QUARTERLY 68 In One Year I GREW MY REVENUE BY HOW % MASTERING The Mental Game Keys To Agency Success Perfect The Competition Technology And Policy Storm PART 2 KNOW LIKE & TRUST KEY CONTACTS AT REFERRAL SOURCES 20 20 $ Million Yearsin The Difficulties of Working with Family & Tips to Navigate Them Golden Heart Des Moines Adapting To Do The Most Good BALANCING ACT Elevating Both Providers & The Workforce To Drive Systemic Change SUMMER 2024 MSRP $19.95 By Steve “The Hurricane” Weiss0822 28 Mastering The Mental Game: Keys to Agency Success - by Samy Nasir $20 Million in 20 Years - by John Neagle The Difficulties of Working with Family, and Tips to Navigate Them - by Nicole Peretti Golden Heart Des Moines: Adapting to Do The Most Good - by Shelley Scott 12 The Perfect Storm: Competition, Technology, and Policy - by Joshua Kondik 36 32 Balancing Act: Elevating Both Providers & The Workforce To Drive Systemic Change - by Brandi Kurtyka How I Grew My Revenue By 68% In One Year - by Gary Stiefel Know Like & Trust: Key Contacts At Referral Sources – Part 2 - by Steve Weiss 04 16 ContentsWelcome Evolve. Adapt. Transform. Thrive. Welcome to Issue #10 of Home Care Evolution Quarterly! Home Care Evolution Quarterly is for those home care business leaders who inspire to continuously learn in the industry. We exist to help you stay up to date on new trends and data from vetted contributing authors, all of who are experts in this industry. This magazine is dedicated to helping YOU be on point in your: ● Sales & Marketing ● Operations ● Recruitment & Retention ● Financial & Multiple Revenue Streams In this issue of Home Care Evolution magazine, the contributors and I provide you with current topics, breaking ideas, & practical strategies you will use to gain better ideas and solve bigger problems for new levels of success. In this issue: ● How I Grew My Revenue By 68% In One Year by Gary Stiefel ● Mastering The Mental Game: Keys to Agency Success by Samy Nasir ● The Perfect Storm: Competition, Technology, and Policy by Joshua Kondik ● Know Like & Trust: Key Contacts At Referral Sources – Part 2 by Steve Weiss ● $20 Million in 20 Years by John Neagle ● The Difficulties of Working with Family, and Tips to Navigate Them by Nicole Peretti ● Golden Heart Des Moines: Adapting to Do The Most Good by Shelley Scott ● Balancing Act: Elevating Both Providers & The Workforce To Drive Systemic Change by Brandi Kurtyka If there is a topic that is important to you that you would like to see in a future issue, please contact me directly. Sincerely, Steve "The Hurricane" President and CEO Home Care Evolution steve@homecareevolution.com 848-444-9865 "But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you." Matthew 6:3368 Gary Stiefel Gary Stiefel is the owner of Visiting Angels in Alpharetta, GA. He acquired his agency in October of 2019. Prior to owning Visiting Angels, he worked in the corporate world for 25 years, running operations at companies such as GE, Kimberly-Clark, and Gulfstream. He possesses a Mechanical Engineering degree from Penn State University. In 2017, he took time off from his career to care for his parents in Pennsylvania. At the time, his father was in declining health and his mother needed surgery. He spent more than 3 months as the primary caregiver to his parents. Through this experience, he became aware of the senior care industry and the challenges in providing care to our senior population. After careful consideration and much research, he pursued ownership of Visiting Angels, Alpharetta. In his role as Owner and Director, he applies his experience in running large operations and his passion for helping our senior population. www.visitingangels.com/alpharetta In One Year I GREW MY REVENUE BY How %5 My journey as a home care agency owner started in October of 2019. I acquired an existing agency that was providing about 800 hours of service on a weekly basis. I don’t think I need to remind anyone what happened to us all in early 2020. As COVID hit, our weekly hours plummeted to 350 in March of 2020. It’s hard to believe that was over 4 years ago. My agency has seen steady growth since that time, with 2023 standing out as our best year of growth to date, with a 68% increase in revenue over 2022. This article is a reflection of what I believe allowed us to achieve this growth. FIRST WHO… THEN WHAT A business book I read many years ago (Good to Great by Jim Collins, 2001) discussed the concept of “getting the right people on the bus.” For me, this means finding and hiring the right people to be my office staff. I want people who can join me in taking our agency to the next level. While looking for staff hires, I’ve become much less interested in home care experience and more interested in other attributes. Things like a good attitude, a passion for caring, a desire to grow and learn, and the ability to get along with others on the team. After four years in business, I feel like we are now at the point where we have the right people on the bus. I can finally spend more time setting the direction of the bus and less time managing the people on it. You might be thinking, “Well, of course I’ve been trying to get the right people on the bus but it’s not that easy!” Trust me, I feel and share in your pain. For every staff member on our current team, two others have come and gone. The best advice I have for hiring great office staff is to learn from your experience and refine your methods of hiring as you proceed. My first few hires were from job postings I placed on Indeed. The team I have now all came from word-of-mouth sources. As an agency owner, you’re out in the community constantly (or if you’re not, that’s a separate issue you need to address immediately). Always be on the lookout for your next office staff hire. I’ve made a couple of hires before I was actively searching to fill a position. With our current growth trajectory, there’s room for another on the bus. As long as it’s the RIGHT person for the bus! NEVER STOP LEARNING A second factor of our recent success has been a focus on continuous education. I had zero experience in home care or health care when I entered this business in 2019. In addition, I had never been a small business owner. It was out of pure necessity that I had to seek out education. I have always been a firm believer in self-improvement and education. When we stop learning, we stop growing. There are so many opportunities out there to learn more about our trade – books, magazines (hey looky here!), podcasts, webinars, YouTube videos, Facebook groups, mastermind groups, franchise meetings, seminars/Boot Camps, the list goes on. The more I seek out learning opportunities, the more learning opportunities I stumble across. During my first three years in the business, I sought out a lot of training/education for myself. It’s only been about the past year- and-a-half since I’ve started to bring learning opportunities to my staff. I guess you could say I had to get the right people on the bus 6 before I could really bring them on the learning journey with me. It’s a great feeling to see a motivated, capable staff member learn and grow professionally. Not to mention the positive effect it has on growing our hours! CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT The Japanese word ‘Kaizen’ is translated to English as continuous improvement. The literal definition is made up of two words: ‘kai’ meaning ‘change’ and ‘zen’ meaning ‘good’. Toyota introduced Kaizen in their workplace in the 1980’s, and it’s since been adopted by thousands of companies around the globe. I know about this from my 25- year career in the corporate world, where I spent much of my time working on Kaizen. In fact, I spent so much time on Kaizen in my “previous life” that I thought I would never want to hear the word again. And in reality, during the first three years in business, my agency wasn’t big enough to apply team-based continuous improvement initiatives. But now, a few years removed from the corporate world and with a small busload of highly motivated, capable staff members, I’m dusting off my old Kaizen books and introducing the concept to my staff. I believe this will be the catalyst for us to continue our stable growth into the future. Our Kaizen initiative involves first identifying a process and developing a current state map. This is basically a step-by-step picture of how the process is carried out today. We then gather as a team and identify improvement opportunities to make the process easier and more efficient. Finally, we implement the improvements to realize a new and improved future state. It’s essentially a team- based approach to improve everything we do, process- by-process, on a continuous basis. To get started, simply write down the major processes of your business. Don’t worry about prioritizing yet, just start writing. My first list included: hiring process, night and weekend on-call process, caregiver accountability and rewards process, new client start-up process, and caregiver training process. Then, pick one process and get started. I chose the hiring process. I purchased a roll of butcher paper and taped a piece of it to the wall. Then we gathered as a team and wrote each step on post-it notes and put the process on the wall so we could all see it together. Then we brainstormed improvements and put those on the map. Finally, we implemented some improvements immediately and created an action plan for the remainder of the improvements. We now are setting aside time each week to work on our continuous improvement efforts. WORK HARD, STAY HUMBLE What I’ve come to realize is that I can be most successful in this business if I have a staff of people who are all more capable at their individual jobs than I could be myself. To get there, I needed to find the right people, give them the education and tools they need, and lead them along the path of continually improving the work we do. Wherever you are in your home care journey, I wish you the greatest success in getting to the next level and then beyond!Get self paced industry training for as low as $97 per month. Home Care Evolution Daily is a self guided program with weekly tips and strategies! It’s time to stop the guesswork. Hit your goals sooner than you thought possible with Home Care Evolution Daily. www.homecareevolution.com/daily Never get stuck guessing what to do next for your business. SIGN UP FOR HOME CARE EVOLUTION DAILY TODAY. ● Exclusive Video trainings ● Strategies designed to help you build your business and get more clients ●Templates making it easy to implement and get results ●Proven Marketing Methods tested and proven by 100’s of home care businesses ● Monthly Private Webinar Training keeping you up to date on what’s working NOW ●Private Facebook Marketing Group giving you support, accountability, and a direct line of access to get questions answered ● Weekly Marketing Tips direct from the best in the industryMastering Samy Nasir Saman Nasir combines two decades of experience in coaching, hypnotherapy, and leadership. Samy’s educational journey includes earning an Associate of Occupational Studies in Mind-Body Psychology with Honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute, a nationally accredited college of hypnotherapy. She has developed a unique belief system enrichment approach that incorporates Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), imagery, mindfulness, and Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). Samy is committed to her personal and professional development, which is why she’s currently pursuing a Master’s in Psychology. Beyond her academic and professional achievements, Samy’s deep academic background along with multilingual communication in 5 languages makes her a versatile and effective guide for home care companies seeking success. https://homecareevolution.com/ The Mental Game Keys To Agency Success9 Running a home care agency is simultaneously a challenging and rewarding endeavor. You are responsible for providing quality care to clients while managing a team, navigating regulations, and maintaining a successful business. In this high-stress environment, you might not notice when your inner dialogue with yourself gets critical, but it has far-reaching consequences. By understanding and taming the critical inner voice, practicing self-compassion, and developing resilience, owners can enhance their personal lives and lead their agencies more effectively. Mental evolution is not only essential for individual happiness but also crucial for providing the highest quality of care to clients and ensuring the long-term success of home care agencies. UNDERSTANDING THE CRITICAL INNER VOICE The critical inner voice is an internal dialogue that can be highly critical, self-sabotaging, and damaging to your self-esteem. For you as an agency owner, the pressures of the job can amplify this inner critic. You may constantly question your decisions, feel inadequate, or experience imposter syndrome, all of which can hinder your personal and professional growth. To truly comprehend the critical inner voice and its implications, let’s take a page from Freud’s book and examine the structure of the human psyche. Freud’s model includes three key components: the ID, the superego, and the ego. These elements play a crucial role in shaping our inner thoughts and dialogue, which ultimately contribute to the critical inner voice experienced by home care agency owners. Imagine a scenario where a client or staff member offers criticism or feedback. It’s not uncommon for this feedback to sting, causing your ID to react emotionally. Meanwhile, your superego, influenced by your commitment to ethical caregiving, advises against showing vulnerability. In such instances, the ego steps in and formulates coping mechanisms. It might encourage you to compartmentalize the emotional impact, temporarily setting it aside to focus on addressing the situation professionally. In another example, consider the desire for agency growth and success—an aspiration fueled by your ID. However, the superego, shaped by ethical standards and regulations, might introduce doubt, questioning whether your ambitions align with these principles. Here, the ego intervenes subtly, aiming to maintain equilibrium. Instead of outrightly denying your ambitions, it might prompt you to take a measured approach, ensuring that growth aligns with your agency’s ethical commitments. The ID: The ID is like the unruly child within us, constantly seeking instant gratification and pleasure. The ID might push owners to prioritize immediate solutions and quick fixes, ignoring the long-term consequences. The Superego: On the other side of the spectrum, the superego represents our internalized moral compass, enforcing values and standards learned from society and upbringing. The superego may create feelings of guilt or self-doubt when owners feel they fall short of ethical or caregiving standards. The Ego: The ego serves as a mediator between the ID and the superego. It strives to find a compromise between the ID’s desires and the superego’s ideals. In doing so, it plays a critical role in shaping our decision-making and inner dialogue. Your ego primarily resides in your conscious thoughts, though some aspects remain in the preconscious. It operates like a seasoned diplomat, mediating between the impulsive desires of the ID and the stringent moral values of the superego. The ego possesses executive powers and carefully plans its actions to ensure that neither extreme dominates.Next >