by Cindy Heilman | Resident Centered Dining Service
Customer-first policy is a result of solid, forward-thinking leadership that filters down from a confident administrative staff. A manager who serves meals on a holiday shift so a food server can have the day with her family creates a loyal team member. That server carries that respect to the residents she serves. When information from a resident is carried on to a staff member that needs to know, this is a food server who actually listens when residents talk with her. That is blending hospitality with healthcare which is a major ingredient in daily living in a senior care community. Listening is another skill of the food server that isn’t always mentioned at the time of hiring but is an important skill. In training, a food server learns what her responsibilities are and good leadership encourages her to expand on those responsibilities.
When food serving staff become familiar with the residents they are serving, they also develop empathy, coming to understand the life of being an older adult. Aging can be difficult for many who are facing new trials in health on a daily basis. Enhanced relationships result from a customer service-oriented dining team creating a relaxed atmosphere in a COVID19 air of tension. A culture of service is food as medicine, mixing hospitality with healthcare.
Good leadership is not seen directly. It is seen when watching a food server make a necessary decision without seeking permission first. It is seen in discussions at company meetings where new ideas that come from those who have hands-on-the-work are listened to and acted on. It is seen when serving staff take ownership of their positions and develop pride in the work they do. Good leadership is applauding food servers when they reach for higher standards in their work.
Kind Dining♥ training series and workshops were developed from my formal education but also from first-hand knowledge of being on the job for many years and seeing what was needed most in senior care communities. Good training of food servers is an investment for a company that knows that its’ best assets and marketing tools are the positive one-on-one interactions between food serving employees with residents, and foodservice and nursing teams in their community.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Take a leadership role by setting a good example today.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
Mealtimes are still your best marketing. Resident-centered food service is where your community quality shows through the strongest. The focus is still on the residents’ preferences and necessities whether making their meal choices from a menu or special food stations in each corridor that are being utilized now within pandemic guidelines of social distancing. The presentation may be different since dining rooms are closed but presentation matters and can be adapted to the individual. A variety of appetizing foods offered needs to be attractive to the eye and taste as fresh as possible. Person–centered care includes varied mealtimes, snacks offered by cart deliveries in off-hours, and availability to food at any time. The approach and sensitivity of the food serving team are still vitally important as many residents are highly unsettled during the restrictions of the day.
Kind Dining ♥ training teaches how to develop and improve communication between food server and resident that creates an open line in a relaxed atmosphere for the resident to ask any questions that concern them. Communication skills are not inborn but can be awakened and developed with training and practice. These skills improve relationships between staff as well as improving communication with residents. Good communication skills also provide the food server the opportunity for empathy with each resident, creating a bonding that was not encouraged previously. In these days of lockdowns and quarantines, food servers are a lifeline to the general news of the community. This bonding also allows servers to make decisions needed that arise at the moment with the endorsement of the administration. Trust in the food serving team is vital.
After years of finding ways to bring people together to the warmth of sharing a table, communities have mastered the challenge this past year of serving meals while keeping residents separate and safe, keeping their well-being in mind while still serving high-quality prepared meals. Some kitchens have arranged reheat meals the residents can pick up by walking a pathway created for them to avoid coming in contact with any other resident. The food serving teams have quickly adapted to serve residents in the best way possible with the new guidelines and restrictions while attempting to stay safe themselves. Combining healthcare and hospitality is still a priority.
B♥ Kind Tip: A positive attitude makes a big difference at mealtime.
by Cindy Heilman | Resident Centered Dining Service
Aiden met Robert during a break after a staff meeting at his new position in a senior living community. He was rather new in the field and repeated what he learned in his earlier classes while still in school, that there was always something new to learn in keeping up with the latest in retirement living. “Yes,” said Robert, “but I’ll let you in on a secret that you can rely on. There are some absolute truths that are standard. If you recognize them and live by them, you will be successful in your field and your company will be delighted to call you their employee.”
That statement piqued Aiden’s curiosity so he asked for more information about this secret. Robert went on to tell him.
“I’ve had Kind Dining♥ training where I learned to close the gap between the residents’ high expectation in service and the food serving staff just doing their job. We’ve learned to work as a team, helping each other when needed. We also make the effort to know each person we serve; call them by name and make sure they know our names. It’s important to all of us to do more than just serve a meal especially now when times are so unpredictable during this pandemic. Many of our older adults are separated from family or have none. Our residents appreciate our being personal while we are serving their meals. We’ve learned that many things that seem trivial to us are hugely important to people in this older generation. It is important to their dignity for us to honor their expectations. Don’t you agree that extending hospitality and a friendly presence aids in their healthcare?”
Aiden thought about that for a few minutes. It certainly made sense to him.
“We share our work experiences and discuss solutions and ideas at our meetings. This bonds us as a food serving team and our residents benefit from that. The previous generations that came to retirement or assisted living communities were of a simpler nature, meaning without the sophistication of the Boomers that come to us now. It is necessary to offer quality service, fulfilling the expectations of a healthier, wealthier, higher educated generation. I keep in mind what someone once told me in reference to a poorly trained food serving staff. It’s like building a Formula One race car and putting a Little Old Lady from Pasadena behind the wheel. I carry that thought with me.”
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Setting higher standards in foodservice is a positive change; embrace it!
by Cindy Heilman | Resident Centered Dining Service
Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures. That is what many senior living communities learned in 2020. It was a year when hard decisions had to be made in quick time that would certainly benefit residents as they were the main object of consideration. We are living and working through historical, hard, and divisive times. People tend to bring out the best in themselves during hard times as we’ve seen in this past year. Kindness has spread to such a degree that people are even making a campaign for kindness. It’s as contagious as a yawn but much more lively. Every encounter in the community is to be met with kindness for it is the kindness that will be remembered long after the pandemic has been restrained.
Present discussions reveal that you are not to expect the new normal to be the same as the old normal in senior living. Another major lesson learned from the pandemic is that hospitality and healthcare go together, hand-in-hand for older adults. The pandemic has taught leaders in the aging industry that vulnerability held in senior housing will call for changes in the delivery of healthcare to hospitality. Kindness will be paired with care services as senior communities expand their on-site capabilities in tending to resident wellness.
Kind Dining♥ continues to train food servers in the social skills in hospitality that bring trust and comfort to residents’ care and excellence to the foodservice team. With practice, they will perform their duties naturally without thought and always with kindness in mind and at hand. Changes have brought creative ways of serving meals to residents that have been happily receptive to meals delivered in to-go containers that are recyclable and microwavable. In some senior living communities, food servers have set up mini-serving stations on each floor level where residents can attend at social distances. Chefs have limited the number of entrees to avoid menu burnout. Drink and snack carts visit at particular times during the day to keep residents from being too isolated. These options are all part of the planning in moving forward and working within guidelines to keep residents and staff healthy and happy.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Kindness remains to a be a focus in these extraordinary times.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
Leadership is no more about telling people what to do than good training is about being told what to do. Leaders of quality prefer a do–as-i-do rather than a do-as-i-say belief. They attend all meetings that are designed for food server participation so they can hear exactly what the food serving team has to contribute; their ideas, thoughts, and what interaction they can add to the workday process. Discussion is the keyword here rather than just listening to complaints being spoken from employees who don’t believe the company leaders truly want their help in improvement ideas. Top leadership recognizes the sincere attempt at improving the habits and routines of food serving to a senior or long-term care community.
Break down communication barriers by attending meetings with an open mind to share ideas and a willingness to practice any new process offered. Leaders must be visible to grow team culture around meal service. If leaders understand their power comes not from control but by empowering their staff, they will encounter employees assuming ownership of their responsibilities. Placing trust in them to make on-the-spot decisions when necessary to arrive at a successful satisfaction.
Good training includes hands-on, acting out practice, and true discussion on how to apply new ideas and suggestions from those who do the work every day. Kind Dining♥ does not train by simply talking. Your training session will probably reveal that some changes can be adapted immediately while others may take time and practice to instill. It takes education, training, and practice, practice, practice, to attain success with culture change. Food servers who continue to excel in personal resident care with kindness, consideration, and empathy added to their physical serving skills will become your company’s treasured assets. Your food serving team that develops conversational camaraderie displays their high standards of performance. The success of accomplishing these skills is well rewarded with acknowledgment such as notices on a public bulletin board.
Stir up passion and excitement in your meetings and training sessions. Leaders will be born while acting out a role. Inspire your food serving team by interacting and sharing company visions and goals that include them. Be generous with sincere compliments on performance. If you want your community to move forward, you must leave old habits behind and build new systems. Respect your food-serving staff from all departments to lead your community to success as they overcome the coronavirus that turned their workplace upside down.
Be Kind Dining♥Tip: Stir up passion and excitement in your meetings and training sessions.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
“The late James Beard said, ‘Food is our common ground, our universal experience.’ He was not only a great chef but also an instructor, TV personality, and you’ll find at least 4 of his cookbooks on my kitchen bookshelf,” said a woman socially distanced by eating her salad at the far end of a picnic table during their lunch break from a culinary cooking class. “He would never know that the other universal experience the world shares is the coronavirus pandemic.” She mentioned the James Beard Foundation that continues to support the industry of food service, including the Foundation directing financial assistance with a Food and Beverage Relief Fund. “He also advocated mentorship and training. We must help each other in the food industry,” she continued.
If James Beard were alive today, he would probably be proud of how the foodservice teams and staff have pulled together in their work in senior living communities maintaining top-quality meals, considering individual dietary guidelines, and still offer selections for the general community. Foodservice teams and leaders had to create ways of serving meals to all their residents, and they had to do it quickly. Food servers were called on to work longer, intense hours to provide seniors with good food while also building relationships using conversation as bridges.
Kind Dining♥ developed virtual training instruction on-line workshops to help food servers work better by working wisely while still learning how to expand their own knowledge of their work field. In times of stress, an educated food serving team can save the day from what could be a disaster. Training sessions encourage and teach you how to create teamwork that motivates and uplifts. Food servers are employees skilled in many ways that are not often noticed. The part-time servers need to learn those skills that aren’t used in other parts of their daily routine. Good leaders realize their power comes from empowering others to make necessary decisions and trusting them to act on those decisions. Inspiring a shared vision of what can be, is valuable as is showing respect and giving credit to others in their success. Let your food serving team know that they are an asset to the company. Even in these most difficult times, your food serving team can obtain a competitive advantage. The training attracts and creates committed food-serving employees, which attracts new residents and reduces the expense of replacing unsatisfied employees.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Food servers work better when they work wisely.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
Sally had no idea that within a short period of time she went from being just a food server in a senior living community to be a hero. That’s what COVID-19 did for many faithful employees. Sally never gave it much thought. She just came into work, did her job as best she could, and went home. Now she realized as well as the world does, that she truly is a hero and has been since the first day she came to work. She always enjoyed casual conversation with the residents because she believed since she saw them nearly every day they were a second family. Kindness and consideration were part of her nature. That was why the others on the food serving team were always so happy to see her. Her kindness didn’t stop with the residents. She was that way with everyone. It’s no wonder she became an instant hero as soon as the pandemic began.
Sally was fortunate to have a pleasant, generous nature. Others who don’t have that natural way can learn good manners and how to turn disasters into pleasant encounters through training. The pandemic has changed the routines that were set in place which makes this a perfect time to reorganize and freshen your food service staff. Send your team the message that the administration cares enough to have Kind Dining ♥ training sessions inspire them further. Kindness has been the operative word this past year. Invite this contagious campaign of kindness to continue guiding your staff. The pandemic pulled food service to work together, encourage what was learned under pressure to continue now that we are overcoming the crisis of 2020. Allow your frontline workers to carry the pride earned by moving forward through dark times.
Good coming out of the bad side of the pandemic is the trust that has built up between residents to staff and food service with their coworkers. In this highly emotional time, we needed to lean on each other and develop trust between us. It’s a great plus for any community. With the no-visitor policy, we continue to share a dialogue with the residents creating a bond that wasn’t there before the pandemic hit us. The food service team has had to be prepared and to respond to emergency changes quickly and to adapt to new ways of serving, always keeping the residents’ needs first and foremost in mind.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Practice your Kind Dining ♥ skills every day; they will soon come naturally!
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
Alice was walking down the hallway and telling a new coworker that it has been a year that she wasn’t sure the community would get through. ‘Here it is, behind us, and we have overcome some difficult hardships, made tough decisions while keeping the safety and comfort of our senior care community. We were continuing our everyday service in the best way we knew how. Vaccines have been developed and hopefully will allow us to return to our former way of life even though I know life will never be the same.”
“Virtual everything has become the norm. Our residents have even learned how to virtually socialize. Chefs are giving virtual cooking lessons and families are doing virtual visiting. But the best thing that has come out of 2020 is that we have built better relationships among staff.”
There is no doubt that team bonding of the food servers is essential for smooth running mealtimes, even more, when the pandemic changed social dining overnight. The food servers trained as a team quickly adapted to new ways of compensating for the loss of dining room meals. Employees are happier and more content with their work when they are working as part of a team. Contented workers are resilient through trials and remain with the company removing the high turnover that is so costly. Add obvious appreciation by the leadership team that is noticeable and you have a solid foundation of employees serving meals that are keeping residents complacent with the sudden, but safe, changes. A bulletin board displaying thank you cards and notes from the residents about particular food servers who have exceeded expectations compliments notices from leaders and peers for the same attention by team members.
Brief daily meetings between the chefs and food servers regarding up-to-last-minute changes or corrections over morning coffee or snacks keep that sense of bond while it keeps the team members equal and on top of things. Kind Dining♥ training has recommended team practice in a similar idea of the huddle that works in football after the meal. With this communication open and operating smoothly, remind the team to have the same open communication with the residents about what worked well and what could be improved during the meal. The residents will appreciate it even more in their isolation and feel more bonded by being heard. Although the vaccine is becoming available it may take many months before social dining is back in place again.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Do you find ways to praise co-workers for all they do?
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
Like never before, teamwork in the Assisted Living and Long-Term Care communities have been vital. The sudden transition of formal dining rooms, cozy corner in-house cafes, and food courts shut down because the pandemic has required food serving teams to make drastic changes to their normal routines and styles of serving meals. It generally takes time and practice to put new ways into place and function properly. The pandemic didn’t allow time and practice. Changes had to be designed, up and running immediately. This major transition was smoother when food servers worked as teammates. Mini meetings kept everyone alert and on track with food servers helping each other as they also comforted residents through the alterations. Some kitchens encouraged their preparation and serving staff to enjoy productive lunches together knowing ideas would be exchanged in between mentions of weddings coming up or babies born to the family. Problems are easily discussed with answers found with the comfort of casual eating.
When coworkers bond as a team they share personal events and stories as friends, not strangers who happen to work in the same company. They recognize the value in each other, reach out to help when needed, and are quick to compliment for thoughtful considerations. Working as a team drastically lowers employee turnover which is costly to the company and creates extra work for those trying to cover for lost employees. Kind Dining♥ suggests you inquire about the value and training of food servers forming relationships with coworkers by working in teams.
Teammates show up for work every day which also helps other food servers from being overworked when trying to get meals delivered on time. These are the heroes of today’s senior living and long-term care communities and need to be recognized for their personal efforts in the face of the coronavirus. Announcement boards hanging in public hallways featuring employee of the week and displaying cards of gratitude from residents who show their appreciation by sending notes or cards to the administration. Leaders know the value of a good employee who goes the extra bit to help a coworker or a resident. There are small ways of showing thanks like sending food servers home with meals packaged up and ready to go.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Remember, every member of the team is important for success.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
We have a new year to look forward to, carrying the experience of living through an unprecedented year of the pandemic that has not happened before in our lifetime. Many older adults have lived through sorrow and loss and had built resilience to get them through the difficulties we face today. Our senior living communities have changed guidelines and rearranged dependable daily routines to suit the situations they now faced. Caregivers and food servers have stretched their capacity to learn new ways of working smarter to better assist residents in their communities. Year 2020 is behind us and we have managed, not only to survive but progressed our services and move forward to continue improving quality of life and person-centered care.
At Kind Dining♥ our foundation is hospitality is healthcare. Our goal is coaching, teaching ways of giving better service to your community residents, and building food serving teams that serve each other as well. Isolation has been a difficult obstacle to overcome. Food servers have learned to communicate with the residents they serve by opening conversations and becoming a lifeline to the world outside their door. They continue nourishing the mental well-being of those living solo. For some older residents who have been lacking in the digital world, food servers have helped keep their spirits up and kept them in touch with the latest local news. Volunteers have collected and donated Ipads, other technological items, and articles for creative art energies to keep our older adults active. This has been a year of giving and sharing.
Caregivers and food servers have shown a resilient source of strength this past year. They have shown up for work facing the possibility of becoming sick themselves. Yet, they are dedicated to the work they do and the community that appreciates their work and loyalty. Kind Dining♥ has increased its online opportunities to continue helping serving staff to learn how to work smarter and to realize that the kindness they show makes them feel better as they are making others feel better. Vaccines are now on the way although it will take some time to reach everyone. It is a time to feel gratitude for the lessons we have learned, improvements made and the progress accomplished through this pandemic year. While we are still facing difficult times ahead expressing gratitude for what we have survived creates a ripple effect that others will recognize and will respond to with their own gratitude.
B♥ Kind ♥Tip: Commit yourself to great service and gratitude today.
by Cindy Heilman | Resident Centered Dining Service
This past year has sent many retirement communities back to square one, unable to utilize the plans of moving forward they had set in place. Finally, there is light ahead that will bring us relief as the vaccines become available. Our resilience and adaptability have carried us through. These vaccines on the way will help many long term care communities to pick up where they were forced to change plans and to begin moving forward again. It will take time for the health crisis to reverse but communities can still set goals and make resolutions for 2021 while the end of COVID 19 comes closer. There is always room for improvement or even goals to keep high standards for your community. It is time to make resolutions for achieving those standards for your residents and the high standards for your serving staff.
One of the ways to move forward is utilizing a Kind Dining♥ training methodology to upgrade the performance of your food serving staff. The individual responses from our training courses have shown that our goals of teaching person-centered care are right on track. The new year will continue to focus on the individual resident and their home in your community and how your food serving staff will show empathy, kindness, and efficiency in their duties. Setting goals now on refreshing your employees’ attention to mindfulness and something as simple as body language is vital to success and the reputation of your community. Including the invisible workforce of volunteers in your training program is investing in the possibility of future employees. At the very least these volunteers are lightening the workload of your serving staff. Help them do it wisely by including them in your training sessions. We caution serving staff and caregivers to be mindful of taking care of themselves both physically and mentally. They cannot contribute to the care of others if they are not healthy and strong enough on their own.
In setting the new year resolutions decide on the first step of quality improvement that is most important to your residents. Purpose and choice are at the center of person-centered planning. When serving staff know the residents’ needs and preferences, they can respond quicker and more efficiently if and when a problem arises. The educated serving staff is a highly claimed asset to the community. Residents build a higher degree of trust and respect for those tending to their care when they feel the care is personal. When a closer relationship has been formed between serving staff and residents, changes can be made appropriately and in a timely response.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: What does person-centered care service feel like to residents?
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
While waiting in line to mail packages at the post office, a friend noted two women discussing, behind masks, of course, their disappointments in the year 2020. They both believed it was going to be a super year instead of the shocker it became, teaching us all new ways of living. “We are ending a year of living carefully in our attempt to stay safe and healthy,” one woman claimed. “Major changes happened in our household. I insisted everyone pay attention to the new guidelines and have respect for each other by not bringing any virus home with them.” The other woman commented that 2021 was starting out with the promise of vaccines though it may take time to get around to everyone. Still, changes were in place and going to stay in place for the good of all the family. “A new year is a great time to change into positive attitudes and continue, realizing that the new wealth is actually good health. Add ‘kindness is the new cool’ and we have a good year beginning for all of us.”
Long term living communities at all levels of care, made enormous strides in educating, changing, and adapting to new ways in 2020 out of necessity. Disaster tends to bring focus to meaningful goals. Speed in placing new guidelines because of the extensive demands the coronavirus made on communities this past year has resulted in positive advancements that had been lingering for future progress. Some communities are entering 2021 with a stable and promising outlook. Food serving teams, including personal care and nursing, have taken on added responsibilities in culture change with a people-centered focus.
Kind Dining♥ training methods lead your food serving teams into 2021 with knowledge of how they can serve older adults by working smartly with better results. Online training instills new ideas and educates your food serving teams for a more prosperous new year, starting 2021 in the right direction. Increased communication and bonding with residents and coworkers will help accomplish those goals within the company. Isolation has been difficult for many older residents. Being separated from their friends and families has added stress that is hard to overcome. Our trained food servers, in particular, have helped greatly by using kindness and thoughtfulness in their newly learned social skills of communication.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Remember, kindness is the new cool.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
We often can benefit from learning a new way of doing something we’ve always done without thought. This applies to the workday of many food servers in the community of older adults. Learning how to work smarter on the job, by finding solutions to our communication shortcomings is a goal. It takes cooperative teamwork to deliver top-notch food service. Holding a weekly discussion group can lead to finding out where the lines of communication between food server and resident plus food server to coworker have broken and how they can be repaired. Discussions will show where focus and concentration are needed to make positive change. The manner in which your food serving team treats each other is driven by the values of the company. The company establishes those values to open a path of clear direction and guide employees in shaping their behavior on a day to day performance and to bring out the leadership qualities in the community employees. It may surprise you when the leader who evolves is the food server who speaks another language besides English. The housekeeper who steps in to help serve meals during this short-handed time of COVID-19 is a leader. The teenager who works as a food server and often volunteers her assistance to a fellow food server or nurse overloaded with work is definitely a leader in the making when she steps in to help pour coffee and deliver a kind word to diners.
Kind Dining♥ training isn’t simply a talk on how to change your routines. It is full of hands-on practice, interactive group discussion, and knowing how to apply them. Some ways can be corrected easily and take effect immediately, others will take time and practice, practice, practice. Continuing group discussions can only work to help your food serving team to become a smooth conveyance through rekindled education. Communities that excel in resident care and food service turn their servers into company assets. They are your best marketing tool. Teach kindness and courtesy by intertwining them into serving skills. Guide your food serving team to develop camaraderie, lift spirits, and make high standards of quality service a goal to achieve. Role players that emerge from practice sessions can become excellent leaders as they gain experience. They take ownership and become passionate about their work, loving what they do. Their food serving team will overcome the fears of change and the challenge of reaching a higher standard of foodservice. It is vital that the leaders who do move to the front know how to define and demonstrate core company values on a daily basis; values that become second nature to your food-serving team.
B♥ Kind® Tip: Through Kind Dining♥ service, we all can become leaders by being brave enough to make positive changes.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
A friend of a friend was having a conversation about the blues, being in a terrible rut during this coronavirus-instigated quarantine until she received a greeting card from a long-time friend. She had not heard from her in a few years. She spoke of that special, particular moment of being lifted up out of her gloom and feeling elated by the simple arrival of a note. It brought the friend into her mind and the many memories they shared in the past. The friend continued saying how it’s the small things in life that matter.
At Kind Dining,♥ we have a saying: Mealtime is the most important time to positively impact your residents’ nutritional health, well-being, and quality of life. That doesn’t change whether you are serving in the dining room or room service. We depend fully on the food serving team to provide these qualities of life for our residents along with uplifting conversations that are vital to chase away the doldrums of residents in quarantine.
While we have been focusing on the residents in your community we also need to offer all employees in these times of uncertainty, to own a sense of calm, a feeling of being valued, appreciated, and completely supported by the administration. Servers deserve training in these social distancing dining room protocols, room service, and in appropriate service techniques. Sufficient staffing enables your servers to do their work without stress and regardless of the demands of their other daily duties. Administrators and servers benefit from working as a team to provide quality service at mealtimes in any manner called for.
Achieving Kind Dining♥ training isn’t just a nice thing to do for your serving team, it is a valuable tool in accomplishing many of the health and quality of life goals you hold for your community. As the long term care industry continues to move towards person-centered care, it is still the right time for dietary managers to advocate and evaluate the daily food serving productive habits in place. Positive changes work with repeated practice and the encouragement of camaraderie between food servers and residents and with each other. This ‘small talk’ increases the quality of life for your residents, especially during these times of isolation and especially those who are living in a single situation. Residents still look forward to mealtimes as their social time of day.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Don’t let “getting your work done” interfere with showing kindness and compassion.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
A woman was talking to her friend, saying that the kindness of strangers is spreading. While buying a soldier a cup of coffee, paying for her meal, or toll on the turnpike continues, random acts of kindness have spread and touched assisted living and nursing communities in a new way. Two women came up with the idea after reading an article in the newspaper about Maine Acts of Kindness. They wanted to help. One of the women, a now-out-of-work hairstylist, and her friend collected in excess of $3000.00 for iPads and cases. They are highlighting volunteer work during these pandemic times when many of the older generations in long-term care are feeling isolated without the benefit of family and friend visits because of the quarantine. Socialization is vital to good health. Even encouraging friends and family to send greeting cards helps residents feel in touch is a kindness that takes little effort.
A 16-year-old in New York placed flyers around her hometown and collected enough puzzles, word books, activity books, and other items to fill 370 care packages for a nursing center to help those in COVID 19 isolation. She wanted them to know someone cares enough to share kindness.
Food servers are a huge part of the kindness of helping residents keep their spirits lifted in this time of isolation. They are in contact with individual residents every day, three times, or more, a day. Emotions may be running higher than usual because residents missed being with their families and friends personally over the holidays. Food servers bringing a meal tray to a room can make a difference by kindly breaking the ice in passing along a few comments to open a conversation that will help relieve strained emotions. In improving the dining service your team begins with small steps. Kind Dining♥ training inspires your food serving team to use kindness wherever they are in the community but they have the most impact while serving meals. The best service isn’t just a nice thing to do; it is a valuable tool in accomplishing quality of life for residents. Communities have moved closer toward person-centered care which brings the focus on mealtimes.
When food servers practice their Kind Dining♥ skills every day; improvements soon come naturally. Setting higher standards in dining is a positive change; embrace it. Mealtimes are important to your company’s reputation; how your team serves meals matters. Through goal-setting, your food serving team can turn a blue day into a joyful one.
B♥ Kind ®Tip: Demonstrate extra kindness today.
by Cindy Heilman | Resident Centered Dining Service
“If you are of a certain age you will probably remember receiving some nuts, a few candies, and an orange or apple in the Christmas stocking you hung on the fireplace or other important spot in your house when you were a young child. My brothers and I were thrilled to get them.” A friend was telling me about her childhood memories. “We hung those stockings on the mantel of our faux fireplace not knowing how Santa could manage it not being a real one, but we just knew he would figure it out.”
Just like in today’s senior living communities, we have to figure out how to still have a wonderful holiday season for all to celebrate though we will have to make many adjustments and rearrangements from your normal planned festivities. “Those were wartime years and while there were fewer trimmings on the Christmas dinner table, we enjoyed all the main ingredients. I remember it well. I don’t remember what presents were under the tree, but I remember all our holiday dinners and the guests who sat with us.” Our Holiday dinners will continue to shine in assisted living and nursing communities even if guests will be absent this year of COVID-19. The main ingredients of caring, sharing, and kindness will be abundant within the community.
Anticipated conversations around the table will not be available to everyone this year. Some will be allowed with social distancing intact. Many will be dining in their own rooms without the chatter of friends and family around them at their favorite time of year and their favorite place for sharing. Residents may be lonely and feeling blue; food servers and staff are overworked and stressed. Everyone is trying to be in a jolly mood even when it is difficult.
The smooth delivery of meals is more likely to come from a well-trained food serving team. This is what our Kind Dining♥ philosophy and now our on-line courses, prepare your serving team to do and how to remedy problems that arise unexpectedly. Each course is as unique as each participant. Even though the curriculum is consistent, students take away beneficial knowledge, skills, and attitudes depending on their age, gender, culture, and individual work experience of each person. Every course brings something new that can be worked into building the great working relationship your community strives for during this holiday season.
The skills of your food serving team shine brighter when under the pressure of a holiday that may be lacking this year.
Our B♥ Kind® Tip: You and your food serving team are crucial to your community’s Christmas holiday success.
by Cindy Heilman | Resident Centered Dining Service
Changes are going on all the time, even in these pandemic times which have changed our lives dramatically in the last year. Most of the time, we don’t really take notice because our focus is on the responsibilities in our lives. The biggest change this year in senior care communities has been the closing of the dining areas where mealtimes were encouraged as social events. It was great for friends sharing time with long-known friends and for meeting new people who came into their community. For the food serving team, this pandemic change has been drastic but not impossible. New ways of serving residents who are under quarantine have stressed planners with how to accommodate residents in the best possible way. It is vital to help our residents keep their spirits up when they cannot socialize over lunch or dinner.
While a Kind Dining® education is encouraged in normal times. It is crucial to include staffers, who once covered other positions, in Kind Dining® training because they are now called into food service. They may not have a clue about the complexities of their duties when serving meals and in contact face to face with older people. Leadership and management will do well if they consider endorsing this training to keep the high standards their community has achieved. It is time to empower employees to perform and make decisions that will be right for residents. Many of those older people are sensing loneliness and abandonment issues. Positive attitudes carried by your food serving team will overflow to those receiving meals with gratefulness. Smiles at the corner of your eyes are infectious. The joy of pleasant conversation adds to the health of the resident through hospitality. The chef helps by offering more comfort foods than usual and adding extra desserts to menu options.
The changes in the daily routines of the community often affect the staff in a negative way. While they are showing extra care toward the residents they also suffer from the separation of not being able to be social with their coworkers. Of course, the fear of bringing the coronavirus home to their families is an additional fear. So all are touched by this pandemic that has us learning about extreme caution to everyone we come near or in contact with our daily routines at work.
Our B♥ Kind® Tip: Remember, just by coming to work today, you make a difference.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
In pre-COVID 19 times, the chef would create special socializing events to bring residents together over his food offerings for festive occasions, celebrate memorable holidays, family gatherings, and mark appropriate events for residents. Even though communities are in quarantine, the chef still needs to create special menus, interesting meals, and recipes to wake residents’ palates in the community. Unaware of the average appetite, the chef also needs to prepare tempting meals for vegans, vegetarians, and Kosher foods for some. Residents with food allergies must be noted, and their particulars kept on file. Although people are not gathering to celebrate around the table together, celebrations must still be honored and infused into planned menus to keep residents’ spirits raised. It is significant to residents who are now separated by necessity in these trying times.
In Kind Dining® training sessions, I encourage the food serving teams in retirement and long term care communities to keep the fire under their passion for always learning innovative new ways to serve meals and care for their residents. The entire team working together to provide good food and good service results from savvy planning and top performance service. Team discussions where everyone’s suggestions and ideas are taken under consideration are important for continued learning. Those who work in food service realize it is more than a job. It is a way of life. It becomes a part of you as subconsciously, you are always looking for a better way that slips into your thoughts; always learning something new.
There is pride in food traditions that outlast pandemics and create warm bonds in relationships with family, friends, and food servers who bring residents’ meals with a few words of comfort or news or any connection from outside their present environment. Celebrations may be held in different ways but are still meaningful and necessary. Chefs must be willing to expand their horizons when seeking information about other cultures to incorporate into their own recipe files. Inspiration often comes from unexpected sources, but their dependence on the food serving team to perform is constant. Team members depend on each other, and all members working in the foodservice department have the same goal in mind. Fulfilling that goal of keeping residents happy with their selections and the quality of meals served to them from the heart comes from drawing on their experience, practice, and satisfaction with their work. It’s loving what you do.
Our B♥ Kind® Tip: Remember your vision to build stronger mealtime relationships.
Mealtimes are still your best marketing. Resident-centered food service is where your community quality shows through the strongest. The focus is still on the residents’ preferences and necessities whether making their meal choices from a menu or special food stations in each corridor that are being utilized now within pandemic guidelines of social distancing. The presentation may be different since dining rooms are closed but presentation matters and can be adapted to the individual. A variety of appetizing foods offered needs to be attractive to the eye and taste as fresh as possible. Person–centered care includes varied mealtimes, snacks offered by cart deliveries in off-hours, and availability to food at any time. The approach and sensitivity of the food serving team are still vitally important as many residents are highly unsettled during the restrictions of the day.
Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures. That is what many senior living communities learned in 2020. It was a year when hard decisions had to be made in quick time that would certainly benefit residents as they were the main object of consideration. We are living and working through historical, hard, and divisive times. People tend to bring out the best in themselves during hard times as we’ve seen in this past year. Kindness has spread to such a degree that people are even making a campaign for kindness. It’s as contagious as a yawn but much more lively. Every encounter in the community is to be met with kindness for it is the kindness that will be remembered long after the pandemic has been restrained.
Leadership is no more about telling people what to do than good training is about being told what to do. Leaders of quality prefer a do–as-i-do rather than a do-as-i-say belief. They attend all meetings that are designed for food server participation so they can hear exactly what the food serving team has to contribute; their ideas, thoughts, and what interaction they can add to the workday process. Discussion is the keyword here rather than just listening to complaints being spoken from employees who don’t believe the company leaders truly want their help in improvement ideas. Top leadership recognizes the sincere attempt at improving the habits and routines of food serving to a senior or long-term care community.
Alice was walking down the hallway and telling a new coworker that it has been a year that she wasn’t sure the community would get through. ‘Here it is, behind us, and we have overcome some difficult hardships, made tough decisions while keeping the safety and comfort of our senior care community. We were continuing our everyday service in the best way we knew how. Vaccines have been developed and hopefully will allow us to return to our former way of life even though I know life will never be the same.”
This past year has sent many retirement communities back to square one, unable to utilize the plans of moving forward they had set in place. Finally, there is light ahead that will bring us relief as the vaccines become available. Our resilience and adaptability have carried us through. These vaccines on the way will help many long term care communities to pick up where they were forced to change plans and to begin moving forward again. It will take time for the health crisis to reverse but communities can still set goals and make resolutions for 2021 while the end of COVID 19 comes closer. There is always room for improvement or even goals to keep high standards for your community. It is time to make resolutions for achieving those standards for your residents and the high standards for your serving staff.
We often can benefit from learning a new way of doing something we’ve always done without thought. This applies to the workday of many food servers in the community of older adults. Learning how to work smarter on the job, by finding solutions to our communication shortcomings is a goal. It takes cooperative teamwork to deliver top-notch food service. Holding a weekly discussion group can lead to finding out where the lines of communication between food server and resident plus food server to coworker have broken and how they can be repaired. Discussions will show where focus and concentration are needed to make positive change. The manner in which your food serving team treats each other is driven by the values of the company. The company establishes those values to open a path of clear direction and guide employees in shaping their behavior on a day to day performance and to bring out the leadership qualities in the community employees. It may surprise you when the leader who evolves is the food server who speaks another language besides English. The housekeeper who steps in to help serve meals during this short-handed time of COVID-19 is a leader. The teenager who works as a food server and often volunteers her assistance to a fellow food server or nurse overloaded with work is definitely a leader in the making when she steps in to help pour coffee and deliver a kind word to diners.
A friend of a friend was having a conversation about the blues, being in a terrible rut during this coronavirus-instigated quarantine until she received a greeting card from a long-time friend. She had not heard from her in a few years. She spoke of that special, particular moment of being lifted up out of her gloom and feeling elated by the simple arrival of a note. It brought the friend into her mind and the many memories they shared in the past. The friend continued saying how it’s the small things in life that matter.
“If you are of a certain age you will probably remember receiving some nuts, a few candies, and an orange or apple in the Christmas stocking you hung on the fireplace or other important spot in your house when you were a young child. My brothers and I were thrilled to get them.” A friend was telling me about her childhood memories. “We hung those stockings on the mantel of our faux fireplace not knowing how Santa could manage it not being a real one, but we just knew he would figure it out.”
In pre-COVID 19 times, the chef would create special socializing events to bring residents together over his food offerings for festive occasions, celebrate memorable holidays, family gatherings, and mark appropriate events for residents. Even though communities are in quarantine, the chef still needs to create special menus, interesting meals, and recipes to wake residents’ palates in the community. Unaware of the average appetite, the chef also needs to prepare tempting meals for vegans, vegetarians, and Kosher foods for some. Residents with food allergies must be noted, and their particulars kept on file. Although people are not gathering to celebrate around the table together, celebrations must still be honored and infused into planned menus to keep residents’ spirits raised. It is significant to residents who are now separated by necessity in these trying times.