by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
Finding a new approach to dining in Residential care communities while still keeping within the present budget has been introduced by trending chef leaders of creative community dining. Using fresh, local food supplies to serve on order ala restaurant-style dining is here and is doing well.
Creative menus offer wholesome foods that taste as good as the food looks and are healthier than the cafeteria-style and cooking from canned foods and steam tables.
Chefs are preparing foods with herbs and seasonings to replace unnecessary sodium that most seniors are avoiding for health reasons.
Mealtimes are the most popular events of the day for socializing at the table, meeting new neighbors, and sharing with friends. Residents reject loneliness and isolation when looking forward to mealtimes as a time to make plans and share stories.
Upcoming chefs are redesigning their kitchen work habits to accommodate new ways of cooking on order and serving fine dining meals. Establishing salad and casual snack bars replaces time-consuming efforts in the kitchen that can be used for other preparations.
Meetings encouraging the food serving team to offer their ideas and comments allow everyone to be part of the changes taking place. This inspires the food serving team to be more aware of the care they use in serving residents and will alert them to the importance of their work.
Creating new and better ways to serve meals is a time for unique opportunities for reviewing the work habits of every staff member who serves meals. Instilling a sense of pride in one’s work through meetings and discussions where each person on the food serving team has the freedom to be part of the transformation.
Kind Dining® training sessions are designed for all employees who lift a plate of food, or even deliver a beverage to a resident.
It includes full or part-timers, nursing and caregivers, housekeeping department staff, and department managers.
Your food serving team is a powerful asset to the company when they are giving quality service.
Employees are cross-trained in our fun, focused, practical skills and competency curriculum which teaches how each meal can be an enjoyable experience.
Kind Dining® developed virtual training instruction online workshops for easier access. The goal is to help food servers work better by working wisely, while still learning how to expand their knowledge in their work field.
by Cindy Heilman | Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
Is the goal for your long-term care community to be superior in service to other communities in your area? To have your reputation rise above all others? To be a top-notch community where service people want to work, and aging adults want to live? If you answer yes, it is time to introduce lifetime learning to your staff.
Kind Dining® has helped staff understand and improve their role and the importance of teamwork to enhance dining and nutrition for residents by adding new ways to their workday.
Learning ‘mindset before skill and tool set’, including soft skills, to their present skills to become a valuable member of the food serving team. These soft skills of conscientiousness, personal reflection, and development, added to experience and mentorship, are learned through our Kind Dining® training sessions. Their soft skills become power skills.
We have revisited staff who benefitted from our curriculum to hear what they learned from Kind Dining® training sessions. The following are a few of the replies received:
“I’m more compassionate, take my time to listen, and make their mealtime more enjoyable. Helped in the serving department and treated the residents as if they were in a restaurant setting. I am more aware of how I serve the resident their food. Try to breathe through my nose before I respond. When something goes wrong.” – Caregiver
“Remembering to have empathy, remembering that the care center is a home, showing kindness to everyone.” -Activities
“I am rephrasing how I want to explain things to the resident. I’m making the food look more presentable and prettier for the residents.” Cook
“I engage in more conversations, and I am more attentive to the needs of the residents when they are dining in the dining room.” Caregiver
“Dining as a community event and the role of food in healing.” Nurse
Quietly send your mother to have dinner in your dining room:
- Would she experience a well-oiled team working together?
- Would the dining room be full of smiles?
- Would her needs be satisfied without asking?
- Would she receive kindness and compassion?
- Would the staff exchange polite words with her?
- Would she be served an appetizing and nutritious meal?
- Would you be delighted with the report she brought back to you?
Be committed to hospitality and healthcare in your community by enrolling your staff in continuous learning with Kind Dining® training. Help your staff advance their skills. Kind Dining® training modules, now offered online, will save your company time and money.
Check them out at KindDining.com
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Superior teamwork enhances the dining experience for residents.
by Cindy Heilman | Attract Residents, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
“When my husband and I decided it was time to move to a senior living community, the first thing I said was, ‘I’m going to miss going out to restaurants to dine.’ Mrs. Long was talking with her friend about her and her husband’s plans.
“As seniors, after struggling financially in the early years of marriage, building careers, raising the family, doing without to save money for the kids’ colleges, we finally reached the level where we could eat out as often as we pleased. You know that is something I enjoy.
But I’m delighted that our senior living community has a chef-inspired menu. It’s like going to a restaurant and dining out every day. A bonus to that picture is we don’t need to be cautious about salt in our food. The kitchen is already aware of that hurdle.”
“What is chef-inspired food?” asked her friend.
“Well, it’s not the old way of cooking masses of food delivered in large cans and kept hot on steam tables where you have no choice, only to eat what they are serving that day.
It means creative menus with choices, fresh vegetables, and foods prepared with herbs and seasonings to bring out the flavor without using salt.
Our food is prepared when we order it, not hours earlier, and kept hot. It also means a plate set before you with beautifully arranged food to whet your appetite even if you aren’t hungry.
Again, it means going to a restaurant every day to dine on food that makes me feel at home. It means a meal we want when we want it. What is not to love about that!”
Kind Dining® training encourages members of the food serving team to offer new ideas and suggestions to consistently be aware of upgrading and improving meals for their residents.
It is vital that dining in the community matches the elegance of residents’ rooms, apartments, and the amenities of their community.
Residents who experience high-quality food service are overall contented and happy. Mealtimes are still the high points of the day.
Your residents must find the food to be fresh in all aspects. These dining hours are an opportunity to build the community’s reputation. Build on that thought and invest in your food serving teams for a higher return on each trained food server. Food servers include nursing/health services, care staff, housekeeping departments, and managers. Your food servers are powerful company assets.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Remember that your food serving team is your company’s most valuable asset.
by Cindy Heilman | Attract Residents, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Is this a good time to look at your food service through the eyes of your customers as top-notch restaurateurs do?
Do you realize that your residents yearn for the same quality of food and service that their favorite restaurants gave them? Those are the restaurants, bistros, and trattorias they patronized before they made your community their home.
That kind of dining service is not out of reach. A food serving team that works together to improve the quality of mealtimes that residents look forward to every day.
An inspired chef can create interesting menus, bring in fresh foods, and design the kitchen to prepare food when ordered. The new way has overcome the old way of cooking early in the day and keeping it hot on steam tables until mealtime.
Still combining healthcare with hospitality, an inspired chef will use herbs and seasonings to replace the salt most seniors need to avoid. It will benefit their health while pleasing their palate.
Dining is their time to socialize, try new dishes with intoxicating flavors, and share stories with newly made or reacquainted long-time friends.
An inspired chef and food service team working together can create excitement at mealtimes and compliment the architecture and décor in your community that first attracted your residents to choose your home.
Your food serving team is a powerful tool for the company. The dining room’s quality of food and service is their most valued asset. Meals that are talked about with warmth, delight, and satisfaction carry more assurance than advertisements. Word-of-mouth is a strong advantage.
Kind Dining♥ training modules are now available online.
Our curriculum is comprised of 9 training modules divided into 3 sections.
We will help refresh the work habits of your long-term food servers, educate your newly hired food servers, and show your part-time food servers how to be part of the team.
A well-trained team helps your community stand out from others by having employees who learn to be dedicated to their work.
by Cindy Heilman | Attract Residents, Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Many seniors will decide to leave their present home and make their new and final home in a senior or an assisted living community. This is a lifetime decision and not one that is made lightly. When keeping this in mind, your food servers have the power to reassure any hesitancy of these new residents. Incorporating kindness into their daily routine shows commitment to helping new residents settle in. It also improves their day. They display empathy by lending an ear and taking a few minutes to listen.
Older Adults making your community their home will welcome this kindness as they often left a home of 50 years. They leave behind a houseful of familiar antiques and treasures to move into a smaller place. Downsizing is rewarding in itself. It can also be painful to leave those treasures collected over a lifetime.
Hospitality is encouragement when starting fresh. Hospitality is also a comfort and is healthful.
Food has always been a comfort and a major factor in the senior and assisted living community.
The food server is the carrier of that comfort. Your food serving team must add the skills of empathy and sincere listening to their list of practiced technical skills. Follow those skills up with practicing kindness to become a way of life. It eases a workday and improves the attitude of the giver and receiver. Now that dining rooms and restaurants in these communities have re-opened, mealtimes can return to their former social times. They become a focal point for renewing friendships and meeting new residents.
It is a time for excitement and fun. It is a time for enjoying the chef’s choices, the food servers’ comments, and the warmth of a table shared with others.
Our training modules at Kind Dining® are experiential.
We engage trainees by using action, reflection, application, and performance. Servers learn empathy with delicacy for seniors who left their family homes to become permanent residents in your community.
Your food serving team can connect with residents one-on-one to build good relationships. We teach that personal and professional skills, like hospitality and healthcare, go hand in hand. These skills improve the lives of your residents while improving the lives of those who serve them.
Everyone benefits from thorough and refreshed training; the residents, their families, the entire food serving team, and the company.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Personal and professional skills go hand in hand, like hospitality and healthcare.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership
Starting over.
Your new residents are starting over, sometimes after living in the same house for 50 or 60 years.
They had to downsize, give away, donate, or throw away their lifetime of brick a brac, and souvenirs. Art treasures and wall hangings must go. There is no room in their new home. Clothes closets must be reduced to fit the new residence. Sometimes, there will be no need for food processors, mixers, and other kitchen tools. It is a major decision in the last chapter of one’s life.
They are starting over, looking forward to a carefree life without the heavy responsibilities of home ownership. They also know that this is the last place to live before moving to the hereafter. It comes with age or, in the case of assisted living communities, infirmities.
Whether the chosen home is in a senior living or assisted living community, they will need a warm welcome and assurance that they chose the right community.
Your food serving team is where they will find comfort and confidence if your team has received excellent training.
When kindness, empathy, and consideration are offered along with meals being served, your residents receive exactly what is needed.
Kind Dining® training series addresses these skills of hospitality and healthcare that can be learned, along with technical skills, behavior control, and positive thinking.
Helping people by listening to their life experiences is the highest form of hospitality. Because it makes them feel better to share their stories, it also attends to their healthcare.
When these new residents move into your community, your food serving team can help them adjust by listening to their concerns, triumphs, and, though it is a little harder, their bumps in the road.
The food serving team can assist in shaping a resident’s outlook on their new lifestyle. This creates a safe space. When your food servers contribute to healthcare this way, they will feel added value to their lives.
We at Kind Dining® training love this new approach.
We teach how the principles of kindness counteract the greatest threat facing the world today.
Too many people are experiencing the epidemic of loneliness, isolation, and the feeling of not belonging. Listening with intent is a major kindness not to be taken for granted. It is a dual kindness in helping the speaker and helping the listener, too.
Your committed food-serving team will also learn that practicing kindness during their working hours becomes a way of life that improves their own lives.
We teach finding solutions to these most challenging problems that arise in senior care communities at all levels of care.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Do you love our new approach to teaching the principles of kindness?
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Everyone has a story.
Ending an old year and beginning a new one brings out the stories that residents find satisfying to tell.
The savvy food server gives the best gift and builds a good relationship when he/she listens intently to what the resident wants to share.
Listening is a skill that can be learned and practiced. It not only gives great satisfaction to an older person but adds to the list of food-serving skills. It strengthens the bond created between the resident and the server. It increases the value of the employee and creates a sense of belonging and a feeling of accomplishment.
Listening is the highest form of hospitality. Hospitality holds hands with healthcare which helps elders through their life experiences. Sharing stories comforts the teller and the one receiving them by listening. The skill can be added to daily habits with little effort.
One of many things a food server learns by listening is that all older adults in their Senior Living Community are not the same.
To lump them all together because they share a certain age bracket would be a major error. An obvious result of that difference is their exposure to various ethnic and cultural foods in their dining experiences. The world has grown smaller and has introduced new food preparations and recipes to everyone interested.
Opting for the time of day when a person prefers to dine is varied. Some prefer early supper, and others prefer late evening dining.
Today’s well-rounded community offers to accommodate everyone in the community.
The answer to all residents choosing as individuals is to operate the dining room similarly to a restaurant. That is the way chefs face the challenges of culinary services.
Experienced chefs incorporate the assorted tastes of people in the community. They execute the daily mealtimes, including special event meals and holiday buffets. Residents’ families are invited to share the meals Mom or Dad enjoys each day.
Kind Dining® training series has long recognized and taught the importance of listening, building friendships, treating residents as individuals with dignity, respect, and kindness, and seeing the difference in one from the other to all employees.
Everyone on the entire food serving team, including the preparers in the kitchen and each one who comes from other departments to serve food or beverages, benefits from our Kind Dining® curriculum training series.
Hospitality and healthcare work together as the food-serving team does. Kind Dining encourages any company that wants to thrive and evolve, to invest in its employees by continuing education and creating a community of belonging to retain valued employees.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Does your food serving team know older adults are not the same?
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Imagine sitting in your room in a senior retirement living community.
You have survived the loneliness of isolation from the Covid-19 pandemic, but now it is over. Yet you are still lonely because you moved into this caring community just before the pandemic started, and you never had a chance to make friends.
Loneliness feeds on your immunity.
You only saw your food servers. How would you feel?
You’ve been relying on the kindness of your food serving team for conversation, and now you still depend on a kind word that will encourage you to sit at a stranger’s table in the dining room.
It isn’t easy if a person is naturally shy or doesn’t hear well and hesitates to ask a stranger if they may join them. Intentional kindness from a food server to make that approach easier by introducing a resident to a table is a small effort for the server, a major appreciation from the resident.
Social interaction is a defense against loneliness. It helps in your residents’ health. An assisted living community’s food serving team has the power to help your residents feel that they are welcome and are a part of your community instead of feeling abandoned.
Not everyone thinks to react to a situation with kindness. It isn’t that they are rude, just that they didn’t think of it.
When intentional kindness is added to the list of skills to learn and practice in training sessions, it will become the most natural thing to do in any needed situation. When kindness enters your psyche, it becomes a way of life that brings joy to the giver as much as to the receiver. Remember how you felt after you extended kindness to someone in the past and the delightful expression on their face afterward. Didn’t it fill you with pleasure?
Kind Dining♥ coaching and training curriculum has long impressed companies on the value of educated, multi-skilled, including intentional kindness and food serving teams. It is commonly understood that skilled staff remain with their company much longer than those without proper training.
Our training series is for your food serving team, both full and part-time, direct care workers, managers, and those you pull from other departments when you have insufficient food servers, as is happening now due to the pandemic.
Our training sessions are experiential.
We engage trainees by using action, reflection, application, and performance. Servers build empathy to respect the aging process by using kindness to connect with residents one-on-one.
We teach personal and professional skills that improve the lives of your residents while improving the lives of those who serve them.
Be♥ Kind: Learning kindness as a skill becomes as natural as the sun rising in the morning.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
“Well, now that you have been on the job, let’s see…6 months, what do you think?” Laura asked Susan, the newcomer to the senior living community food service team.
“Do you have an hour? I have lots to say for an answer.” Susan replied in a joking manner.
“I’m listening and curious.” Laura knew Susan came to the community soon after she graduated high school and had never been in the workforce.
“First of all, I thought having a job was all about getting a paycheck and how I could spend it. Wow! That is way down the list below of the things I didn’t know.
Our training sessions taught me important everyday ways of work that I never learned in my business course in school. The first up is working smarter with intention using the new skills I’m learning. I had no idea how much there was to serve a meal. It is so much more than I expected. I practice each new skill as shown to me so it will come naturally in time. Wow. Who knew?”
Laura grinned, encouraging her. “I still learn from our training meetings. It keeps my skills fresh, so I’m happy you appreciate them.”
“Oh, I do! My first day on the job serving meals made me aware of the difference between the older generation and the physical issues they have to contend with. At the same, I noted incidents I faced in high school, like bullying. Some elders are darlings that I loved immediately. I practice being extra kind, knowing they may struggle with something I don’t yet understand. But I’m committed and determined to help overcome loneliness and the complications of aging. I’m learning. It doesn’t always come naturally. My coworkers help and are kind to me too. They advise me when they notice I need it and include me so I feel like I belong even though I am the youngest and the new kid on the block.
“COVID hit my high school friends hard, though we are all technologically savvy,” Susan continued. “Knowing about isolation and knowing it is much harder for seniors is constantly on my mind when serving. I chat and ask questions to build a connection, as was taught in the training curriculum. I rely on that curriculum. It reminds me why I want kindness to be a way of life for me. Already, kindness comes naturally.”
Kind Dining ® curriculum is for all employees, not only the newly hired. Kindness is core to their training of skills necessary to be a community seniors choose as their home. It is a new way of life and a challenge for them, leaving behind a home that was familiar and dear to them.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Kindness is core to learning basic skills.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
What are the toughest problems older adults face in their communities today?
It isn’t the lack of a swimming pool or a 5-star restaurant.
Loneliness and isolation are at the top of the list. They are two challenges that became prevalent during the coronavirus pandemic and remain within many senior and assisted living communities.
The huge loss of family members and dear friends hangs heavily on elderly shoulders. But, these dilemmas can be met and reduced by training your food serving team and employees about kindness and friendliness.
Knowing how to approach older adults with these skills and adding care to that list is not a talent one is born with. It is a learned skill.
Once your team becomes aware of this resolution and practices being amiable, it can spread to include not only residents but also coworkers and administration. Needless to say, adopting these kindness-based skills will improve their personal lives outside of the working day.
Friendliness goes in hand with kindness. Adding these skills to your training and practice sessions is imperative.
The newly learned skills will set the ambiance in any dining room. It will create warmth to the table, reminiscent of the dining room in the home they left behind.
In turn, this improves their nutrition and becomes a connection of healthcare to hospitality, harmony, and happiness. All of these words lead to the word ‘care.’
It’s what is desired most in Long Term Care and assisted living communities. Allow your employees to care about their work, the residents they serve, the team they work with, and the company they work for. Let them commit. Once employees incorporate these assets from your training and discussion meetings, they will form a desired way of life.
Kind Dining® curriculum is uniquely designed to improve the lives of those working and living in senior and assisted care communities.
Hospitality is a universal language and core to skills necessary to your food serving staff.
Remember that your dining service is central to the success of your community. Kind Dining® training guides your food servers into being your company’s most valuable asset.
A few important facts to remember for now and the future are: mealtimes market your community, residents spend 60% of their day focused on mealtimes, investing in your employees is the effective path to culture change, the organization’s success, and kindness is a healthy habit.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Remember that kindness is a healthy habit!
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership
I am delighted when friends of mine, knowing my passion for my work, bring personal stories and feedback to me from the retirement and assisted living industry. This is another recent one that reinforces the importance of my beliefs in the training curriculum I’ve created.
She began to tell me, “I was enjoying my visit with Ellie as five of us sat around the lunch table chatting about the ups and downs of our lives. We were stunned and speechless when the newest and youngest addition to the group said, ‘I have a hard time believing this is my last home.’ All eyes were on her, and I’m afraid my mouth was wide open.
She appeared to be 65 and had only recently moved in when her husband entered the Alzheimer’s unit in the next building. She moved into a 3-bedroom apartment on the fifth floor.
Four of the others, now in their 70s and 80s, had lived here between 6 and 15 years. Ellie was now in her third year and loved it from the day she moved in.
One of the ladies, a quick thinker, said, ‘I remember thinking that when I first moved here. I left my friends behind, and my family wasn’t coming to see me daily. I knew no one.
That all changed with the help of our dynamite staff! They introduced me to others they thought I would fit with and went out of their way to chat in the hallways when we met. They also asked brief questions, which people ask when they get to know you. It didn’t take long before I was raising my hand in greeting. Of course, I have my favorites, just like I have favorite nieces and nephews. You’ll see. It will come.”
Another of the ladies followed up with: “I hope you noticed how friendly the staff is to all of us. If you aren’t standoffish, and I know you aren’t, they are the first to make you feel at home. When you know them by name and a little about them, they become what I call – your in-house family. Familiar. Like your favorite pair of comfortable shoes.” She laughed at her joke.
Ellie said, “We promptly became your friends when Sylvia brought you to our table. She knew instinctively to bring you to us. Soon you will find more. Plus, when you fall into the routines and join the activities you like, you will feel more at ease. The staff will help you.”
Kind Dining® knows and teaches how the staff can be your community’s best asset. Using our training curriculum, they will learn how to incorporate small acts of kindness into their daily routine. One of those kindnesses is helping a new resident feel at home.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: It is easy to feel at home when surrounded by friends at the dining table.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Moving into a new home can be strange and difficult for anyone at any time.
Making your last move into a senior living community, knowing it is the last time you will change your residence, can be unsettling. This change in a new resident’s life can be scary, especially if they are stepping into a place where they know no one.
Your staff has the power to make new residents feel comfortable and at home with the many ways that the Kind Dining ® training curriculum prepares them for that very task.
Your food serving staff will immediately recognize new faces entering the dining room. Leading them to a table they know are friendly residents who will welcome newcomers and making introductions is a huge step in getting new folks settled in.
Offering a friendly greeting and a few words of welcome goes a long way with a person walking into a dining room with unfamiliar faces. It is a small kindness that has huge and happy results. It is also important to extend that friendliness when meeting new residents in the hallways.
Learn names and use them as often as possible. It helps people feel they belong when they hear their name spoken. Sharing a word or a pleasant greeting invites a person to respond kindly and increases their sense of security. It is the beginning of a conversation, and conversation leads to a feeling of ease, comfort, and familiarity.
Kind Dining® training educates your staff by giving them the knowledge to use in their daily actions of serving older adults.
It instills confidence they use to create a culture of belonging for new and all seniors in their community and develop that sense of belonging for themselves.
It develops the incentive to stay with a company that values them highly enough to invest in extended education, honing their skills, and the confidence in knowing the organization appreciates their work.
This confidence works and is a way to welcome new residents, to dissolve any feelings of isolation or the discomfort of moving into a new home.
Your staff can make people content knowing they chose the right senior living community to spend the last chapter of their lives.
Making new residents feel at home is the best possible bit of thoughtfulness they can do.
Kind Dining® training helps to reduce burn-out by helping people learn new skills, gain confidence, and value in what they do. They learn to manage their behavior and instill accountability.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Your staff can help create the feeling of home for new residents.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
Many friendships are formed and carried through long periods over the lunch/dinner table. ‘Let’s meet for lunch’ is a common phrase that indicates wanting to spend some time with a friend.
It’s nice to have lunch served to you but it’s the friendship that is the magnet. Even casual friendships are important to us. To share a meal with a friend, or potential friend, is a bonding moment. To hold business meetings over lunch forms friendships that break down barriers and continue to work long after the meal is finished and the table is cleared.
Forming friendships on the job is a vital part of having a smoother workday. We all know there are days when everything goes wrong.
Now picture going to that friend at work who is the very one to help you solve a problem and put you back on track. Friends who have been on the job years longer than you, can give you tips on how to do your work easier, with intention.
Sometimes a friend is like having an extra pair of hands. On the other hand, it is just as gratifying when you can be the friend to help your coworker. There is a particular feeling of attachment in your gut when you have extended yourself to help another.
There is a spring in your step as you prepare to go to work because you know you will see friends to greet you, exchange the latest news, and bring you up to date on any events.
Having kindness about you is beneficial when working in a senior or assisted living where you will be helping residents in one way or another. That same kind of attitude is an invitation to your coworkers for friendship. You all share the same work reality and that is powerful in forming friendships on the job.
It is easier to understand a dilemma that arises and discussing it is uncomplicated when you know you are all immersed in the same field. That also applies when you want to share happy news or accomplishments.
Who could better share the joy than someone who knows the situation? Your coworkers seek the same goals you do for the residents. When issues are shared it builds a better working relationship.
Unexpected friendships in the community create strength and a positive growth of self.
Kind Dining® training sessions open the doors for these friendships to form. Discussion and alliance as a team at work are encouraged.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Friendships with coworkers create strength and a positive growth of self.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging
After an exchange of comments about friendships in today’s world, this true story came to me:
“UPS in my neck of the woods, otherwise called a neighborhood, many of us have formed an unusual friendship . . with the UPS driver! He is so friendly, considerate, and kind that even though we only know his first name, we all consider him a friend.
Many of us meet for lunch at the local café on Main Street in town. We learned that the UPS guy has lunch there every Friday. To show our appreciation, one of my group of friends occasionally pre-pays for his lunch. The lunch prices run fairly close so it is easy to just cover a general cost, including a tip. He never knows which one of us does it.
It is funny, whenever I see the brown UPS truck coming up a street I’m driving on, I wave. I have no idea if it is my delivery man or not. It doesn’t make any difference. I’ve never met a grouchy UPS delivery person wearing the familiar brown uniform, yet they always cheerfully wave back! I wonder if they are hired for their smile instead of physical capability.”
Friendships in senior and assisted living communities affect everyone touched by friendship without even realizing how. When a food serving team member brings a tray to a resident’s room, carrying a smile, a happy comment like ‘Guess what good news I have for you today’ or a question like ‘Tell me how you are doing today’ the server is inviting the resident to respond with a pleasant comment. The room becomes light-hearted. Encouragement is introduced and no one even notices what is happening. The server is guiding the resident to enjoy the experience. This is a casual, but powerful, friendship at work.
This exchange of casual friendship can grow into much more. There can be trading of conversation that uncovers the background of one or the other learning about a culture unfamiliar to them. This opens the mind to a wider scope. It also builds trust between residents and staff members as it builds respect, one for the other. It works.
Friendships between coworkers are also a step in building a stronger foundation for the company. Friends help and support each other making their lives better. In Kind Dining® training sessions, follow-up practices and discussions of friendships will reinforce the training sessions. Friends enjoy each other’s company and sharing their experiences both on and off the job is part of that friendship.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Friendships on the job can change the way you look at your work.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Joyce was talking on the phone with her long-time and long-distance friend David. He lives in the northeast, and she lives in the southeast in the same town as his mother. They grew up together, and though they married and had lived far apart, they always remained devoted friends by computer or telephone.
“I couldn’t keep flying down to check on Mom every month and worry the rest of the month about how she was handling being in a wheelchair at home. I was terrified she would tumble out of it and not be able to get up. Her friend Paula stopped in every week, but though I was grateful, Mom needed more supervision than that.
I finally convinced Mom to come to live in an assisted living community near me. I now visit as often as I wish and feel much better knowing she is getting the attention she needs and deserves. And by the way, she loves it!
She had all the wrong ideas of what assisted living is in reality. There were too many old, out-worn ideas rolling around in her head. She knows better now, though.”
Joyce, who often volunteers to work with seniors who need help, replied with a question. “What do you think has impacted her new life the most?”
“Believe it. She has become a social butterfly! She has met like-minded friends who share her passions, especially reading, word puzzles, cards, and board games. The computer was her only companion before. Her new group eats together nearly every day.
Any signs of depression have disappeared completely. It always concerned me that she was alone too much before she came north. With the help of the dietitian, she has lost 40 lbs. in a healthy manner and can now walk short distances. Her arthritis seems to bother her much less, and her breathing has improved. One of her particular friends is a charming gent who is by her side often. ” David’s smile could be heard through the cell phone.
Surveys have revealed that the social environment benefits the lives of older adults. Socially sharing meals with neighbors with the same interests develops a support network. This aids in living a satisfied life. It creates the feeling of home in the assisted living community.
Kind Dining® training curriculum teaches staff how to draw residents into the conversation, build the basis for relationships, and connect with residents. The knowledgeable staff knows active seniors will bypass depression by having sharper minds in friendship exchanges.
Elders who intellectually engage in mental stimulation with others lessen their risk of dementia. Daily or even weekly, sharing the comfort of the dining table provides necessary social interaction.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Do your food servers use conversation to encourage elders?
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Healthy people who enjoy living solo know when it is time to be social and mix with friends.
Living in a senior living community makes it easy.
All a resident needs to do is step outside their apartment home and head for the dining room or to a planned activity event. The dining room is the central location for socializing on most residents’ days. It’s where they meet to talk about which events they plan to attend and discuss their hobbies and interests. It is a good place to discover others who share the same pleasures. It is also where the food serving team can assist residents in finding like-minded people to share a table with.
Any member of the staff is happy to suggest or guide someone who is new to the community or anyone who is naturally shy. Excellent training and practice enable a staff member the confidence needed to reach out to a community resident.
Surveys reveal that socially active older adults enhance their health benefits and are generally happier than those who spend too much time alone.
Choosing to become acquainted with others by joining a table at mealtime is effortless. A food server learns in training and discussion sessions how to help a new resident find the table best suited.
The ideal assisted living community staff members have adopted a friendly persona as a way of life, so it is easy to encourage residents to be social by suggesting various activities. Many of these activities are offered to appeal to those without the physical strength to participate. There are board games, card games, Bingo, book discussion groups, sewing, knitting, singing, music, coloring, painting, and movie nights. Participating in these recreations will dissolve loneliness and improve a person’s reticence. Meeting someone who enjoys the same events will create group friendships and a network of support key to well-being. It also increases the feeling of home.
Friendships play a vital role in buffering against negative effects of general health, dark moods, physical functioning, and aging. Intellectually engaged, mentally stimulated residents hold less risk of developing dementia when they participate in activities daily or at least weekly. They form self-identity and a sense of belonging. Family members can relax during visits, knowing their mom or dad is receiving care when they need it. Their anxiety can disappear, and they can enjoy the visit with peace of mind.
Kind Dining ® training modules, now available online, teach the food serving staff in communities new ways to further the dining experience for residents. Staff will learn to work to build a better food serving team and explore the science and psychology of dining hours.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Does your staff understand the complexities of assisted living single residents?
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Regulations and Standards
“Whenever I am filling out forms and asked if I live alone, I always fill in the blank space with ‘Yes’, and somewhere near it, I write ‘by choice’. The form taker always asks what I mean. I explain that I like to be alone. It is solitude after years of too many people around me. To be alone does not mean that one is lonely. Too often, people confuse that fact. I am a people person who loves solitude. When I need companionship, I know where and who to go visit.”
A friend was repeating the conversation about an application form she received with that comment on it. Since it struck her as unusual, she brought it to the attention of a colleague for discussion.
Loneliness has been a severe problem everywhere during the pandemic but has eased up some since the waning of isolation restrictions. For some older adults, loneliness comes from losing friends and/or family to the coronavirus.
Loneliness is devastating. It lowers the resistance of immunity to illness, declines cognitive ability, and increases high blood pressure, heart disease, and obesity. It is known to increase depression. It attacks the physical, mental, and emotional health.
Loneliness remains a problem in many senior living and assisted living communities. It is a target for employees of those communities to notice and help eradicate it.
Employees who have benefitted from excellent training practices extend friendliness to all residents and coworkers. Though, it calls for more effort than a friendly ‘hello’. Show sincere interest in a lonely resident and maintain a running conversation with them. It helps. Encourage them to partake in activities you describe as lively and amusing. Introducing them directly to other residents you know will extend kindness and caring.
Social isolation crept into all aspects of senior living and LTC communities.
The training and practice meetings share examples of dissolving loneliness when spotted. This also refers to coworkers. They, too, were affected by the devastation the pandemic left behind.
Cultivate and seek social connections during your work day. Friendships are a cure for loneliness. Cross-generational interactions are excellent for defraying feelings of being unnoticed or unwanted. Social connections are key factors in warding off depression and dementia.
Kind Dining ® curriculum was designed because we care. We believe developing and expanding the skills of your staff are signs that the organization is investing in them. This investment works to reduce the epidemic of loneliness, isolation, and feelings of not truly belonging. The training and practice instill compassion and provide a true quality of life for your residents.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Loneliness attacks physical, mental, and emotional health.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
There are no reasons to be lonely when you live in an Independent or Assisted Living community. Yet many residents have become lonely despite being closely surrounded by others in their age range and various life-enrichment activities to appeal to their interests.
Losing friends and family during the recent pandemic has impacted many, allowing a feeling of isolation to settle in. It is difficult to overcome that feeling for some, even though an extended sense of loneliness can cause a higher stress hormone cortisol, depression, and social anxiety.
When food servers notice an elder showing signs of loneliness, they may mention in conversation how becoming a volunteer for a community event is a great way to meet new friends without the awkwardness of stepping into a circle of strangers. Just increasing their social activities is a step toward decreasing isolated feelings. Getting to know their neighbors will boost their morale.
Living a stress-free lifestyle is offered in senior care communities to encourage healthy living and wellness by providing social opportunities. It also allows residents to stay independent in a safe, friendly environment.
Some residents need a little nudge from a familiar staff member whose advice they respect. Staying active lessens loneliness and the risk of Alzheimer’s and increases happy contentment. It’s easier to start a conversation while strolling onsite pathways around the community, sitting next to someone at an outdoor concert, or saying ‘hello’ to a dog walker.
Let it be known that friendships formed become chosen families.
The dining room or café is the most popular spot for social engagements. Mealtimes are much more than only eating good food. It’s a social experience that provides an easy opportunity to introduce oneself to new people. Making connections can be assisted by caring, helpful food servers. They can sometimes guide a fresh resident to a group that welcomes newcomers. It’s great to plan a day over coffee in the morning and share the resulting experience over dinner that evening.
More attention is now being paid to the loneliness residents are experiencing in the aftermath of the coronavirus.
Kind Dining® has been aware of the situation and designed a training curriculum to teach your staff how to respond and improve life with skill and caring. We have created this curriculum for the culture of belonging, with ongoing, continual learning through training for your staff, from which they also benefit. It gives them an incentive to stay with your company because they get to work at an organization that places value on them. They achieve the true quality of life for residents, quality of work for staff, and quality of success for the Senior Living Marketplace. Complete success lies in intentionally focusing on the older generation led by kind dining and civility.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Excellent training and practice eradicate ignorance in your staff.
