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.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
“I know many people, women in particular, will stay home with a salad in front of them rather than eat in a restaurant alone. I am not one of those people. I love it because I hear the best stories by listening in on what is being said around me.” A writer friend told me this recently.
She is a strongly independent woman who also travels alone, apparently for the same reason. She goes to talk with strangers who teach her about their surroundings. This is the base for several of her stories. Many of those are about travel. She does this because she is a writer. When she wants to relax and just be herself, she gathers friends around her table and begins by pouring the wine.
As my writer friend knows, most people are not comfortable eating alone. The pleasure for them is sharing a meal and socializing with long-time friends and finding new ones. This is especially true in retirement and assisted care dining. Making the decision to move into a Senior Care community is a major change in a person’s life. Often the decision comes at an emotional time, after losing a life partner or an oncoming physical disability.
It is a time to be welcomed into a new, friendly social group. It is not a time to be lonely. The food serving team can help in a great way by doing small things. Start with a big smile and sincere greeting. Offer to introduce them to a table or group you know will invite them in. Senior and LTC communities are great places to spend time with people who share the same discussion subjects as you enjoy. It can be a carefree lifestyle designed for people of a certain age. I repeatedly hear “It’s the best decision I ever made!”
All throughout history it is reported that gathering around the warmth of a dining table is a way of getting to know another, build a relationship, even a job interview is often performed over the lunch table. Therefore, Kind Dining® believes it is essentially significant to build a powerful food serving team.
Our curriculum encourages adopting a culture of belonging, a training benefit to staff as incentive to belong to their community because their organization places value in who they are and the work they do. The same organization is investing skill development that works to reduce the epidemic of loneliness, isolation and instills a sense of belonging. A team who trains together creates unity and builds that same sense of belonging.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Encourage your residents to share the joy of the dining table with new residents.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Some of the best information comes to me from friends overhearing conversations at lunchtime in restaurants.
This conversation came to me from a friend:
“When are they going to understand that I am not my grandmother? I am their grandmother. I am different and experience life differently. They cannot assume I will think like others my age just because I am that age. I still think for myself and make my own choices. That is important to me. It was my choice to relocate my home base to a Senior Living Community because I am independent and demand I am treated so by everyone, family, friend, colleague, and staff member.”
Her dining companion quickly replied, “Which, by the way, I have introduced politeness and kindness to a food server recently. I reminded her of that very same idea. I am to be treated with respect and friendliness, and then we will get along just fine. I reminded her that the white hair on my head was not an indication of a grey brain. I’m still an individual, thinking my way. We may enjoy some interesting conversations ahead of us. She seems intelligent enough, just was not taught good manners.”
Both staff and residents have experienced incivility in their daily routines. Not all elderly people are the same, a fact that needs to be recognized by food serving staff. Life in senior communities does not need to suffer these awkward moments when a resident corrects the poor manners of a food server which may cause feelings of resentment. Training teaches how vital the dining experience is to every resident and each food server, including caregiving staff. When performed correctly and with joy, mealtimes are appreciated by all. It is an uplifting happening.
My hospitality background set the tone for the Kind Dining® training curriculum. It introduces interpersonal and technical skills that improve our communities and help to build relationships. The inclusion of staff serving meals, from all departments, in this training is vital. We also address emotional control tools and help your food serving team to become more engaged in self-improvement on their way to becoming highly valued employees by the company.
Kind Dining® training series shows commitment to helping those who want to succeed, discover a new sense of belonging and a meaning for their work, and feel passionate about their work.
Learn how Kind Dining® training can transform the dining experience in your community here.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Older people in your community do not have the same expectations.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
The human emotion of that “sense of belonging” does not fade away after graduating high school, raising a family, and/or fulfilling a career. It remains with us as long as we breathe. As many seniors choose to shed household ownership responsibilities to live in a senior living community, they will look for the one place that says, “I belong here.” A major vibe they absorb as they visit your community for the first time is the sense of your staff feeling as if they belong. Those vibes emanate from the relationship employees have with each other and their relationship with the residents they serve. A staff that is well trained to work as a team and knows the importance of performing as a team will exhibit that sense of belonging naturally. This team completely accepts and respects each other, willing to jump in to gladly help when needed and without waiting to be asked. It’s a team whose individuals are alert, aware, and committed.
Once team members develop these qualities through training curriculum and practice, each member’s behavior, attitude, and belief will alter to conform to the team’s goals. If their work began as an unskilled job, the influence of team education, adding skills learned, will guide them to work with intention. As their work performance improves and progresses, they will experience a sense of belonging. This feeling is what employees rely on to commit to their organization for the long term.
That sense of belonging with residents encourages them to join in the various social activities, appear at events, and stop at a table during lunchtime to chat with others. Knowing you belong builds self-confidence and a sense of security. It even extends to welcoming new residents, showing that you chose the right community; you belong there and are a contented, happy resident. Living where you belong dissolves anxiety, depression, and loneliness. It supports excellent physical and mental health.
Kind Dining ® designed its’ training curriculum and hands-on exercises, knowing that it is in the organization’s best interest to ensure a well-trained staff. The results are employees confident to see their work as a ‘calling’ and to know it as a way of life. They take pride in their efforts to do a little bit more to make life better for residents and coworkers.
Kind Dining® nourishes a desire in participants to continue honing their skills, expanding their education, and securing their sense of belonging.
Learn how Kind Dining® Training can transform the dining experience in your community here.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Residents need to feel they belong in your community.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Assisted Living and Long Term Care communities may have different regulations than Senior Independent Living communities but many similar responsibilities make one community stand out from its neighbor. It’s a time when those regulations and also policies are updated to match the intelligence and needs of today’s residents. The same approach stands for senior independent living communities. An ongoing discussion with suggestions and notations from the employees who are involved with challenges daily is encouraged to bring possible problems to the awareness of all. A problem anticipated can easily be averted.
Providers as well as employees can improve routines of responsibilities with empowerment to correct shortcomings.
Outdated rules and regulations can only drag a community to inadequacy if they are required to wait for outside government surveyors (a short-staffed field) to fix problems the company can do with integrity and experience.
Kind Dining♥ suggests this is an area that can be improved by holding scheduled training and meetings for discussion by anticipating areas that can be improved within the company employees.
While senior independent living communities are a relatively new industry, the underinvested nursing homes now must find a way to upgrade to assisted and long-term living, and memory loss centers. Introducing a new quality care system would be ideal, created from those within the industry who already are direct care staff.
These guidelines would come out of the training and education meetings where the participants are there to ever improve the situation of the individuals they tend to. Many who work in the personal care industry consider their work as a calling rather than just a job to earn a paycheck. These experienced and educated caregivers must be respected and celebrated. They stayed on the job during the recent pandemic when others chose to stay safely at home. They have built resident relationships and connections that have value beginning each day with a happy smile and a hearty “Hello! How are you doing today?”
Dedicated food servers and caregivers aren’t born with the talent and skill they need to be excellent at their work. They have learned through active participation in proper training like Kind Dining♥ provides because we also believe with our hearts that we educate people to do their chosen work with intention, and skill, setting goals, and equitable care for the deserving residents. Training is a continuous journey. There is always a better way to learn, a new understanding, or an old skill reworked for a smoother result.
Be♥ Kind Tip: Training is a continuous journey.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
“While I stand in line to buy a cup of coffee at a ridiculous price to drink while I run errands, I wonder why I do these dumb things. I could easily have made a whole pot at home.”
This woman’s story came to me. “You may know that I work in an assisted living community for reasons of my own. The coffee I buy today tastes better than mine and my reason for choosing to work with residents who need daily help is that I care. It makes me feel like I am doing much more than working at a job. I look forward to going to work each day and set an intention to do a little extra more than expected. The residents I help aren’t always sweet little old ladies. When they are grouchy, I remind myself how difficult life is for them, when they struggle to get through the day and cannot manage it alone. I like to show a bit of compassion. It helps.”
“The wonderful training I had when I first began in this industry many years ago, instilled the work ethic to aim higher, and set goals that are minor to me, and the small extras I do are major to the residents I serve. We continue to have training brush-up sessions where I continue to learn new ways to freshen up long-time duties. I love my work and the expressions I see on the residents’ faces when I smile and say a hearty ‘Good Morning!’ or whatever my phrase of the day happens to be. They love it!”
It is essential that employees of long-term care and assisted living communities commit to equitable care for their residents as done in independent living communities. Their service delivery is vital to ensure a positive experience for the residents receiving care. Personal word of mouth is still the best promotion of a community to ensure higher occupancy.
Residents love to boast of the great care they are receiving when help is needed to get through the day. It reassures family and friends that they chose the right community. The resident’s response is the result of respect, dignity, and kindness received regardless of race, religion, or gender.
Policies and regulations must be discussed at scheduled meetings with all employees, including administration. The active response must be invited from the employees who have hands-on contact with residents.
Invest in and empower those employees allowing them to be part of the solutions. Stress the strength of being a team player. Kindness and respect are embedded in the Kind Dining♥ curriculum and training sessions.
We believe in the power of your skilled employees and the results that proper training brings to a company and the community.
Service without training involves many avoidable errors and causes poor experiences not forgotten. Proper training provides your service team with skills and the ability to create positive responses from your residents that they will remember when speaking about their time within your long-term care or assisted living community. Kind Dining♥ provides that training.
Be♥ Kind Tip: Scheduled discussions and training sessions create a powerfully skilled team!
by Cindy Heilman | Attract Residents, Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership
It’s a Wonderful Life, Miracle on 34th Street, A Christmas Carol, Little Women, and Rudolph, the Red Nosed Reindeer are a few from a long list of stories of Christmas where kindness wins the day. Winter Holidays, no matter which one you celebrate, are a time for generosity, thoughtfulness, and kindness . The holiday season can be exceptionally difficult for older adults spending their first year in an independent living or assisted living community. They have chosen your community to call home but may be missing many of their family and friends lost in the recent pandemic. They may be yearning for past, happy memories and traditions that will never be experienced by them in the same way again.
This holiday season is a time for your food serving team to go the extra mile to fill in those lonely, melancholy moments. While they have been practicing their social skills with residents, now is a good time to ask about those memories and traditions. Holidays are all about food. Gathering around the warmth of a dining table to share those foods that were special to their memories is still a way to bring happiness to your residents. It’s also perfect timing for serving particular foods that were enjoyed. Food servers can gain and carry the information and recipes back to the chef to include them on the menu.
In conversation, food servers can also encourage their residents to expand their sense of culture and start new traditions by tasting the Christmas specialties of friends they have met. Perhaps your food serving team can suggest sharing traditions of others such as watch a holiday movie, enjoy a sing-along, start a story meeting where each person tells their stories of Christmases past. The key is for your food serving team to have compassion with residents, to understand they may be suffering silently. Asking a person to tell her/his story is an easy way to start a chit chat. Perhaps Christmas themed aprons can be worn by your food servers to spread the jolly Christmas spirit.
Kind Dining® training curriculum leads the way for your food serving team to create great relationships with those they serve while building their own skills and self-confidence. It’s easier to love your job when you know you are good at what you do, that you bring holiday cheer along with the meals you serve. It is a proven turnkey curriculum for communities that realize resident-centered care is a priority that benefits the company. Kind Dining® coaching is designed uniquely for staff who, directly or indirectly, serve meals. The interactive courses inspire your serving teams to weave hospitality with healthcare, to converse with residents, and to care.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: The holiday season is a time for your food serving team to go the extra mile.
by Cindy Heilman | Attract Residents, Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership
Close your eyes, think of the Winter Holidays coming up, and what do you see?
Perhaps a Christmas tree in the background, hear Christmas carols being sung, but you ‘see’ family and friends gathered around a festive dinner table, no matter which holiday you celebrate. It’s the table that holds the warmth, celebration, camaraderie, and feelings of joy!
It’s about some foods that are only made on certain holidays. It’s the food that reminds you of past Christmases and loved ones of long ago.
Wonderful memories abound! It is a goal for Independent and Assisted Living Communities to recreate some of those treasured moments for their residents. It is in the power of your food serving team to help recall those memories and replace lonely reflections with the joys of today including newly found friends in your community.
The chit-chat your food servers initiate can result in favored recipes shared and specialty traditions being passed along to the chef for planning mealtime events.
Small, casual verbal connections between the food server and resident can result in making holidays happy replacing any feelings of the blues commonly experienced during this period of celebration.
These are vital skills taught in the Kind Dining® training curriculum that bring about important results that will linger in the minds of those on the receiving end. Resultant mealtimes are your company’s best asset and your mealtime servers have the power to make mealtimes memorable. Holidays are times when your food serving teams shine their brightest when feelings are tender, and when merriment is present in décor, attitudes, and at the table.
Setting higher standards in dining practices is a positive attainment. How your team performs at mealtimes and any time food and beverage is served, matters.
Kind Dining ® continually updates training to reflect the needs of food serving teams as traditional service changes to include new rules, regulations and suggestions that keep residents healthy and safe.
Hospitality and healthcare are still wedded together.
Kindness has always been a core belief in the Kind Dining® curriculum. New challenges in Senior Care Communities show committed food servers learning how to combine hospitality with healthcare using kindness, compassion, and competence as skills learned and practiced daily.
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 on a one-to-one basis. We teach personal and professional skills that improve the lives of your residents while improving the lives of those who serve them.
Be ♥ Kind Tip: Does your employee training include compassion and care?
by Cindy Heilman | Attract Residents
Once the experience of moving into an Independent Living Community happens, the older person has found a place to belong, enjoy, and begin a new chapter in life. There comes a time to let younger families take care of house maintenance, repairs, and household responsibilities. It’s time for the elder of the family to step into the hustling, bustling center full of new friendships to form fresh opportunities and join in the day’s events.
Today’s independent and assisted living communities are designed to enhance people’s quality of life. A place where they happily belong. A typical day begins when the person chooses whether to sleep in or meet the ‘pre-breakfast club’ for coffee in the dining room, where they meet daily at the same table. There is always room for a “newbie.” Afterward, some will stay for breakfast, and some will go to their rooms. The person serving the meal is a member of the food serving team and greets everyone with a smile. She knows who takes cream and sugar in their coffee and who drinks only tea while greeting each one by name. The group will discuss last night’s events and plans for the coming day.
The residents realize that the server also belongs to this group because she loves her work, the community, and the company that hired and trained her. They invested in her by teaching them the skills needed to be an educated, competent, and a caring food-serving team member. She is a young woman who plans to remain with this community. She feels confident that she belongs here.
Kind Dining♥ curriculum coaches your staff in the skills necessary to connect personally with the residents they serve. These connections will reverse any feelings of loneliness left from the recent pandemic and create the confidence of belonging in your community. The easiest and most logical place to begin this is with meal times. It may take practice and reminders for your food-serving team to know personal connections are more important than a task waiting to be completed. Encourage your team to understand empathy and the aging process and how it affects older adults, to add kindness to their list of skills along with the basics of serving meals and beverages. Continue their lessons, practices, and discussions while instructing methods to show you care. The more knowledgeable your food serving team is, the more the company can depend on them to love coming to work daily.
Be♥ Kind: Social skills when serving meals are more important than the basics.
by Cindy Heilman | Attract Residents, Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
Stories come to me from all directions. As soon as my career choice is known, someone has a story for me. This one came from the laundromat while the woman’s dryer at home was being repaired or replaced.
“My mother-in-law is way ahead of us. She announced last week that she has researched senior living communities and has chosen one for herself. She is selling her house and moving.”
“Oh, my!” came the reply of her companion. “I’ve never heard of that happening.”
“She said it is like going on a permanent vacation, and she deserves it. Further, she has lunch with a friend in the community she chose and received first-hand recommendations, like what to look for and what is most important. She has chosen her friend’s community.”
“Tell me more. I want to relay the information to my mother, who has been living solo since my father died four years ago. I’m concerned with her lack of luster since the pandemic. Maybe a senior independent living community is the answer.”
She continued to say that, surprisingly, it wasn’t the fancy trimmings that made the decision easy; it was the people who worked there. The staff, as she called them. First, they made her feel welcome as she came in the door. One young woman took the time to chat with her, and later after touring the grounds and common rooms with her friend, they stayed for lunch. She knew the food being served was especially important. The young woman, who met her when she came in, waited for their table and remembered speaking to her when she arrived! She was so impressed! She knew at that moment she belonged there.
It was obvious that the young woman who met the mother-in-law at the door was educated to respond with a pleasant greeting to any visitor. Following up by recognizing her when she served the meal was the result of training, loving the work you do, and being a part of a team who shares the same goals.
Kind Dining♥ continuing training series creates a culture of belonging, of working as a unified team. The knowledge gained in training sessions benefits the staff by giving them the incentive to stay, to work with intention, and to have the confidence to extend that sense of belonging to the residents. They get to work with a company that values them.
We are proud to announce that Kind Dining® is now approved for 11 Continuing Professional Education credits for RDNs, & NDTRs, as well as CDMs. CPEs are from the Commission on Dietetic Registration (CDR), the credentialing agency for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. This includes 1 Ethics unit for the entire series. The CPEs for Certified Dietary Managers are from the Certifying Board of Dietary Managers (CBDM), the credentialing agency for the Association of Nutrition and Foodservice Professionals.
Be♥ Kind: Skills gained in training sessions benefit the staff, giving them the incentive to stay.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, approximately one-third of all older adults live solo. Many of these people are lonely, which can happen even when surrounded by others, as in a senior independent living community. Not all widows have the confidence to approach others to open conversations and make new friends. It isn’t easy for everyone to do.
It can be awkward for an older person, especially a woman, to enter a dining room alone. She may be fearful of asking to join a table and being rejected. This doesn’t apply to everyone, but enough to put up an alert flag.
Once the problem is recognized, it can be corrected. When you are educated, a trained food serving team, who sees the same resident daily, is aware of the dilemma, they can change an unhappy frame of mind to a confident, happy one by being social.
Training teaches your food servers how to open up conversations and introduce diners to others they know will be receptive. The recent pandemic affected many older adults who had busy lives with a circle of friends to share their thoughts and activities.
The pandemic ended with quarantines and the loss of their friends. Computers and Facetime only helped to hold on a bit.
When older people are living in social isolation, they often lose their appetite.
Losing weight brings declining health.
Stress and rising blood pressure follow loneliness to decrease their quality of life.
Your trained food serving team becomes a key factor when noticing plates of food not eaten and depletion of a response from the person they serve. They can reach out to build up the spirit of a resident by bringing good news, a little story to share, or just passing the time of day with a happy attitude.
One person on your food serving team can make a tremendous difference. Imagine what your entire team can do when they are educated to be alert to the dilemma.
Kind Dining♥ coaching series encourages empowering your staff with skills and tools to aid residents by connecting with them daily. This increases an engaged and purpose-driven staff and a resident population that is happier and healthier.
Providers investing time and energy will create career paths for all who participate, not just jobs to be tended to. Our excellent training series may influence younger staff and part-timers to consider staying in the senior care marketplace.
We teach how to combat loneliness with a support network of friends, family, and staff.
Opening conversations at mealtimes is a small item that plays an enormous role in social action that improves the lives of your residents and your food servers, too.
Be♥ Kind: Taking notice of a resident’s downward change in attitude can alert a problem.
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Resident Centered Dining Service
“It’s probably a reflection of my own, if I may say, loneliness.” This quote is from the famous American artist Edward Hopper (1882–1967). He was a master at conveying loneliness and isolation in his paintings. To look at them is to feel loneliness seeping into your skin. Morning Sun, painted in 1957, could easily depict exactly what some older adults in senior living communities feel; loneliness.
Further, suppose you look on Sunday 1926. In that case, you feel the isolation many people are now overcoming in senior care communities with the assistance of highly trained staff, especially the food servers in close contact. Some experienced the emotion during and coming out of the recent pandemic.
It is common knowledge that many residents in assisted living and retirement communities are still lonely. Many people want to reverse this epidemic of loneliness. I am one of them. Loneliness is a significant factor in declining health and increases the risk of Alzheimer’s disease. The disease rapidly progresses in lonely older adults. Blood pressure and stress levels rise. When your educated, trained food serving team carries an aura of friendliness and conversation while serving meals, they offer a welcome hospitality that relieves loneliness. Your residents will feel cared for and comforted. They will also be healthier for it. Kind Dining♥ wants to teach you how to close the gap between food servers and resident diners using education, awareness, and understanding while building relationships.
My name is Cindy Heilman, and I work with people every day who want to reverse this epidemic of loneliness, people who want to find more meaning in their work by showing more kindness and appreciation for those they serve. Our Kind Dining® principles and practices, now in an eLearning format, make learning stick and help people implement insights. I wrote a book, Hospitality for Boomers, on how to attract residents and keep good team members. As a result of my work, clients often share their staff has a new sense of purpose, gets along better, and keeps their focus and energy on what matters most.
We are proud to announce that Kind Dining® is now approved for 11 Continuing Professional Education credits for RDNs, & NDTRs, as well as CDMs. CPEs are from the Commission on Dietetic Registration (CDR), the credentialing agency for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. This includes 1 Ethics unit for the entire series. The CPEs for Certified Dietary Managers are from the Certifying Board of Dietary Managers (CBDM), the credentialing agency for the Association of Nutrition and Foodservice Professionals.
Be♥ Kind Tip: Loneliness is a significant factor in declining health.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
Changing how you look at something changes your whole perspective. That is a key phrase to removing burnout from your long-term care and senior independent living community workforce.
From grocery stores to art galleries, changing your product around gives your shoppers a new way of looking at what you have to offer. It freshens the atmosphere. Flexibility in work schedules and routines will do the same for your food serving teams, including everyone who participates in bringing food and beverages to your residents. Most importantly, it prevents burn-out, reduces sick-day absences, and promotes good health. Allowing flexibility in schedules shows your employees that the company cares enough to improve their working hours. Service providers tend to be exposed to emotional and physical demands during their long hours, which creates stress. This high-pressure environment leads to burnout.
Good training and scheduled discussion meetings are resources needed to manage these chronic stressors and exhaustion that spread low morale. Employees with burnout compromise the quality of care residents receive in your community and damage your community’s reputation. Keeping your staff fit, energetic, and uplifting affects your residents, keeping them happier and healthier. Also, think of the costs saved by preventing a problem instead of the expensive cost of hiring new ones. Open communication with management includes clarifying what duties are expected of each individual. This helps to solidify working relationships that ease an already tight labor market.
It is promising to know that burnout can be avoided by learning how to work smarter with intention. Kind Dining♥ training series encourages practicing newly learned skills that give confidence to all staff who participate, not just your food serving team. They will continue to find value in their work performance and build a better self-image. Your team will learn to manage their behavior and accountability while improving their mental health. You want your residents to enjoy top-quality experiences every day. Your highly trained staff plays a major part in that experience.
Our Kind Dining♥ online and on-demand training series consists of 9 service training modules divided into 3 sections. The Foundations of Service, The Nuts and Bolts of Service, and Maintaining Service are happy and proud to announce the series is now approved for 11 Continuing Education Units for RDNs, & NDTRs from the Commission on Dietetic Registration (CDR). Please consider attending one of our monthly complimentary Taste of Kind Dining Showcases to see Module 1 of the series. Contact Cindy directly atcindy@higherstandards.org.
Be♥ Kind: Do you know body language extends communication beyond mere words?
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Resident Centered Dining Service
One of the huge negatives left behind after the pandemic faded is isolation.
So many residents who enjoyed the camaraderie of living in an independent living community still have that sense of being left out.
Many elders didn’t have a chance to bond with other residents to build friendships when the pandemic hit.
Now is the time to move back into routines of meeting friends for lunch or dinner or even to begin the day with conversation over coffee and bagels.
Again, this is a place where a food server can perform a vital service. Be on the lookout for a resident who needs a bit of assistance in meeting others. If you notice diners still taking meals in their rooms, suggest going down to the dining room.
Reassure them that you will introduce them to others you think will enjoy sharing a meal and some news of the day. It is a small kindness on the part of a food server that makes a huge difference to a resident. You will also be helping someone already in the dining room waiting to meet a person new to them. That small kindness will touch more than the one person you are helping.
When you perform this small kindness, watch the results with great satisfaction and the enjoyment of knowing you have created happiness that overflows and spreads to affect more than the one person you started with.
You also have a hand in keeping the people you serve healthier. Research has shown that loneliness may increase failing health where social connections to others can create overall immunity to illness.
Feeling left out and alone drags on your immunity which fights against disease. There is enormous power in fulfilling a small kindness.
Training employees to give their best behavior and to like the results of new skills they use, such as kindness shared is a major key to success.
Kind Dining♥ training turns your employees into the company’s most valuable assets.
Residents rely on your food servers in many ways which include being content to invite friends and family to join them at meals. It is noticeable when your food serving team cares enough about a diner in your community to extend intentional kindness.
We invite every employee within senior living communities to be cross-trained in our fun, focused, practical skills, and competencies, which makes each meal an enjoyable experience.
Be♥ Kind: Do you know loneliness lessens the immunity of an older person?
by Cindy Heilman | Build Communities of Belonging, Leadership
It’s like a party!
When you entertain, you want your guests to feel special to have received an invitation to your home. You prepare foods and beverages that entice, tempt an appetite, please the eye, and you serve a variety so there is a choice. You want your guests to know they are welcome in your home, and to socialize with other guests you’ve invited.
Mealtimes at your senior living community have the same goals that you do for a party at your home. It’s on a larger scale but the standards and challenges are similar. It also takes the same skills you want your food serving team in your community to perform as naturally as breathing.
A good host will be aware of certain people who need to connect and be brought together, knowing they will benefit from each other’s company. You want food servers who can spot a possible problem and know how to dissolve it before it develops. Most of all, you want your guests to be glad they came and will take away happy thoughts and memories of the evening.
Some people are legendary for the parties they’ve given and are known internationally. They weren’t born that way. They became great hosts through learning, practicing, and using social skills. They wear invisible antennae that tell them what is happening in their realm. These are the skills that you want your food servers to have and to use each time they step into their role as food servers.
It includes every employee that carries a plate of food or even a glass of water.
It includes full-time employees and part-timers, which may include teenagers who want the experience for their resume`.
An investment in training your food serving team, all of them, and following up with practice, practice, practice, promises that residents and guests will talk about your community in a way that will exceed the paid advertising you do. Your residents will feel and know they belong in your community. Your dining rooms will buzz with conversations that connect people as friends and create a general feeling of happiness throughout the halls of your community.
Kind Dining♥ are key words to your success. We offer virtual training sessions that you can extend to use with part-time and newly hired employees, as well as your full-time and long-time ones.
Training teaches ways to add kindness to their skills. It can open doors to culture change and understanding coworkers and residents.
A kinder, happier staff is a healthier one that creates committed employees who stay with the company. The spread of kindness to residents reinforces their immunity to illness. It begins with your food servers carrying pleasant considerations along with the food.
Know those food servers are still the company’s best assets. Investing in them is an investment in your community and your company’s growth.
Be♥ Kind: Training teaches ways to add kindness to a food server’s skills.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
David and Matthew were driving to their usual Saturday morning basketball game to stay in healthy condition. Both worked in the management department of different long-term care communities but discussed problems and ideas because their workplace routines were similar regardless of what community it was.
Matthew began as soon as David put the car in gear to pull away from the curb. “The boss called an impromptu meeting this week to discuss management’s weakness in leadership. It seems our filling in at meal times has not brought the high response he expected. Not the best comments were made from the residents he polled nor from the full-time food serving team we were supposed to be helping because of the labor shortage. He was pretty upset, though he stayed calm while he called us failures.”
David chuckled to soften the self-criticism knowing Matthew took his job seriously and wasn’t the sole person responsible for the poor response. “Don’t be too hard on yourself. We, meaning management, are not always able to sit in on the training sessions the food-serving teams get. The boss expects us to know about serving meals. I’m not sure how we are supposed to know if they don’t allow us in on the training. I never waited tables in college. My part-time job was working in the library.”
“He also revealed a bit of his plans for 2023, saying that for the first time, an allowance for a series of training is placed in the budget and for onboarding,” Matthew said with surprise in his voice. “With all the change of employees and lack of a full staff nowadays, he felt it important that we all get the training necessary, to be a completely fulfilled community organization. He claims that will include leadership training, I like learning new ways to look at the work I do. I confess, I never paid much attention to the waitperson when I was out for dinner. So I don’t know the proper ways to serve either. Just never thought of it.”
“I agree with you. Onboarding. Are you familiar with that term? David asked.
“I wasn’t. He said it’s about the newly hired, that they are easily confused and lost in workplace routines, guidelines, etc. He added that the largest number of employees that quit, do it within the first 90 days of being on the job. They wander through the halls, carry trays, and talk to you with a dazed look in their eyes. They have no idea what is required of them, let alone come to love the work they do.” Matthew replied. “The onboarding is training intended to make them comfortable and knowledgeable in their responsibilities to the point of developing commitment to the community and the company. I understand that it works. I’ll keep you informed before our next week’s game and I’ll drive then. Take care and I’ll see you next week.”
Kind Dining♥ training sessions introduce and train new employees so they can become part of the company/community family. They guide all employees to work together as a team helping each other while they are tending hospitality and healthcare to residents.
Kind Dining♥ knows the difference between teaching the basics and educating employees to become committed, long-time members of the community family; employees that stay with the company because they love the work they do, the community residents, and the rest of the work team.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
Because many retirement and assisted living communities are shy of the number of employees needed to keep their community running smoothly, many are resorting to hiring gig workers.
After your company has responded to excellent training for its food servers and ancillary employees it is imperative to be certain gig workers are involved in the training program. To hire these part-time or short-term workers without providing the same, educated training the rest of your staff participates in, would upset the care invested to make your community stand above the others.
Staff retention is part of the goal to turn your well-trained staff into permanent, committed employees who accept the responsibilities of their work, and build relationships with the rest of the food serving team and with the residents.
Of course, this can be attained with the new workers who choose to attend fewer hours than a full week for their reasons. They can still be added to your list of permanent employees.
We are stepping into an era where applicants coming into the retirement and assisted living Marketplace are members of the Generation Z group of independent thinkers. They are often only accepting fewer working hours than what has been the norm. This may help fill the empty gaps made in your staff by the pandemic.
Remember the importance of their training. Instill your core company values ensuring empathy, respect, and kindness with coworkers and residents. The old guard can be a great help in working with gig employees by offering to mentor them. The practice of what gig workers learn in the training session is part of this mentoring.
Integrating a hybrid workplace in your community may be the answer to the short-staffed problem. The idea of Gen Z is focusing on the balance and flexibility of work and other life. It has been suggested that for some, this will be their primary income. For others, it will be a second income position. Combine this generation with the ‘baby boomers beginning to settle into retirement or assisted living communities.
Is your community ready for these major changes?
Training is helpful to include education about person-directed regulations required by government policies. If gig staffing is the way for your company to correct or supplement your strained staffing issues, at least they can depend on the company to provide training for proper service to introduce and meet your person-centered goals and residents’ service expectations.
Kind Dining♥ is ready to assist you in this goal. Our training series is experiential, meaning that we engage trainees by using action, reflection, application, and performance. Servers build empathy to respect the aging process and connect with the residents on a one-on-one basis.
We teach personal and professional skills that improve the lives of your residents while improving the lives of those who serve them. These skills will benefit the performance of your gig employees as well as refresh your permanent employees who will be there to help them through the process of becoming an employee that makes the company proud.
Be♥ Kind Tip: A hybrid workplace may be the answer to the company’s short-staffed problem.
by Cindy Heilman | Leadership, Resident Centered Dining Service, Retain Staff
“Our last training session took an unexpected turn this time. I was quite surprised at first. When I gave it some thought, it all made sense.” Kelly spoke with her usual enthusiasm. She and her mentor Coleen were enjoying lunch at their favorite bistro in town. They agreed that the service was as good as the food. They always took note of both.
Colleen replied, “It must be important if it impressed you so.”
“Well, you know how much stress is placed on our assistance in helping our residents in every way we can when we serve their meals or snacks. But in this session, we were shown how learning new skills give us value and aid us in building our self-confidence. In turn, we learn to manage our behavior! I never thought of it that way! Remember Midge and her behavior problems? We were all sorry she couldn’t change her bullying ways which resulted in her leaving. We food servers certainly show accountability.” Kelly took a deep breath.
“I’m so happy we work as a team and no longer have to worry about facing a bully.”
Colleen smiled and added, “Remember that it improves our mental health, too. Those additional skills you continue to learn to reduce experiencing burnout. Hopefully, the pandemic is behind us, though we still need to be conscious of residents who may face loneliness. Generally, isolation is gone but individuals suffer from it. We food servers are the first to notice, I think.”
“It’s from our daily and personal contact with each resident. Building trust with them one conversation at a time helps. A few have opened up to me when they had a mild case of the blues. Our communication by sharing thoughts keeps the feelings of isolation away. ”
Too often, retirement and assisted living communities are staffed with under-trained employees including those serving meals. The well-trained employees will start their day being aware and recognizing different moods older adults may be carrying. C
ommunication and asking open-ended questions to keep a person engaged can turn a blue day into a happy-I’m-so-glad-I-chose-to-live-here-day. It’s a small moment that can bring about a big change in an attitude, all while serving a meal. Setting an intention to make that difference by showing empathy and compassion will lift the spirits of the server, too.
New skills learned during Kind Dining♥ training sessions build confidence in your employees by their becoming aware of the value of what they do. They learn to manage their behavior, and accountability and will avoid the tendency to burn out. This improves mental health by keeping spirits high.
Be♥ Kind Tip: New skills learned in training sessions keep spirits high and build confidence.
