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The Truth About Senior Living You Cannot See Online · A Place for Seniors

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_03: Welcome to a place for seniors, where we share the real truth about what seniors need.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_03: This podcast features honest, heartfelt conversations, the ones we don't always have, but matter the most.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_03: Here we share real stories and simple insights about aging with dignity, choice, and autonomy.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_03: Together, we bring what we've learned from over 20,000 conversations with seniors and their families, guiding you through some of life's hardest decisions.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_03: We invite you to listen, learn, and prepare with us, because these conversations matter and the choices we make today shape our tomorrow.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_03: Hi, welcome to A Place for Seniors.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_03: I'm Alison Carmen, and today I have Michael Brown, who is the executive director of Thunderbird Senior Living, which is a stellar community.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_03: And that means it is Stellar, but the name of the company that uh is running Thunderbird Senior Living is Stellar.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_03: So welcome, Michael.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you for having me.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_03: You're welcome.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_03: You're welcome.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_03: So I really am excited.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_03: I'm a little starstruck because I have followed your career through I don't know how long.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_03: So since you were at the MBK property that you were at prior, which was McDowell Village in North uh South Scottsdale.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_03: And now you've took over Thunderbird, what, two years?
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh just over two years, about two and a half years ago.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: Beginning of early beginning of 2024.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_03: And you know, one of my big points of education for my families when I talk to them is they can't possibly know by going online what the teams are in the communities, right?
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_03: So you can look at all these pictures.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_03: They all kind of look the same.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_03: They all kind of sound the same.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_03: They say the same words.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_03: You're on a journey.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_03: You know, we're meeting you at wherever you are in your journey.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but they don't know, like what we know, because we're boots on the ground, who these teams are.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_03: And as an executive director, I've watched your career through this.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_03: And I watched McDowell Village completely change.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_03: And now I've watched Thunderbird Senior Living completely change under your leadership.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_03: So if we could talk a little bit about what brought you into this uh this whole scene of senior living.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you again for the compliments.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: That's very kind of we've been um I had the pleasure uh nine years ago I got into this industry.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, it's been a little while now.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: The my original um education in college was hospitality management.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I I really service industry in general, certain leadership.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: It's always been a thing.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: So had the opportunity to um get a degree in hospitality management and it was uh immediately in very high-end resort style.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um which is very close to senior living, which I didn't learn until 20 years later.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_03: But a lot of people don't understand that.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_03: No, that it's a resort-like style living.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: In the industry, uh this is when I got into uh into hospitality, this is late 90s.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um the the connection she had hospitality back then, it was an experience you made the word connection came up a lot because you met um people on vacation, you learned to um appreciate that these people, this I look at it like the parents were working 50 to 51 weeks a year to save up for this one week.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: And this one week was their only week to give to their kids and do everything they possibly can.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: They want to get it all right.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: So they did all the work to uh to save the money, and then all they're trying to do is uh for us to give us the money and and expect that experience that they're wanting to have.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so we wanted to make that connection with them, and I loved that about it.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: So you had this opportunity to just make them be the hero for that week.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_03: I never even thought of it that way, but that's very true.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's very true.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: Give them a chance to earn what they've worked so hard for for that time frame.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: And going back 30 years ago, the hospitality industry was much more in that realm where you made these connections with your clients, with the customers, the guests, the members.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: And you could make it special.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: You can make it memorable, you could do all these little unexpected things for them that would just over-the-top stuff.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and it's like the Ritz Carlton way with the golden rule and all those things.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like you could really make it special for them.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I love that about that.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: It was yeah, every day was an opportunity.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: You met 100 to 200 new people, you found opportunities to just little minor things.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: And usually if they make take care of the kids, the parents are really happy.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: So if you find ways to entertain them safely and all of those, do all the things.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so that was uh a wonderful part of that industry.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I learned um, like most back then, you start and do every realm under the sun, do every job, which lends very close to scene living again, because the idea is housekeeping and maintenance and dining and front desk reception, all the things that are involved, we we did those.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: The only uh difference that we had was the clinical piece.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: So I didn't have that, obviously.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: So but I love that industry.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: And it was I I got to work, I didn't mind when I was young.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: You worked in remote locations, destination locations, and you traveled, you moved around a lot, you had to work a lot of hours, but you just kept doing everything.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_03: Um and you learned your craft.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: You learned your craft.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_03: Because I find that that's what I did too when I was young.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: And I learned I learned a lot about the craft.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: I learned a lot about appreciation for the hourly staff of what you do because when you manage housekeeping for two years at a resort that has 1,500 rooms and you have to help clean toilets every day and your tie falls in the toilet all the time.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, you you learn a lot.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah and you have a lot of respect for those people who do the grind day in and day out.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: And um I also what I didn't know was I was in that realm.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: You you had to fend for yourself back then a bit.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: You had to, I had to just take whatever same company, but move around, didn't take positions.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: And no one really I learned the craft, I learned all the different departments, I learned all the things involved with them, but I never really learned how to be a manager, which was something that and a leader and all the words that we use now.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: That was something that was never really taught to do your job or you leave, right?
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: You do your job and you leave.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: And even the orientation pieces of it, and that's something that I will touch on with MBK that helped me was they um when they orientate you as a manager, they don't really they show you the system.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: They go, here's our CRM, here's our like all the different payroll, all the things.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: They just show you logins and how to approve stuff.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: And but they don't really teach you, nobody spends time investing into the people from a leadership standpoint that's like, you are here to lead these people and what that looks like.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I do believe in the industry that there are the the successful, and there's a lot of very successful executive directors in this valley who um I have the privilege of knowing as colleagues and as friends, and I glean information from them all the time.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: They they have the ones that are successful are the ones that are good leaders.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_03: And you can tell when you go into a community that it's uh you you just have the a lot of times I tell people when they walk in the door, you're gonna have a feeling in your gut and it's not gonna feel chaotic.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_03: It's you know, the person at the front desk is gonna be very, you know, at uh uh greeting you very professionally and welcoming.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_03: Uh lots of times you walk into a community, uh, and I'm sure you've seen this, where uh the it might be a teenager or it might be a young person in their 20s uh looking at their cell phone or doing something, but they never look up when you walk in the door.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_03: And I've had clients look at me and say, we're leaving at that moment.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_03: At that moment.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_03: So if that's your first impression, then that's the most important person in the in the community sometimes, right?
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: And it's um a lot of companies, I don't care.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we're small, big, you could be as large as the ones that own thousands to the ones that own 20.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we all have a purpose, we all have a vision or a mission.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and there's a terminology like there's words on a wall and there's actions in the hall.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like we like they don't mean much just on a wall somewhere and what our vision is, if it's just if it's still the person.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and that's drilled down all the way to the leadership on the community level.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: And that's where um you can always draw various comparisons from any industry about franchises from fast food franchises and why is one successful and one is a good idea.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, right.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_03: One one Burger King to another, right?
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: So the uh and and that's something that is a a lost piece for those who just don't quite grasp that that is so important.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um giving them that uh feeling, like that from a leadership standpoint, like teaching us, that was the point of understanding um how important we have a responsibility to our team.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um I know creating value to all of them, having them feel that they're valuable to the success of the community.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: They can't always be monetarily you know, from a value standpoint, but uh showing that being attentive and teaching them how to stand up and greet and smile and my pleasure and all the things that are the niceties involved, how that starts in that first impression and um it goes a long way.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: But it starts with the leadership and it was again all the way back in the hospitality world, that business that that industry has been around forever.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: And they are still archaic with for a long time of not really teaching anybody.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: It was just if you're good at your job, we'll promote you to do supervisor of that same job, but you don't know how to supervise people.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: You don't know how to supervise people.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: You just do it well.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I will say starting my business and and having people leading people, teaching people how to do this, leading people through.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_03: Um it is a true something that I had to teach myself.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_03: I was always a producer, right?
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_03: So I always I was an escrow officer for 14 years, I was an engineer for another 11 as a process engineer in service industries, uh, credit card mostly.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_03: And then I went into senior living.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_03: And I had I was sometimes somewhat in a like a sales leadership position.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_03: And even there, it was very difficult.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_03: I didn't have the skills.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_03: I really didn't have the skills of leadership, and I've really had to teach myself how to talk to people, how to you can't just bark orders, you know.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: No, well, is you've usually had your industry, you've your business now since 2023.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: 2023.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: So and we talked a little bit before this started that you um have gone through a f a few folks to find the right group of individuals to that share your same vision for your for your business, right?
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_03: Well, and yes, and it's standards too.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_03: It's like we talked about you have standards, I have standards, and I think that uh not everybody can live up or or want to live up to those standards.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's one of the biggest hurdles that leaders have is you have a passion and a drive to make this business successful.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: And it's an obstacle for a lot of us to run into people who don't have that same.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_03: No, when they just see it like a paycheck, it's not gonna work.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_03: Because in this industry, I'm sure you know, we're working with human lives.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_03: We're really working with the last years of their life.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_03: And it should be a great last year, right?
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_03: And and that whole transition starting from I don't even know what senior living is to getting them into moving into a senior living and having the promises that you made to them uh and depicting what it could be like actually be fulfilled then once they get there.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_03: That's always where I wake up at night.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_03: You know, they say what keeps you up at night, that keeps me up at night.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_03: I can see that.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: And this industry, I am very fortunate.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_01: I when I was in the hospitality industry for 20 years, and I honestly, the reason I left was I just became that connection piece just started to fall apart.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you can liken it to people, you know, hotels is kind of harder to notice as a customer because you don't see it as much other than like, oh, it seems more convenient that I can just get a key fob at off check in the front desk.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_01: But likening it to airline travel with those who traveled in the airlines back in the 80s and early 90s, it now is feels like you're just making it.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: Just a busy bus anywhere.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: So and that's where I kind of became I managing multi-sites uh in in the different resorts all across the country.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I I just felt that we were no longer caring about the customer and that connection.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I just felt like I was distancing further and further from them.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: And at that point, uh I had started to look outside the scope of that area and go, what else could I do?
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_03: And with those same skills and talents.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: I was not gonna all of a sudden switch and become an accountant somewhere, but I was like, what am I gonna do with this?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: And um the there was uh like it's very cliche of uh like I feel like I have a better purpose now that what I do at the end of the day matters more.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_03: It matters.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_03: And I know I went into the senior living industry 16 years ago.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_03: And I remember the fur when I started placement the first year, after the first year of talking to like, you know, 12 people a day and going through everything, every single scenario from somebody's father dying in the hospital to guiding a, you know, a daughter who just can't do it anymore, um, or talking to a senior themselves who said, We're, you know, we're thinking about this, or my husband doesn't want to do it, but I do, you know, those kind of things all day long for 12 days, 12 calls at least a day.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_03: And then that year I physically felt myself change.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_03: I felt like this, I this is changing me as a person.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_03: I have a purpose now.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_03: All that customer service that I had done and all that understanding, you know, because with the credit card companies and American Express was big customer service and is a big customer service company.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_03: So everything was about the customer, so putting processes in place that did that.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_03: But this was actually one-on-one.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_03: So it made such a difference.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_03: And yes, I have a purpose now.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_03: I I mean, and I get so passionate about it, people are like, whoa, you're really passionate about this.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, but I do now.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I I concur with that.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's um that I wasn't sure what to move into.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: I had at that point I was close to my very close with my grandparents, um, and had a lot of the values to this day were instilled in me from my grandparents and watching um again, they were over time losing them both uh before I moved into this industry, but seeing how they were cared for towards the end and seeing how they um were very well revered in their small little town.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, they uh and there were certainly wonderful moments that towards the end that they were being cared for.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: There was other moments that you saw and went, My goodness, I think they deserve better than this.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um then it kind of helped me just start to go, I think like that terminology.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, what's that?
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: And then that that that idea is they've given, they've given to us all their life.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: So if this is the last chapter of life, what can we do to give back to them a bit?
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so it it kind of leaned, it's where I started with this and thought they deserve this.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_01: And they deserve, I'm a very competitive person.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I I just I feel like it's it's you know, it's part of my leadership style.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I try to remind people it's not that I'm trying like if we're doing it right, then the result is excellent care for these people.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and so we should give them everything we can.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the idea is that last chapter of our life is something that's memorable.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: We give the kids a chance to stop.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: And most of them, the education piece, the misinformation that's out there about this industry.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: And right you ask right now somebody off the street who doesn't who doesn't have to do this, and go, if you need to put your mother in a into a place to be taken care of, yeah, Google it.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: What do you start with?
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, the terminology still of nursing home and things.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_03: Nursing home, assisted living.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: And trying to educate them like in what you see on TV or what you ever, you know, maybe heard in the past.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like that's not all true.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: And these are actually very vibrant, uh, very enriched areas of what we can do to help them.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, like honestly, at times, some of them give like they come to life a little bit more.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: They come back more.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: They come back from it.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_03: That's what I always say.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_03: Because your community, Thunderbird Senior Living, is how much like 80% independent living, and then about 20% assisted in memory, right?
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we have 60 total AL memory care and 285.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_03: And it's a big, big community.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_03: So it's large.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and it was built years ago in the middle of Glendale.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_03: And um and it's very, very affordable.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_03: And what most people don't understand is they're thinking I'm asking them to spend eight, ten thousand dollars.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not a month, a month, guys.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_03: You know, and we're not, we're not asking that.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_03: And but what we're we're got a nice one-bedroom apartment with that's been remodeled.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_03: It's very nice and airy and bright.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_03: You've got a beautiful pond in the backyard.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, these older communities have a lot of land.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_03: Most of the new ones just are cement around them.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: They're up, they go up versus out.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, they go, right.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_03: And so I when I went over Friday night, I just got to tell you, I got tears in my eyes because it was amazing.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_03: It was a big, you know, senior Thunderbird has a big, huge lobby, very large.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_03: It was in completely packed.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_03: There wasn't a seat to be had for anybody, tons of chairs in there, be great, you know, the musicians that are going around.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_02: The fiddler.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_02: They love it.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, the fiddler.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_03: And the but these people that are now playing in these communities are like very competitive.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_03: It's a great career for a lot of these people to go around and do happy hours.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_03: We call them happy hours, you know, and and more social hours.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_03: But they're more social hour because they're really not drinking a lot, you know, but they're having so much.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_03: They were the dance floor was full, you know.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_03: It is.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_03: And you're looking at people that are pretty, you know, just having a great time.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_03: And um, it's a modest community in that sense that it's not one of the fancier, you know, more bells and whistles, but it's beautiful.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, it's just really, really that that kind of camaraderie and and just smiles on their all their faces and those their eyes are bright.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_03: Do you notice that too?
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_03: Because I notice when they move out of their homes where they've been living in a solitary environment, then I get them into a community.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_03: First of all, they have to like it.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_03: Their jaws drop, first of all, when they walk into a good community because they had no idea this exists.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_03: Then when they are there, maybe four weeks or so, all of a sudden their eyes get brighter, their skin color changes.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_03: They come, like you said, they come back to life.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_03: It's like amazing.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: It is.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_01: They have purpose again.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: They have purpose again.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: And the purpose could be as minor as just getting dressed before noon to go to lunch because they haven't done that before.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: It could be a lot of things.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_01: But um, yeah, we're very fortunate.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: The uh the industry, I got into it in 2019 or 2017 when I first uh was my first year.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_01: I was very fortunate.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: I came from uh like a regional position for oversight of multi-site senior uh resorts.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: So I had enough uh experience to where another company prior to MBK gave me the opportunity.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_01: They're uh a nationwide company, uh, to give me the opportunity to be an executive director here in Scottsdale.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and it was my first learning experience with that.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and learning the industry, I knew a decent amount about it.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: I had the first couple of years were certainly spent a lot of rules and regulations and understanding the other pieces of it.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: But um learning at that point in time, but even back then, the the industry was starting to look and recruit for more hospitality experienced uh directors versus just coming straight from clinical.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that was a shift.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: They were shifting because you could tell they were shifting because it wasn't just only about care.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there is, like you said, the enrichment piece of all this.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: And from it could be from dining, it could be from activities, it could be multivarious uh facets of the community, but it wasn't just uh how well do you understand clinical and so um because a lot of times once if you get into an independent living early enough, you don't need care.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_01: No, I mean yeah, you're right.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_01: And especially for that, you there was a lot of independent living communities that they didn't they didn't need you to have that type of certifications and education.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: They needed more uh hospitality.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_03: Hospitality for sure.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, because it's like a resort.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_03: You're running a resort that everybody lives in.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: They just checked in, didn't check out.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: And uh they um and so I was very fortunate to be allotted that opportunity.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_01: And it was there for a few years.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: And uh through various people that I knew um the opportunity to join uh MBK down to McDowell Village in 2019, I um I took that opportunity mainly because of their leadership from the the corporate office resource center all the way down through.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_01: I I McDowell Village was a very uh it's a very nice community.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: It has.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's a good location.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's got a lot to it.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: And um I certainly also the company MBK, I thought that would be a a really wonderful opportunity to to the only thing they they don't have memory care, but they have a great assisted labor.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_03: They have a great ale.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: We actually expanded it.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: I got there a couple of years it took COVID was in the way.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: But eventually we were able to expand that uh a bit more because of the need for it.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um and that's where uh was them with them for like five years.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: And the the leadership piece, so the the mentorship is a program that they weren't they were working on.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: They had it in they had it in place, but it really wasn't it wasn't meaningful at that point.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: It was more again mentoring executive directors.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: So they had like certain executors that were considered like senior executive directors that would mentor other ones other ones new or new to the company, whether new to the industry or whatever, but new.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: And that's interesting, right?
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: I had an assistant executive director role, which was for my, you know, that that role was to develop that person into an executive director.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_01: And uh over the five years, we developed three people in that role.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_01: All of them are still with that company, all of them are still uh two executive directors and one regional now, and very close to them to this day.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_02: Wow, great.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there and I took it very serious.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I, you know, I I feel like they deserve me to to care about them.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas I remember gleaning all the way back from when I first got into hospitality and starting to want to be a manager one day, and nobody teaching me anything.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody, it was just simply it is work you and there's no investing back into your team.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: So I really take that serious.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_03: And the that's interesting that you say that, because investing into your team as a mentor, and that is how I've moved now.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_03: Instead of like somebody who says, Oh, you're just gonna do what I do and make the same money that I'm gonna make and you're gonna do this, I now am in a much more mentorship role through another agent.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but and sometimes personally too.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, there's just so much to do, this and all other different things.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_03: But that mentorship has run through all of my I was just thinking about my first mentor when I was 19 in the in uh title industry.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_03: And it it's amazing.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_03: I s I can still remember Nina Bill Brooks.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_03: I can still remember her name.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_03: I can still remember her teaching me everything.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_03: She's stern, but she was very, very good at what she did and she wanted me to be as good as she was.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: So that's and it was something that I was lacking, honestly, in my career.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_01: I felt like I didn't get somebody that really just took a moment, looked at you, and said, You're pretty eager.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I can see that you want more.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: And you're a pretty hard worker.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_01: Let me give you some guidance.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_01: Instead, it was it was more like, all right, this guy's a good hard worker, just grind him and just grind him and then he'll and then when he wants to find something else, he will.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: And um, so I I I I feel like usually you're supposed to lean into finding people in past as leaders and managers and support and try to emulate their uh styles so that you can utilize that for your own in the future.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: I I feel like I leaned more into what not to do versus what to do.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_01: Oh uh, and like how I felt.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want other people to feel like that.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um, from a support standpoint.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: And um so I was I I I really embraced that mentorship.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_01: MBK was very helpful about allowing me to expand on that part of I let's not just teach them the software and teach them our rules and regulations.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_01: Like let's teach them how to be leaders, let's teach them the responsibility and what they have and how if they if they shift themselves a bit and looking back at the team as their customers versus just the residents and the families as their customers, oh yeah.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: Like it it will it'll pay dividends, I promise.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_03: And and what what do you think makes the I'm sorry to interrupt.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_03: That's okay.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_03: Did you have another photo?
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_03: Um what do you think makes what do you concentrate on when you went into Thunderbird or even MBK or even uh McDowell Village?
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_03: When you went in, what were you like the not to do's?
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_03: Were you identifying those right away?
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: Or Yes.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, McDowell was a little bit wasn't as much of a lift as Thunderbird.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: So we can get into how Stellar brought in Thunderbird and how that worked.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: The McDowell Village was part of an acquisition through MBK.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_01: They took over a bunch of communities.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: McDowell Village was part of that package.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_01: And uh they already had a pretty good foundation.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_03: Well, they have people there for 18 years.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they have a stable staff.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: They have a stable staff.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_01: We had minimum low retention or turnover, like high retention, low turnover.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: The um they just couldn't get out of a certain gear.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_01: They were stuck in that 85 percentile occupancy.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, okay.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: How do we, you know, how do we stop being a B student, start being an A student, uh-huh, and what that looked like.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: So it was more that that group, uh uh really not much leadership change.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: It was just more just kind of breaking that ceiling for all of them and saying, you you have better potential, you have more.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_01: Like let's not be right, let's not be okay with 85.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: Let's be like until we hit 100, we don't we haven't achieved our goals.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_03: Well, and that's a number goal, right?
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_03: And then my my thing when I teach seminars and things like that, um, or any educational piece, I'm always telling people what seniors want most.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_03: And I've studied this for, you know, 16 years now.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_03: People want independence, they want choice, they want um dignity and respect and empowerment.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_03: So those four things are super important to all seniors.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_03: And when you get your staff all working and delivering on all those points, because a lot of people think if I move into a senior living, I'm gonna lose my independence.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_03: Are they gonna tell me what to do?
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_03: Am I gonna get to come and go as I please?
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_03: Can I keep my car?
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_03: There that's question is all the time.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, why are you asking?
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_03: Of course you can keep your car.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_03: There's a lot, yeah.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_01: There's a concern of loss.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: There's the dignity piece.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: They're worried about like, am I still gonna feel that I have my independence?
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I have a I have dignity every day.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_01: There's uh and yes, it it is an obstacle that we is one of our biggest challenges when people come in and are concerned and um getting the staff to to learn that.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: And the uh there was a different piece when we came to Thunderbird.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: Thunderbird was uh owned and operated by various entities over the past 30 plus years.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_01: And in that time frame, it had really had some struggles and it was deferred maintenance and all the other things.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: Lots of things, lots of things.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: So that one had a much larger lift to it and change.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: And the the one of the biggest reasons I had I took the opportunity to to move over was one, there was a lot of colleagues of mine from the previous company that were now with Stellar Senior Living.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_01: Stellar's fairly younger in the industry.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: They're only since 2012.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: But the owner, the CEO, the chairman, the founder, he was part of uh five star.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: He was one of the founders and CFO for there.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: He's a very nice man.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_01: His son is again, they have a big heart.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's a it's it's a family, they care.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and that was what, and we just I honestly went to Thunderbird because I met, I snuck in, I looked around.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_01: It was depressing.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: You yes, it was rough.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, it's like night and day, really, Michael.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, from from when you took over and I started to see it right away, and then I and then slowly and surely, but like the last year going back there just has been amazing.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: It was I was uh fortunate with that.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: I I I had it was a I remember it, it was a January, it was a weekend, it was rainy, it was gross.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I snuck around in a sweatshirt and pair of jeans, and this lady was smoking outside underneath of an umbrella, and her name was Lorraine.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_01: She's no longer with us, but she was very kind and she looked at me and said, You don't look like you're from like your work here, I'm gonna know.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh-huh.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_01: She goes, You're with that new stellar company.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Maybe.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_01: And she said, Well, and I said, Well, can't I ask you some questions?
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like, sure, go ahead.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I asked her some like, how long you've been here and all the niceties, and then like, well, what are you liking about her?
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: She's like, I just, I really residents, we care about each other.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: We take care of each other.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: I said, That's wonderful.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: And she goes, Yeah, I just wish the people who ran it cared about us.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, wow.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my gosh.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: And she's and I, and it was like, there's physical stuff.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: You walk in, the lighting, and you know, cleaning things up and fixing things, and like there's tangible things you can do.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um and that tugged my heartstring a bit and said, Okay, well, they deserve as much as this is gonna be hard, and this is long as it's gonna be a lot of work and it's gonna be mentally, physically difficult, they deserve somebody to care about them.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_01: And that's where I'm really proud of Stellar because I when I joined the company and I didn't know much about them either.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_01: I was learning this, but they are they're built on instead of rules, it's values.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_01: So, like we're we run on our values.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: We don't run on like our rules.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's like we need to do this, we do that.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's not how we run.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's just like our values are deep rooted into giving residents purpose, giving them dignity, giving them um all the things they need to be successful this last chapter in our life.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_01: And and however we achieve that is what makes sense.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: And Thunderbird is yeah, uh, I'm proud of that community.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'm proud of working for this company.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's been um a journey.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm proud to take people there.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_03: I actually am.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_03: And when I hear Stellar is gonna take over a company, I'm uh or a community, I am just thrilled.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_03: We're and we're still growing.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: Arizona's now our largest uh out of all the different cities or states on the West Coast, we're the largest population for Stellar communities.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um we are still Thunderbird, is we are offering like again, we're in Glendale.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so we have a lot of the I mean, the resources that are there are undervalued as a simple termination terminology.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_01: It's just what we're offering and what we're making or and what we're doing, our market rates are, or in comparison, if you pick that building up and stick it over here in Scosto area, it would be much much more expensive.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_01: For the exact same price.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_01: We're we're very fortunate.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_01: We're very I mean, we have uh, like you mentioned, we're very large.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we're very spread out, we're across two blocks, but um you know, we reinvested and rebuilt that coi pond, and we have hundreds of coy fish out there.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_01: So the residents like go.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's like going to a park.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's like going to a park every day, and they they enjoy it out there.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, I'm just proud of everything we've been able to do.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_01: And the team that's there, the directors that are there, some of them have been there from the get-go, some of them have been there a long time, way before me.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, residents as well.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_01: And they had said that they're all very happy now and appreciative and thankful for Stellware.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_01: They were all hesitant at first class.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, sure.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_01: Everybody is.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_01: I need to see change.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_01: And then it all did.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: And then we're so we're we're very fortunate.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_01: And we're um safe full and assist living in memory care.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the independence fairly high occupant as well.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_01: So we're um, yeah, it's a it's a wonderful community.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um it has a vibrancy to it, like you said.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's very busy, it's always busy.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_01: You can't, yeah, uh, you you can't.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_03: I know I actually have gone in and I rarely see this, but they're all sitting around that one table in the lobby there, laughing and singing and you know, just happy to be there.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_03: And I I like movies.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_01: I have to, I'm not a big like I uh I don't dance and things like that, but I have to remind myself when I go down there during during social hour, I'm gonna get dragged out.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_01: And someone's gonna want to dance with me.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_01: So I have to like mentally prepare myself before.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, they wanted us to dance on the tour.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: They do.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: They're they're a function.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_03: They're very fun.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, so I'm I'm happy that you're very much a wonderful company.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_03: Well, Michael, thank you so much for joining me today.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_03: See how fast it went?
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_03: That went fast.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it did.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_03: It did.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_03: Well, thank you again.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_03: And this um is just a pleasure to interview you and talk to you about this.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_03: And I hope it's of value to everybody because I'm hoping to get the word out that independent living is an excellent way to end your or start your next chapter.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_01: Start your final chapter.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: So thank you for having me.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: You're welcome.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you so much for joining us today.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_03: I'm Alison, and you can go to my website and uh uh placeforseniors.org, and you can also sign up for my seminars there on the events page.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm having them twice a month.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_03: So, and then we'll be adding more and more.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you so much.