Week 25: Professionals Have Personal Lives Too | The Other 5%

Caring for the People We Ask to Care for Others

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Senior living asks something unique of its employees.

We don't simply ask people to show up and perform a job.

We ask them to care.

Be patient.
Be compassionate.
Notice when something feels different.
Listen to the same story one more time.
Comfort a family member.
Sit with a resident who is having a difficult day.

And then, at the end of their shift, we ask them to go home.

Sometimes we forget there is an entire life waiting for them there.

A child struggling at school.
A daycare schedule that changed again.
A spouse who isn't feeling well.
A parent who is aging too.
A car that needs to be fixed.
Bills that need to be paid.
Maybe simply a really difficult weekend.

We spend a tremendous amount of time in senior living talking about the importance of knowing our residents as people.

Their history.
Their family.
Their preferences.
Their fears.
Their routines.

We understand that knowing those things allows us to care for them differently.

Maybe we should think about our employees the same way.

Not because leaders need to know every detail of someone's personal life.

But because people don't stop being people when they clock in.

The caregiver walking into apartment 211 may be carrying something herself.

And yet we are asking her to leave that weight at the door and pick up some of ours.

That deserves recognition.

It also deserves empathy.

Sometimes that means flexibility when childcare falls apart.

Sometimes it means asking someone how their weekend actually went and caring about the answer.

Sometimes it means noticing that a normally energetic employee seems a little quieter today.

Sometimes it is simply creating a culture where someone can say, "I'm having a hard week," without feeling like they have somehow failed the team.

But there is another part of this conversation that I don't think we talk about enough.

Our caregivers experience loss too.

On a monthly operating report, a resident's passing may eventually become a move-out.

An apartment becomes vacant.

The unit gets turned.

Sales begins working toward the next move-in.

The business continues.

But think about the caregiver.

Maybe she cared for that resident for three years.

She knew which sweater was their favorite.

She knew how they liked their coffee.

She knew when they wanted to talk and when they wanted a little space.

She knew their children.

She celebrated their birthdays.

She helped them through difficult mornings.

She may have been holding their hand during some of the most vulnerable moments of their life.

Then one day, they're gone.

We shouldn't assume that because caregiving is someone's profession, loss somehow becomes professional too.

Grief doesn't work that way.

The relationships created inside our communities are real.

That's actually what we want.

We want caregivers to love residents.

We want genuine relationships.

We want people to become deeply invested in the lives of the people they serve.

But if we ask people to create those relationships, we also have to acknowledge the emotional weight those relationships can carry.

Caring takes something out of you.

Great organizations understand that part of their responsibility is putting something back in.

That doesn't always require another program.

It can be a manager who notices.

A schedule with a little flexibility.

A team that acknowledges a resident's passing together.

A leader who knows when someone needs five minutes instead of another task.

A culture that extends the same grace internally that we work so hard to provide externally.

Because resident experience and employee experience aren't separate strategies.

One creates the other.

If we want employees to show up with patience, compassion, and emotional presence for residents and families, we have to build organizations where they experience those same things themselves.

Our employees have children.

Parents.
Spouses.
Bad weekends.
Financial worries.
Great days.
Hard days.

And sometimes, they grieve the residents we lose right alongside their families.

They bring all of that through the doors with them.

The best senior living organizations don't ask people to leave their humanity at home.

They recognize that their humanity is exactly what makes them so good at this work.

Taking care of the people who take care of our residents isn't separate from the mission.

It is the mission.

And that often lives in The Other 5%.

—JT

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