have higher expectations on your the culinary experience. We're already seeing it, but it's gonna continue to increase on the you know the entertainment, uh, life enrichment. Um, I think you know it's going to it's gonna be it's the value is gonna have to be there because it's gonna become more expensive, right? And so I think as an executive director, you've got to start looking outside the box and and going, hey, we've got to increase our you know accountability on what what we're how we're approaching those things. And I think it's um I think just knowing uh our our clientele and also educating. I think that that's a piece where we have to do a better job so we can get some of our some of our elders a little bit quicker. We're seeing some people now come to us later than they would have 10 years ago.

SPEAKER_01 14:08

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 14:08

And so what's that look like 10 years from now? Um we we we've got to get out there and say, hey, it's okay to come to us before there's a need. Uh people are waiting right now until mom has a fall. Mom had a scare with her medicine, right? Yeah. Now, if we can educate, get out there into the market, we've got tons of opportunities to do that with with our partners, but to get out there and talk to them and say, hey, let's create an environment where people feel like, hey, I can come there and live today.

SPEAKER_01 14:40

Yeah. So important. And I think that you know, realistic expectations. You mentioned about the education, I think educating families too. Yeah. Because people are waiting longer. And, you know, what used to be nursing homes, we find there's high care people in assisted living. So really judging, are they appropriate for the community and the services you can provide? And really assessing that too to make sure we have appropriate residents in these communities. You know, Tim, one of the things that these executive directors are really challenged with is, you know, how do you align expectations? Like there's always a budget, and that's just the budget. How do you exceed that? How do you drive people? How do you align what their budgets are, and then a plan to exceed that?

SPEAKER_00 15:23

Yeah. I it's it's done from the very beginning, right? And I think it's with, especially when we're bringing on new team members, right? To know, hey, what do you expect of me in return? What should I expect from you? Yes, right. Most caregivers, most med techs, most of our team members have never been asked that. You know, when you really do sit down and go, hey Joe, what do you what do you expect from me as the executive director of this community? Yeah, they may not even know how to answer that because no one's ever asked them. No one's taken the time to ask them. Yeah, right. But when you go, hey, this is what I mean, like, how do you expect for me to to to coach you? How do you expect to me to hey talk to you when maybe there's an issue going on, right? Um, it's such a powerful tool to be able to set that at the beginning, set the tone, align expectations on, hey, you know, you don't want somebody to say, well, you can expect me never to be late. Well, we all know that somebody's gonna be late for some reason, right? But to go, hey, here's my expectations. I'm gonna come, uh, I'm gonna be, you know, uniform clean. I'm gonna have a smile on my face, I'm gonna be a great teammate. Um, I'm going to, you know, love my residence. I'm gonna get involved with activities. Great. Well, hey, you've done that at the beginning of that relationship. It's easy to go back to them and say, hey, I I love to go always go back to a caregiver and go, how am I doing?

SPEAKER_01 16:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:45

Right? And they go, Well, you're doing good. Well, did I did I yeah, did I do the things that, you know, am I doing the things? Oh, you know what? You asked me to do this and I haven't done that yet. So I can improve upon that. Um, and then I think the whole time they're looking at it going, oh, wait a minute, I said I was gonna be doing those things and maybe I haven't set up. So it's a great accountability um tool to be able to do that, like I said, off off, you know, right at the root.

SPEAKER_01 17:12

Yeah, I like it. You know, one of the other things too is that executive directors are so challenged, uh, and I think it's all consuming. And one of the things that we encourage is to actually take your PTO because it's a 24-7 role. So many of them continue to work on PTO. Um, but I think one of the big challenges is actually checking out because good leaders want to be there, they want to answer and be responsive, and helping them realize that that's what your regional team's for, that's what your department heads are for. And I think you know, the best practices we see with that are actually shutting the phone off, right? And not taking your laptop. And, you know, it's gonna become more challenging because we we put more expectations on the industry and there's more expectations on us. So I think that's something we really need to look at for the future and how we continue to grow that area as well.

SPEAKER_00 18:07

I agree. Yeah, it is it is tough. It's tough for anybody to take you know extended time off, right? But it's so healthy to be able to do it. Um and I think you know, when you're having weekly one-on-ones with your team leaders and your management, um, it's easy to be able to make sure that, hey, we're staying up to date, we're staying up with if they need to take time off, right? Um, but hey, I sometimes it's easier said than done. It would be great to be able to take a little time off each quarter um and and do that refresh. But we owe it to ourselves, we owe it to our families too, right? To our own families, to be able to get spend some time with them too, because we spend so much time with our pine senior living family. They've we've been entrusted with the lives of some of the most important people, right, in their lives. Mom and dad, grandmother and grandfather, an aunt or an uncle, right? These are loved ones. And it's so important for us to get to know them so we can care for them like a wonderful mother would care for their child, right? That's right. Not just an okay mother, but a wonderful mother. And so it's it's so important for an executive director to, when they see a family member walking in the door, to greet them and see, hey, how are we doing? How can I help? Hey, guess what? I saw your mother doing this yesterday, right? I saw an activity, and I I'm actually, you know, got a snapshot of it and I want to show it to you because we can't believe it, but she was doing bingo. We all thought she would never do bingo, right? And so, but it's it's establishing that those relationships and going going to them and going, hey, how are we, how, how are we doing? What can we do better? What would you see? What else would you like? Because when you moved in, you said these three things were important, right? You know, we wanted to get mom's medication correctly uh to her each day. We wanted to make sure she was eating uh well-balanced meals. Uh, we wanted to make sure that she was socialized. It's so important to socialize. Well, this is what we're doing to get her to come to breakfast. She sits at this table with these three residents. Um, we know their conversations. All of a sudden, the family goes, Oh, they know my mom, they know my dad. And that gives us a lot of um credibility moving forward in the relationship and in that process. So I think our executive directors that know their family members' names, know that know their residents by names, and they're not just an apartment 102, uh, but they know that, hey, that's Ms. Jones. And uh this is Ms. Jones' family, and this is Ms. Jones' grandchildren that come in to visit. Um our community are set up in a way that our executive directors, they they know their their residents. Um they spend, they they manage by walking around, right? Um and it it's so it's so evident that they spend time in the dining room, uh, spend time um popping into activities. Um I've seen some of our executive directors drive the bus uh for outings uh to be a part of that. And it's really cool to see some of our executive directors like throwing barbecues for our team members, uh, throwing, you know, uh happy hour, right, for the residents and family members, um, and seeing different ages, different generations coming together and celebrating. Um, it it's fun when all that comes together and we celebrate that correctly. Um, it's contagious, makes you want to be there.

SPEAKER_01 21:49

You know, Tim, one of the things, right? We both have been executive directors, and that goes a long way with the respect. We've done everything. We've mopped floors, we've cleaned up after residence, we can change the dependence. I mean, you name it, we can do it. And I think that credibility goes a long way. Uh, but it also puts a perspective on things that we never forget. I know you often tell that story, so I think it's worth sharing about when you were in D and how it shapes your leadership today.

SPEAKER_00 22:13

Yeah, I I think it's so true. It's I'm not asking one of our leaders to do something that I haven't done or that Joe hasn't done. And so it it's a very realistic approach. And I I don't see that very often where we've had uh, you know, C-suite team members that have led in those roles. And I think that makes us special at Pine Senior Living because I just had a conversation with an ED candidate this week about hey, I've been able to shave a man's face, I've given showers, I've painted apartments, um, you know, whatever it takes, right? And you know, there's sometimes where you get in there and you do those things and it really they go, oh my gosh, I had to come see this to believe it. Um but we get in there and we do it because we know it's the right thing and we lead by example. Um but I think for us being, you know, former executive directors, it also shows some of our leaders, hey, there's advancement opportunities. There's it's a beautiful industry to be able to start at a certain level and go and climb the ranks. There's not a lot of industries out there that allow that to happen. I've seen activities directors go into sales and marketing uh positions and then go into executive director's role, then go into a regional sales and then RDO. Yeah. So it's pretty special what you can do. But going back to got to have the want-to and got to have the drive, that's right, and great mentors and partners to do it with. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 23:42

Um, and the other part is the culture and the fun and the team. You know, we love to see our EDs get creative. I love to see the best practices out there and fun. And some of them just stand out from others, but it's really an amazing career, and I think it's something that if you're considering leadership, it's vitally important to continue to pursue it. We welcome new young leaders in our industry, and we hope that you found this helpful today.