Power of One Podcast With Tony Medlin - Navigating choosing an Assisted Living

For over a decade I had an opportunity to work with Long Term Care communities and experienced and saw from the inside what is important in choosing a place for your loved one. Don't miss this podcast!! Remember I'll be glad to help!

Transcript

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Welcome to this week's edition of the Power of One Podcast with Tony Medlin. I'm very excited about this week's edition because we're going a little bit off script. Typically, I talk about something related to church, discipleship, growth in Christ. But you know what? Part of my testimony is that for several years I honestly was away from the Lord. And now God has just really impressed upon my heart to be back in ministry full-time in a couple of different forms. As I'm pastoring the church at uh Grace Global Methodist Church, uh doing the power of one business, hoping to help people individually in discipleship growth. I'm actually going to be seeing PRN some hospice patients as a chaplain, and I'll have more about that later. But I want to talk a little bit about the last decade or a little bit more than a decade now of my life when I was doing something completely different. And I was an executive director in long-term care at Assisted Livings. And I wanted to take a moment and a podcast to talk about that experience, not just to let you know what went on in my life, but to help you. I'm going to continue to renew my license each year, getting my continuing education units. And I want to be available to you as I still have the knowledge, the experience, and a lot of success because of a lot of wonderful people. And I'll talk more about that in a moment. And I want to be able to help you. If you're looking for someone or somewhere to put your loved one who are at that part of their journey, I have plenty of knowledge about the places, particularly here in Oconee County. And if not, I can tell you what to look for and what's important. And so I want to help you and use this podcast to talk a little bit about long-term care, particularly assisted living. Now, as I said, I've been an administrator for a little over a decade now, and God really blessed to have a lot of success. And how do you define success in assisted living? Well, for me, it was wanting to help as many people as possible. So filling the buildings wasn't just about money, though we had to have a good NOI, which is net operating income. To me, it was about helping as many people as possible. I actually had somebody say to me once, do you know what? Whether you fill 16 empty rooms or you cut expenses to get the bottom line where it needs to be, as long as the bottom line is where it needs to be, that's what matters. My heart was broken when I heard that kind of theory because clearly that's not correct. And the first thing I said was the only problem with that is that with the 16 empty rooms filled, you get to help 16 more families. And that's what really became a passion for me and will remain a passion for me for anybody that needs advice or anybody that needs help. So someone asked me one time, uh, Tony, this was not your first career. How did you have so much success? Well, it wasn't about Tony Medland, let me assure you. It was about having the opportunity to put the best people around me. And there is no way in this podcast that I could share with you all of the people that have helped me in this journey. I do want to, however, mention a few nurses' names because I have had the best nurses you can possibly imagine, beginning with supernurse Suzanne Lucas. There was Kim Fisher that was so special and is still doing a lot of good work to help people. There was Kathy Newman, and I appreciate Kathy and always will. And then there is uh my partner in crime. We've called each other, I called her boss 1B. Don't even know what that meant. But Christy Holebrooks, what a special, special nurse, and enjoy working uh with her. Suzanne's retired, but uh, but these folks are continuing uh to help people in in this industry. Now, I want to tell you the backbone of any community, the residents, of course, are why we are all there and have done what we've done, but the backbone of any community is the caregivers. It's the medtechs, it's the caregivers who do not get paid nearly enough to do what they do. My friends, let me tell you, those people that we hire to work on a daily basis to take care of our elderly, they make a difference in this world. So to every caregiver that has ever worked with me, I never like to say work for me, to every caregiver that has ever worked with me, I want to thank you and give you special praise for all that you are doing to make a difference in the lives of people. Hey, I have been blessed to be surrounded by great leadership teams. Business office managers, activity directors, dining room directors, nurses, as I mentioned, maintenance directors, have been so blessed. Marketing directors have been so blessed to have great leadership teams. And what we just talked about with caregivers is one of the reasons the leadership team is so important. You need cohesiveness, you need to be on the same page, and you're going to be able to hire the right people and motivate the right people to do the work that we are called to do in long-term care. And my friends, let me assure you, working in long-term care with the right heart, it is a calling. I'd like to talk about a couple of things that I would encourage you to do if you are researching a community in which to put your loved one. First of all, notice the environment when you walk in. What's it like with activities? I used to tell our staff, listen, our senses really count. What is it we see? What is it we smell? What is it we touch? What is it we hear? What is it we feel? What are our senses telling us? Do you smell some homebaked cookies? Do you hear some singing going on? Most of all, do you hear residents laughing and having a good time? That's important. Listen, I would encourage you also to ask to be able to have a meal with the residents before you decide whether to join that community or not. I've also been blessed with some incredible dining directors. And this is one of the most important parts, if not the most important parts, to the resident. It's not just their meal time, and we need the meals to be tasty, we need them to be presentable, we need them to be healthy, but it's also their social hour. The residents love coming to that dining room three times a day and visiting with their friends. Something else I would encourage you to do, and particularly later in my career, I begin to notice how this is really, really important. Research the company for whom you are who owns the place where you may take your loved one. There's some great companies out there. I'll always appreciate Five Star, for example, giving me a chance. Were it not for them, I'm not sure that I would have been able to continue in the journey that I took. I'll always appreciate Grace Management. Grace Management, who, by the way, still manages the Willows in Easley, where my dear friend Laura Spearman is the executive director, and Christy, that I mentioned, by the way, is the nurse there. Grace Management taught me so much. And Belvedere Commons here in Seneca was managed by Grace Management. There's another company now, but I'm very proud of Jenny Witzel, who I hired when I was at Belvidere Commons, and she now is the executive director there. And uh Jenny has just uh found an amazing career in long-term care, and so grateful uh for her. Now I want to share with you also some behind the scenes things that became very important to me. Regional directors, for example, are huge. Folks, I'm gonna tell you, as you research the company, know who the regional teams are. I've had incredible regional nurses. When I was marketing in this area, I had the best regional marketing director ever in Danette Cogdall, who I who always said, and this is not original with me, could sell ice to an Eskimo, but not because she's just a good salesman, because she taught me how important it is to find the right fit, the right place for the right person. That's why what she taught me concerning something called discovery is very important. You're not just showing somebody around a building, you're learning about that person. You're actively listening to that person. And you want to make sure that those things are happening and that the regional directors who are training the leadership team at the local levels know what they're doing or they're doing. You need a combination in a regional director of competence and integrity. And I want to tell you, I've had the opportunity to learn from the very best, from very experienced and competent and integrity-filled regionals who want success. They have to have success, but are always thinking about doing the right thing and about the residents. And again, I'm always afraid to leave people out, but I've got to say thank you to Tim Cook, who helped me fill out my application. Stacy Gotto was the first person to hire me with Grace Management. Derek Dafino with Five Star. Dan Woland taught me so much when he was a part of Grace Management. Doug Visi, have to mention that name, part of Dominion Senior Living, which is no longer in this area. Uh, but Doug taught me that it is possible to have a faith-based even community that can still maintain elite success, but talk about your faith at the same time. These were all experienced, competent regionals who had integrity and understand and understood, and this was important to me, what leadership is all about, how to motivate someone. I will forever appreciate not only that they taught me, but they trusted me and they allowed me to lead. They did not micromanage and they were always supporting me and having my back. And I wanted to do the same thing with my staff and my team, and I don't like to use that word my so much, remember, because it's our team. It helped me understand that I needed to show the leadership with them that these guys and girls had taught me taught me. Folks, I'm going to tell you, you can see the difference when there is a regional team or an ownership group that does not have the competence, the experience, and the integrity to lead assisted living communities. I am fortunate that I have been blessed with great leaders. I have seen the other side of it, however, as have many, and you can certainly see the difference between darkness and light. All right. So although I am going into ministry full-time now, I'm excited about where the church is. I'm excited about the power of one and where we're headed. I am excited about uh ministering to these PRN hospice resident, I mean patients as a chaplain. I'm excited about all these things. But I'm also going to keep, as I mentioned at the start of this podcast, my long-term care license up to date and make it a continued passion to offer you, if you need it, advice and direction, as I do have extensive knowledge, do have a track record of success, do have more than a decade of seeing inside the business, knowing who is a good leader, knowing who is not a good leader, and knowing what you need to find in a place for your loved one. If you're looking for a place for a loved one, I can share with you good places to visit. I can give you insight about the leadership, the leadership that is necessary because of what I have shared in this podcast. You don't have to go to a third-party referral source. You can visit communities yourself. And as I said, if you just want some advice, pick up the phone, email me, go to my website, whatever you need to do. I will be glad to help you and give you advice on what to look for and finding a place for your loved one. What I have shared today in this podcast is so incredibly important. Our seniors, as lifespans are longer than ever, our seniors deserve to be taken care of. They deserve to be treated with the most elite care possible. It breaks my heart anytime I hear a bad assisted living or skilled nursing facility story. Your loved one deserves a place. You as a family member deserve a place where you can have peace knowing that your mom, that your dad, that your loved one is going to be taken care of. So I appreciate the opportunity in this podcast to share a little bit about my experience in the long-term care industry. Now, back to the thought of power of one for just a moment. As you know, this is the Power of One podcast. And the Power of One Business is all about training people in discipleship and helping them grow in the Lord. You can go to my website and you can see the three-month discipleship class that I'm offering. And it's listed on the website for one person, which I'll be happy to do. But I'm also expanding that. If you have a group of five or six that you want to split the cost, and we'll do a uh a Zoom class, and it's an intense discipleship class, where my goal at the finish of that three months together is for you to feel closer to God and in your journey with the Lord and in discipleship than ever before. Uh, if there's just something in your journey that you want to talk about individually, maybe it's vocation, maybe it's um something in your discipleship journey that is troubling you. As Paul said, maybe it's your thorn in the side. Well, we've got individual sessions also, and I'll be glad to help you with that. Whatever you would like to ask me about, there are many ways to get in touch with me. My email is anthonymedlin26 at outlook.com. Anthony Medlin26 at outlook.com. The website is powerof1 spiritual renewal.com. Powerof1spiritualrenewal.com. And hey, give power of one a call if you would like. If uh if I get a message, I'll call you back. That number is 864-430-4498. Thank you for joining me today as we've talked about long-term care. And please remember it would be an honor for me to use my knowledge and my experience to help you find the right place for your loved one. God bless you. Thank you for joining me on the Power of One podcast. We'll see you right back here next week. This is the Power of One with Tony Medlin.