Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / Serving the Aging Population: Uma Das Munshi on Building a Home Care Business | Nursing Home Series | Senior Care

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Serving the Aging Population: Uma Das Munshi on Building a Home Care Business | Nursing Home Series | Senior Care · The Inspired Stories Podcast

• 0:04
  Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast,
• 0:08
  where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from
• 0:11
  their successes and be inspired by how they've overcome
• 0:14
  adversity. My name is Anthony Kotaspodi and
• 0:17
  today's guest is Uma Das Munchi, owner and CEO of Synergy Home
• 0:22
  Care of Greater Boston. They are dedicated to providing
• 0:26
  personalized home care plans including non medical services
• 0:30
  like companionship, memory care and disability support.
• 0:34
  Their mission is to deliver the best possible care, enhancing
• 0:38
  People's Daily experiences and building strong connections
• 0:41
  through compassion. Under Uma's leadership, Synergy
• 0:45
  Home Care has maintained a reputation for high quality
• 0:48
  service and has been recognized by Home Care Pulse as a Best of
• 0:54
  Home Care endorsed National provider for several years.
• 0:58
  Uma brings more than 24 years of experience in post acute care
• 1:03
  and is specialized in stabilizing and improving
• 1:05
  operations across various healthcare facilities.
• 1:09
  She holds a Bachelors of Science and Physical therapy from
• 1:12
  Northeastern University, an MBA in healthcare administration
• 1:16
  from DeVry University, and an executive leadership
• 1:20
  certification from Cornell University.
• 1:22
  Her focus on strategic growth and operational efficiency has
• 1:26
  led to significant achievements within her organization and
• 1:30
  beyond. Now before we get into all that
• 1:32
  good stuff, today's episode is brought to you by my company,
• 1:35
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• 1:39
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• 1:42
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• 1:49
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• 1:54
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• 1:57
  To find out if your company qualifies, contact us today at
• 1:59
  AD Back benefitsagency.com. All right, now back to our guest
• 2:03
  today, the owner and CEO of Synergy Home Care Services of
• 2:07
  Greater Boston. Oma.
• 2:09
  I appreciate you making the time to Share your story today.
• 2:12
  Thank you for inviting me, this is going to be fun.
• 2:16
  OK. So Uma, let's go back a little
• 2:18
  bit before Synergy because you've got quite a bit of
• 2:21
  education, several degrees and you have leadership experience
• 2:26
  at different healthcare companies along the way.
• 2:28
  Tell us a little bit about that path before we get into synergy.
• 2:33
  Well, it's a story of me coming from India to study here at
• 2:38
  Northeastern University to get my physical therapy license.
• 2:43
  And, you know, little did I know when I was graduating with my
• 2:46
  physical therapy license that within the first two years of me
• 2:50
  joining as a travelling physical therapist, I would land in the
• 2:55
  geriatric industry and fall in love with the geriatric
• 2:57
  industry. You know, I had the honour to
• 3:01
  work with some very known companies at that time and just
• 3:05
  working with geriatric population, I learnt one thing.
• 3:09
  Through their eyes, I get to see the history of where we were,
• 3:13
  and through their eyes I get an honest opinion of where we
• 3:16
  should go because at their point in life, they are not trying to
• 3:19
  be diplomatic. They're honest.
• 3:22
  And you have to be really creative to work with them
• 3:26
  because no person who's 92 years old or 86 years old is just a
• 3:31
  knee or just a hip. So you're working with a whole
• 3:33
  person. It's a very holistic approach.
• 3:36
  I love that you have to be at your creative best to work with
• 3:40
  geriatric people, and it's very fulfilling.
• 3:43
  So I went into that and that just grew into me stepping into
• 3:49
  different leadership roles and soon I was running a rehab
• 3:53
  company. And then from there I started a
• 3:56
  home care company because I'm always a little restless.
• 4:00
  I'm one of those kids who in schools did not study all the
• 4:03
  chapters that were coming in exam wanted to read the next
• 4:06
  chapter. So I think I was doing geriatric
• 4:10
  rehab and then I was like, wait a second, home care is the next
• 4:13
  best thing to do. So I created the skilled home
• 4:16
  care company, Medicare certified for that particular rehab
• 4:19
  company. From there, them getting
• 4:22
  acquired led me into the nursing home industry on the other side,
• 4:25
  not the rehab side, the actual operational side.
• 4:28
  And then I just kept going to different companies and I
• 4:32
  realized everybody, I guess, has a superpower.
• 4:35
  My superpower is only one small thing.
• 4:38
  I'm a catalyst. I like to see when I go in what
• 4:41
  the issues are, where we can do better and bring those resources
• 4:44
  together. So I think I've been very, very
• 4:49
  blessed in getting really good team members by recognizing who
• 4:52
  does the best and what talent, pulling them together and
• 4:56
  turning a company around or getting to a point where they
• 4:59
  can actually spin it off to sell.
• 5:03
  And from there, here I'm at Synergy because at some point
• 5:07
  you decide that now I want to do this for myself where I can make
• 5:11
  all the executive decisions. So here I'm at Synergy.
• 5:15
  So let's go back a little bit because I want to hear more
• 5:17
  about the journey that brought you from India to the States.
• 5:21
  Did you already have family or friends here?
• 5:24
  Were you coming on your own kind of blind without support?
• 5:28
  Like that's a big move to make. What was?
• 5:30
  It is. It is a big move.
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  And now that I'm a mother myself, I don't know how my mom
• 5:34
  let me go. But you know, my sister was here
• 5:38
  studying at Northeastern University.
• 5:39
  She's a big scientist in the research wall of muscular
• 5:42
  dystrophy now. So she was the reason that I was
• 5:46
  even allowed to come here because from India at that time,
• 5:50
  sending a girl who's not married off to the world of America is a
• 5:54
  scary, daunting task for any parent.
• 5:57
  So I came here, I lived with her.
• 5:59
  I studied at Northeastern with a good heart to go back.
• 6:03
  But again, just exactly what happens in colleges, you meet
• 6:07
  your significant other and then you get married in one year
• 6:10
  turns into three and now you have a child and you are here.
• 6:13
  So this, that's how I got here because my sister was here.
• 6:16
  So I owe a lot to her. OK.
• 6:19
  And then you found yourself in the the senior care industry and
• 6:24
  one of the companies that you were at, you helped take them to
• 6:28
  a point where they got acquired I.
• 6:30
  Understand that, yes, actually therapy resources management, we
• 6:34
  started the home care division and the home care division got
• 6:37
  acquired by Athena. And from Athena I moved on to
• 6:40
  another company that hired me just to turned their company
• 6:43
  around, Vero Healthcare, and they got spun off and sold.
• 6:47
  That's what he needed me to do. That's what I did.
• 6:50
  Gotcha. So those jobs that you're
• 6:53
  taking, you developed a bit of a track record, probably came
• 6:58
  with, you know, a relatively decent paycheck.
• 7:01
  And it's consistent and it's safe.
• 7:03
  Unlike being a business owner, going out and starting your own
• 7:07
  business takes capital. There's risk.
• 7:09
  You're responsible for, you know, a lot of folks and their
• 7:12
  paychecks. Were you at all nervous about
• 7:15
  making that jump from sort of job security to, you know, the
• 7:19
  great unknown? Oh, absolutely, absolutely.
• 7:22
  I was very nervous and to be very honest, like a lot of
• 7:27
  people who get into their first business, I think I had more
• 7:30
  rainbows and dreams then I had the reality check because when
• 7:34
  you are running a company as ACEO, you have a whole financial
• 7:37
  team supporting you and you've got it all figured out.
• 7:40
  You don't have to worry about every single dime, right, and
• 7:44
  every single department and then you get a small entity.
• 7:47
  So coming into Synergy, I think I was mentally prepared for a
• 7:51
  little bit of a challenge because now I don't have a
• 7:53
  paycheck. But I didn't realize the realm
• 7:56
  and the depth of the challenges till I started it.
• 8:00
  And you know what? Honestly, I'm so grateful
• 8:02
  because it brought me back to ground level base humility and
• 8:08
  the desire to learn again. So I think it went from me
• 8:12
  overseeing a team of sales and a team of finance and a team of
• 8:16
  OPS and giving, you know, orders basically, hey, let's figure it
• 8:20
  out. Let's do a strategic plan.
• 8:22
  I'll be your facilitator. You guys decide the plan.
• 8:25
  Let's put it into action from all of that.
• 8:28
  I had to turn into what do I do next?
• 8:31
  Whose door do I knock? I hadn't knocked on anybody's
• 8:34
  door in years. So it gives you a humility
• 8:37
  check. So you're right.
• 8:38
  But I I knew there was going to be a risk, but I was thinking of
• 8:42
  not having a paycheck. I think the risks were a lot
• 8:45
  more. But also the learning curve
• 8:48
  started all over again. And I think, like I told you in
• 8:50
  the past, I love new things. Well, Uma here was a new thing.
• 8:56
  Back to square A, So yeah. I've heard the similar story
• 9:01
  from lots of business owners and I've been through this myself
• 9:04
  with different start-ups where, you know, I get X number of
• 9:08
  months or years into it. And maybe now it's finally
• 9:11
  starting to click. But I look back at what I went
• 9:14
  through and I'm like, if I had known how hard it was going to
• 9:16
  be, I might not have, you know, rolled up my sleeves and jumped
• 9:19
  into that because it, it was, it was a bit overwhelming.
• 9:23
  And I think sometimes that naivete is actually helpful for.
• 9:27
  Folks, right? Because yeah.
• 9:29
  Otherwise, I would not step into the ocean of new business, you
• 9:32
  know what I mean? I would just be comfortable.
• 9:34
  But they always say comfort zone cannot be fun.
• 9:37
  So I think you and me are both people who've learned, and
• 9:42
  you're still here. We're still kicking, so you
• 9:47
  decide that you want to go off and you want to start your own
• 9:49
  business because you're the girl who likes to read the next
• 9:52
  chapter. You want a new challenge, And
• 9:55
  how was it that you actually landed on the decision to buy a
• 10:00
  franchise from Synergy Home Care?
• 10:03
  You know, sure there were other. Options.
• 10:05
  Well, you're right. I was thinking of my own
• 10:07
  business for a while, and then my mom had cancer.
• 10:11
  By God's grace, she's good. Now she's in remission.
• 10:14
  But when she had cancer, me as a working daughter and my sister
• 10:18
  to provide care for her, we were looking for caregivers to be at
• 10:22
  home, to keep her at home, keep her safe.
• 10:24
  I did not want her in a nursing home just because I you know,
• 10:27
  the way our Indian upbringing is.
• 10:30
  I want her at home with us, but finding the consistency of
• 10:34
  caregivers and having a schedule that works for my mum, not for
• 10:38
  the caregivers so much was just so difficult that I was always
• 10:42
  saying to my mum, I wish I owned the company.
• 10:45
  Well guess what? I get a call from a franchise
• 10:48
  owner who wants to sell the franchise and he said, are you
• 10:53
  interested? I've seen your name and talked
• 10:56
  to some people who said you're in the market for a new
• 10:58
  business. I was like, this has got to be
• 11:00
  universe saying something to me. And so the journey began.
• 11:04
  So. How did this person get your
• 11:06
  name? You know, it's from the
• 11:08
  community. I think what ends up happening
• 11:11
  is brokers hear about people looking to buy businesses or
• 11:15
  doing something in the healthcare industry.
• 11:18
  And I think that's how he got my name and he perchance just
• 11:21
  reached out. And it just happened to be the
• 11:23
  right day for me because I wasn't thinking, I was thinking
• 11:27
  more emotionally. So I'm like, here I am.
• 11:29
  And honestly, as I was going through the process, I started
• 11:34
  noticing other home care companies and I started talking
• 11:37
  to people and Synergy kind of stuck with me.
• 11:40
  And I took the franchise because Synergy came out as a company
• 11:45
  that really supported their franchisees.
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  And I think I was looking for somebody who would support me.
• 11:52
  So I think that worked out really well.
• 11:54
  Say more about the support that Synergy provides you, because I
• 11:57
  think that's really important. There's a lot of franchise
• 11:59
  opportunities out there, and maybe you're not always getting
• 12:03
  what it is that you need to be successful.
• 12:06
  So what? What is it that they do for you?
• 12:09
  A few things. The screening process is very
• 12:12
  tough. You have to actually go through
• 12:14
  all their senior management teams and make sure they
• 12:17
  understand you and you understand them because they're
• 12:20
  not just going to give a franchise to anybody.
• 12:23
  The training process was very rigorous.
• 12:25
  I felt like I was back in school, which is great.
• 12:28
  But more than anything else, their support is incredible
• 12:32
  because I don't have to be creative in marketing because
• 12:37
  you click home Care and synergy comes up faster than anybody
• 12:40
  else. They have a lot of national
• 12:41
  partnerships that they put me in touch with.
• 12:44
  They have an operational team that's right there next to you
• 12:48
  but not breathing down your neck.
• 12:51
  You know there's a difference. They are, they are right there,
• 12:53
  but not micromanaging. They want you to be successful.
• 12:56
  So they will put you on different webinars, different
• 13:00
  trainings. They have different partnerships
• 13:02
  that you can learn from, but they are not telling you how to
• 13:05
  run your business. They have very strong guidelines
• 13:08
  and training programs, but they will never tell you this is how
• 13:11
  you need to run your business. So that's what makes them, I
• 13:14
  think, incredible partners for franchising.
• 13:17
  So you said something a moment ago where you had to start
• 13:20
  knocking on doors again for the first time in years.
• 13:23
  In my mind, I took that to mean like marketing sales, like going
• 13:27
  out, like looking for referral partners kind of a thing.
• 13:31
  Am I correct in that? Because it also sounds like
• 13:33
  maybe Synergy is directing a lot of business to you already.
• 13:37
  No. So the way if you think about it
• 13:40
  is they have marketing done right.
• 13:42
  They have taken care of all the brochures and creating that
• 13:45
  website and all of that. I don't have to create that
• 13:48
  because when you start a new business, that's your
• 13:49
  recognition in today's social media, right?
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  So they have that covered. The sales that I have to do is
• 13:56
  knocking on the doors of my local partners.
• 14:00
  The national partners can only give you about a 3% of the
• 14:03
  referrals that can or cannot convert because there's those
• 14:06
  national partners have partnerships with some other
• 14:08
  people too. My local partners is where I
• 14:11
  need to knock doors on because they need to know UMA running
• 14:15
  synergy, giving local care. And as you know, Massachusetts
• 14:19
  is a very close knit community. If you're from Mass, you will
• 14:22
  succeed. If you're if you know people in
• 14:24
  Mass, you'll succeed. And national cannot help that.
• 14:27
  So that's what I mean. They're two different levels.
• 14:30
  Gotcha. So who is it that you forged
• 14:33
  relationships with there locally that was able to help direct the
• 14:37
  right kinds of clients to you? There's a few, there's doctors,
• 14:41
  obviously doctors in the community because when they have
• 14:44
  elderly patients who need a little extra care, that's who
• 14:47
  they call is me because they want trusted partners.
• 14:50
  They don't want their case managers to call 15 people.
• 14:52
  They want somebody they can call and they know is going to take
• 14:55
  care of their patients. Then we have the assisted living
• 14:58
  facilities, which have a huge need nowadays because they have
• 15:02
  their staffing pattern. But if a patient does not want
• 15:05
  to leave the assisted living and going to a skilled nursing
• 15:09
  facility, they need to be a little bit more independent.
• 15:12
  And for that, the families need extra care for this person.
• 15:15
  That's where I come in. So there's assisted living,
• 15:18
  there's doctors and then there's senior centres.
• 15:21
  Those are three of my biggest referral places.
• 15:26
  So aside from setting up those relationships with the the
• 15:29
  referral partners, you purchased this business a little over two
• 15:32
  years ago, what are some of the other big changes that you've
• 15:35
  implemented since coming in there?
• 15:37
  You know, one of the biggest change I think I've implemented
• 15:40
  is being the face of the company.
• 15:44
  I am making sure that I am personally going in and
• 15:49
  assessing every new client that comes in that's with the door.
• 15:52
  They're not just a phone call. I'm not sending off my director
• 15:55
  of community relations to meet them.
• 15:57
  I want to go and assess them. I'm a physical therapist, so it
• 16:00
  makes it easier for me to assess their mobility so that I can
• 16:04
  make sure the caregivers have matched appropriately.
• 16:07
  That's one of the things that people didn't know that the
• 16:10
  owner of Synergy would do, that they were to me.
• 16:13
  As well. Yeah, and it's it's nice also
• 16:16
  because as you can understand, sometimes private care, private
• 16:19
  duty is expensive. So sometimes a family cannot
• 16:22
  afford all the care. But me being the owner, I can
• 16:25
  actually sit down with them and say, OK, what is it that you
• 16:27
  need? What can you afford?
• 16:29
  And let's figure it out. I don't need to go through
• 16:31
  hierarchy to get you different rates.
• 16:34
  Let's figure out what can I do for you?
• 16:36
  Because at the end of the day, my job is, is actually my
• 16:40
  commitment to my mom when I started it is I'm going to try
• 16:43
  my level best to try and provide the care without stressing out
• 16:49
  the family. And that's a fine balance for me
• 16:51
  because I'm also running a business.
• 16:53
  So I like being able to be the face of synergy.
• 16:56
  And I think that's one of the biggest changes that we've made
• 16:59
  in synergy here. So you talk about being the, the
• 17:02
  face of the company. So that involves, you know,
• 17:05
  being the one to meet with the the patients 1st and assessing
• 17:09
  what their needs are and putting a plan in place.
• 17:11
  It also involves doing things like this, like our interview
• 17:14
  today. Does the, does your blog kind of
• 17:19
  play into all of this as well? And can you tell us a little bit
• 17:22
  more about that? Actually, no.
• 17:25
  My blog is more of my passion, leadership, and that's separate.
• 17:30
  OK, Yeah, it's separate and leadership people go, you know,
• 17:34
  you're talking about corporate leadership and I'm not.
• 17:36
  I'm talking about a mom being the CEO of the family and how
• 17:39
  that skill set gets transferred to their kids.
• 17:42
  And when they are coming out of high school and college, they
• 17:45
  know what leadership skills are. So I talk about leaderships in
• 17:50
  different arena because I love leadership, you know, whether it
• 17:54
  be taking a new team of managers and training them to deal with
• 17:59
  their departments or working in a meeting and presenting to
• 18:02
  somebody because speaking in public is a scary thing for a
• 18:05
  lot of people. I talk about that.
• 18:08
  I'm not perfect at it, but I learn from other people and I
• 18:11
  pass on those. I interview people sometimes and
• 18:13
  I take their quotes. I talk about how important it is
• 18:17
  when young people are choosing a company to look at the culture
• 18:21
  versus just the salary. Because the culture of a company
• 18:24
  is going to eat your operations for breakfast every day, you
• 18:27
  know? So there's different things that
• 18:28
  happens in our leadership realm, and that's what I try to get
• 18:32
  across to people. So the blog is Leadership
• 18:36
  evolves dot blog. Yes, it is.
• 18:40
  And you're regularly updating the content here, I mean, I
• 18:43
  think. You know, I need to be better,
• 18:45
  Anthony. I need to be more like you, more
• 18:48
  diligent. I'm going to start doing it
• 18:49
  better. But there is a lot on that and
• 18:52
  I've had a lot of good feedback from it too.
• 18:56
  I mean, there's almost enough here to write a book.
• 18:59
  I told you that's my next goal, to write a book.
• 19:02
  And you know what it is, Anthony, I think.
• 19:04
  I think what I enjoy writing is not about a lot of
• 19:09
  technicalities. It's more about day-to-day
• 19:12
  situations, right? I mean, if you think about it,
• 19:16
  when you were going to do a podcast with me, my nervousness
• 19:20
  obviously is there. I'm going to be on camera.
• 19:23
  I'm going to be talking. Do I say the right thing or the
• 19:25
  wrong? You put me at ease.
• 19:27
  Now, the skill sets I saw from you is what I'm going to write
• 19:30
  about in my next blog, because when somebody goes to meet
• 19:34
  somebody new, those skill sets of putting somebody at ease,
• 19:38
  it's huge, right? Because if you were nervous,
• 19:42
  then I would be nervous. If you were uptight, then I
• 19:44
  would be like, Oh my God, this is a school performance.
• 19:46
  So those things, your smile, how you came across, I was having
• 19:50
  technical difficulties right up front.
• 19:52
  You didn't let that bother me. It's just how even keel you
• 19:55
  were. And I think that is huge.
• 19:59
  Now that's something I'm going to write about because a lot of
• 20:01
  people don't realize how they can put the other person at ease
• 20:05
  in a meeting. Well, I appreciate you saying
• 20:08
  all those kind things and I look forward to reading that blog
• 20:10
  post. When do you think we might see a
• 20:13
  book from you then, Uma? I'm hoping before the end of the
• 20:16
  year. OK, great.
• 20:18
  And keep us. Posted That's my dream, that's
• 20:20
  my passion, that's my dream, and I'm going to bring it to
• 20:22
  fruition. All right, So Uma, a lot of our
• 20:25
  listeners are looking to make their mark.
• 20:28
  I'm kind of curious to hear what advice you might have for
• 20:31
  someone else that's looking to advance their career in this
• 20:34
  same field. You know what, one of the things
• 20:38
  that's really helped me, Anthony, and I think a lot of
• 20:41
  people forget that is as you go through the journey of your
• 20:44
  career and life, you meet a lot of people and we see each person
• 20:49
  as what can they give me today. And I think building that
• 20:53
  network of relationships, learning from them on an ongoing
• 20:57
  basis, being vulnerable to ask the questions and learning from
• 21:02
  somebody who's been more successful than you and somebody
• 21:05
  who's not been as successful because then you know what?
• 21:08
  Not to fail in that humility, that vulnerability and that
• 21:13
  ability to constantly forge relationships is what's going to
• 21:17
  build a path for you. Because a lot of people
• 21:20
  sometimes think that career path is all about money and growing
• 21:24
  to the next ladder and the next ladder.
• 21:26
  We both know it's not. Sometimes it's that sling back
• 21:28
  effect, right? You get pulled back and because
• 21:32
  you need a paycheck and food on the table, you do take that.
• 21:35
  But if you take it with good grace, you end up learning a
• 21:38
  skill set you did not have, and the next jump you're going to
• 21:42
  make is going to be way better and way steadier than it would
• 21:46
  have been if you just took a paycheck increase.
• 21:50
  Interesting. So say more about the slingshot,
• 21:52
  this idea of sometimes you've got to take a step for a step
• 21:55
  backwards in order to be launched even faster and further
• 21:58
  forward. Is that kind of the idea?
• 22:00
  Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I was, I'm a physical
• 22:03
  therapist. I went and started doing
• 22:06
  different management roles in a therapy company.
• 22:08
  That's all I knew, right? Therapy was my picked to do.
• 22:12
  Then I created a home care company.
• 22:13
  I learned that. But then I got this opportunity
• 22:16
  to go into a nursing home and assisted living and oversee
• 22:20
  them. And you know what, in all
• 22:22
  honesty, I loved it. I joined it with the fear of not
• 22:25
  knowing enough and I was honest with the owner.
• 22:27
  I do not know that industry teach me that's vulnerability
• 22:32
  because I would love for him to think I'm the best.
• 22:34
  Give me the highest paycheck. I did not want the highest
• 22:37
  paycheck. I wanted to learn.
• 22:38
  I learned. I told my regional managers who
• 22:41
  were technically reporting in to me is the only reason I was the
• 22:45
  CEO is because I had a strength of pulling all resources
• 22:48
  together. But the knowledge base was with
• 22:51
  them and I'm going to learn from them.
• 22:53
  The next position that I took was actually a step back.
• 22:57
  I got a pay cut, went into the industry of actually financing,
• 23:04
  and I did that for personal reasons.
• 23:05
  My daughter was about to graduate high school.
• 23:08
  The one complaint she had was she never got to spend time with
• 23:10
  me while she was still here and she was going to go off to
• 23:12
  college. So I took a step back knowingly
• 23:15
  and I went back, was not thinking that it's going to help
• 23:18
  me in my career. But now that I look back, it did
• 23:23
  because I learnt a whole different industry.
• 23:25
  I learnt how the financing world works that makes the entire
• 23:29
  industries go around. And then from there, the next
• 23:32
  leap I made was way better than where I was going to be if I
• 23:36
  just stayed in that company, previous company, or just kept
• 23:39
  going in that line. Because now I was coming with
• 23:42
  the knowledge base of operations and the financing background and
• 23:47
  how do those mesh and what do I need to learn.
• 23:50
  So did I take a step back? Oh, absolutely.
• 23:53
  It was a pay cut. It was a title change.
• 23:57
  It was I wasn't the important shark anymore as one of the
• 24:01
  small fish. But you know what?
• 24:04
  I learned so much more. And that was the first time I
• 24:08
  realized, Oh my God, it's OK, because the next jump I made was
• 24:13
  way bigger than I would have ever made.
• 24:15
  And today's generation needs to learn that because I have my own
• 24:20
  kids, my son's 27, my daughter's 21, and I have this conversation
• 24:24
  with them all the time. Do not just look at the paycheck
• 24:27
  and the title. Look at where you can learn.
• 24:31
  This is your time to learn. If you can learn your skills
• 24:34
  from different places, moving forward is going to be easy.
• 24:38
  Piece of cake. But you've got to learn those
• 24:40
  skill sets. So you have to take a step back
• 24:42
  to move forward. I firstly believe when that
• 24:45
  opportunity comes and you have a gut feeling that says go for it,
• 24:49
  go for it. Yeah, it's interesting.
• 24:53
  It it's easy, you know, for once you get to that sort of spring
• 24:56
  forward part of the the the slingshot effect to be able to
• 25:00
  look back and say, oh, you know, that was really helpful.
• 25:02
  That helped to propel me. But when you're in the midst of
• 25:05
  that and you've taken that pay cut and that title demotion and
• 25:09
  you're not the big shark anymore, it could be pretty
• 25:13
  unsettling. You know, you, you, you feel
• 25:15
  like you've taken a, a step back in life.
• 25:17
  You're the trajectory, if you were to draw a graph was going
• 25:20
  up and to the right and then all the sudden you feel like you,
• 25:23
  you dropped off. Did you feel that way as you
• 25:27
  were kind of taking that, we'll call it a demotion, or did you
• 25:32
  already have clarity in what this was going to turn into?
• 25:36
  Oh, clarity never comes till after the fact, You and me both
• 25:39
  know that right? The rear view mirror is the best
• 25:41
  one. But I had fear because I was
• 25:45
  stuck between a commitment to my child, a paycheck that I needed
• 25:50
  for my child, and my resume, right?
• 25:53
  What was it going to look like? So I was very scared, very
• 25:57
  nervous. But that network, I talked about
• 26:00
  people you meet in your life who can teach you, who can be your
• 26:03
  mentors. I was very lucky.
• 26:05
  I had a friend who's a very big person in a different company,
• 26:09
  and he has always been a mentor to me.
• 26:13
  And I had a long chat with him and I was like, what am I doing?
• 26:16
  He's like, you're going to take a step back.
• 26:19
  Bless you, bless you, and you're going to know what to do next.
• 26:25
  You're going to be scared and it's OK to be scared.
• 26:28
  And you know, you're absolutely right though, Anthony, when the
• 26:31
  paycheck is not there and you need certain things to do.
• 26:34
  So I'm not telling people to just take a slingshot.
• 26:36
  I'm telling people from my experience, what I can share is
• 26:40
  prepare in your life when the tide is high and you're doing
• 26:42
  really well, but there's that feeling that there's another 10%
• 26:47
  you could do better, start saving, start planning and look
• 26:52
  for the opportunity that's going to give you that extra 10
• 26:54
  because that last 10% is about fulfilment and that'll come by
• 26:59
  learning more. Otherwise you're just doing the
• 27:02
  same thing. For me to go into a company
• 27:05
  that's like post acute and turn it around, no problems.
• 27:10
  But now that I have some other added value to me, it's just was
• 27:15
  so much more fulfilling. So I have learned the hard
• 27:19
  lessons. People are getting laid off all
• 27:21
  the time nowadays, right? And I always tell them layoff is
• 27:24
  hard and I get it. But take a moment, that's your
• 27:28
  moment to take a step back, think about it and say, what do
• 27:30
  I really want to do? Is this where I want to go back
• 27:33
  with my get my resume, get it on the door, or let me do something
• 27:36
  small on the side while I find what I really want to do?
• 27:41
  Sometimes it isn't. Scary but good.
• 27:43
  Those times in life where it feels like you've taken a step
• 27:46
  back or things have slowed down, they can be really hard because
• 27:50
  you've sort of been detached from what your identity was
• 27:52
  before. But you know, I think part of
• 27:54
  the lesson of what you're trying to share is if you can take
• 27:57
  those moments and do some reflection about what you want
• 28:00
  to do with yourself, where you want to go and, and use that
• 28:04
  time as an opportunity to improve, to shore up, to learn
• 28:08
  new skills. Even if you've, you know, had to
• 28:10
  take a step back career wise, Like what can you learn and how
• 28:14
  can you do the best at what it is that you're doing right here,
• 28:16
  right now? So that when in the future,
• 28:20
  when, not if a new door opens up, you've got a whole new set
• 28:24
  of skills that you can bring to the table.
• 28:26
  And a lot of times, that's where things really can blossom and
• 28:30
  bloom. Because your passion is there
• 28:32
  too. Yeah.
• 28:34
  So, Uma, I'm kind of curious to hear where do you see the future
• 28:39
  of the business? What are there growth plans?
• 28:42
  Are there new territories? Are there additional services
• 28:45
  that you can offer? Unfortunately, unfortunately,
• 28:50
  Synergy provides home care that's non medical, but it's
• 28:54
  only home health aides and caregivers.
• 28:56
  We we're not going to have a diversified line unless they
• 28:59
  create that right. But for me, there's definitely
• 29:03
  new territories that I'm already thinking about.
• 29:06
  And there is definitely a growth there because as you know, the
• 29:10
  baby boomers that are coming off age now that need care, they
• 29:15
  have decided how they want to grow old.
• 29:18
  They're no longer my grandmother who had no planning.
• 29:22
  The baby boomers have a plan. So a lot of them want to stay
• 29:25
  home or in an assisted living. So the business is growing and I
• 29:31
  have to make sure that my services are catered to it.
• 29:34
  I want to make sure that my caregivers are trained to do
• 29:37
  more than just go take care of a 95 year old person because I
• 29:40
  have a 75 year old person who actually likes to do some other
• 29:44
  stuff that just get their meal prepped and getting ready for
• 29:47
  the day. So the market is growing, the
• 29:51
  need is growing every day. I have to stay ahead of it by
• 29:54
  creating programs within our team that is more towards suited
• 29:59
  towards a little bit younger generation than the 95 year old
• 30:03
  grandmother that I still do take care of.
• 30:05
  So it's very different now and I think that's the exciting part.
• 30:09
  It's going to keep growing. There's more of the mental
• 30:12
  health issues, there's more of the dementia that's coming on
• 30:15
  early onsets. There is more education that the
• 30:18
  community needs. That's what I'm excited about
• 30:20
  too, is the sandwich community. You might be younger for that.
• 30:24
  I am there. I have my kids that I take care
• 30:27
  of and my parents, right? So I'm stuck in the middle.
• 30:30
  And I, being from a medical industry, have some knowledge
• 30:33
  base. I come across people who have no
• 30:36
  idea, no idea. Now my dad has a little early
• 30:39
  signs of dementia. What do I do?
• 30:42
  And I want to be that resource. So I think trying to be that
• 30:46
  resource in the community where people know I'll call Uma.
• 30:49
  I may not use her service, but she will connect me to the right
• 30:52
  people. Because being a clinician, I
• 30:55
  think that's very fulfilling for me sometimes.
• 30:57
  Just making sure people can age in place and be at their best
• 31:02
  and the family can not be so stressed all the time because,
• 31:05
  you know, kids have their life. They want to be taking care of
• 31:07
  their kids and their parents without the guilt.
• 31:11
  And there's a huge network in the geriatric industry that
• 31:14
  people are not even aware of. That's what I'm excited about.
• 31:18
  More colleagues in the industry, more people who can solve the
• 31:21
  solutions here. So it's it's going to be an
• 31:24
  interesting next five years I think at least to see the
• 31:28
  booming go up before it even steadies up.
• 31:32
  You know, you've sort of touched on this, the importance of
• 31:34
  mentors, peer groups, you know, having others that you can kind
• 31:38
  of go to for support. Aside from your mentors, are
• 31:43
  most of the folks that you kind of go to, are they within your
• 31:45
  own industry or do you have kind of a network of other business
• 31:49
  owners that you know that you can sort of, you know, get
• 31:52
  together and discuss more broad topics?
• 31:54
  Oh, absolutely. I actually have a lot.
• 31:57
  It's funny because you think you're only going to meet
• 32:00
  healthcare people, but then you end up going in the finance
• 32:03
  industry. Then you meet people who are in
• 32:04
  a finance industry in the IT world and you're talking to
• 32:07
  them. Different industry, similar
• 32:11
  issues, but different solutions. And I think that's what I have
• 32:15
  is a nice network of people of different age groups, different
• 32:18
  experience levels, some retired to that we can reach out to and
• 32:22
  talk about. But the whole thing is
• 32:26
  initiative. If you need the knowledge, you
• 32:30
  need the set network, reach out to people.
• 32:34
  Very, very rarely does somebody say I don't have time to help
• 32:37
  you. Very rarely.
• 32:40
  So I think that's another issue that people don't understand is
• 32:43
  reach out to somebody. The words they can say is no,
• 32:46
  but most people don't say no. Most people want to help.
• 32:51
  They do especially. If you because somebody helped
• 32:53
  them. Right.
• 32:54
  Exactly. None of us have gotten to where
• 32:56
  we are without some assistance along the way.
• 32:58
  A lot of a lot of folks are. I think it's just in general,
• 33:01
  it's human nature. We're kind of wired to want to
• 33:03
  give back. Now I know that you you don't
• 33:08
  consider yourself a very technical person, but I'd be
• 33:10
  curious to hear if there is a maybe a piece of software, a
• 33:14
  tool or a framework that's really contributed to your
• 33:18
  success. In the synergy business?
• 33:24
  That was my intent with the question, but maybe if there was
• 33:26
  something earlier on that's that helped you as well, I'd be happy
• 33:29
  to talk about that as well. Well, I'll be honest with you.
• 33:32
  In the healthcare industry, we have a lot of Emrs and a lot of
• 33:35
  reporting tools. And in the sniff industry, I
• 33:38
  think in skilled nursing facility, there was a tool that
• 33:42
  I used a lot. It was called Sniff Metrics.
• 33:44
  It was really good. Though I'm not technologically
• 33:46
  savvy, I like reports because I am, I think, old school in that
• 33:51
  I still need to see pretty pictures and numbers and graphs
• 33:55
  and that gives me an idea of strategic movements.
• 33:57
  Where do I go? What did I do right?
• 33:59
  What did I not? In Synergy, we have an excellent
• 34:03
  access care software that we are using all the time for
• 34:05
  scheduling and money management and financials.
• 34:09
  So there's multiple tools out there that have helped me all my
• 34:11
  life. I've just never been very good
• 34:15
  with the setting up of tools. I just need somebody to guide
• 34:18
  me. You know what the end outcome is
• 34:21
  that you want and then you can sort, you've got the big vision
• 34:24
  and you can kind of direct somebody to find the tool to
• 34:26
  kind of plug in and achieve those objectives for.
• 34:28
  You. You say so nicely, Anthony.
• 34:31
  Thank you, Uma. So you know in a business like
• 34:34
  yours, I imagine that sort of two primary challenges,
• 34:39
  certainly multiple smaller ones, but the big buckets would be OK,
• 34:42
  how do I find patients right? How do we find the the clients?
• 34:45
  And we talked a little about that you, you know, you find
• 34:48
  good referral partners in the community that are coming across
• 34:52
  the folks that need that care and you're developing a
• 34:54
  relationship and trust with them that you know, you're there to
• 34:57
  help those folks. And then on the other side, you
• 35:00
  know, once you have those patients, you also need the, the
• 35:03
  folks to service them, right? You need the team members behind
• 35:07
  you. And I'm curious to hear because
• 35:09
  it's, it's not, it's not an easy job.
• 35:11
  It's, you know, it takes quite a bit of effort, a very rewarding
• 35:14
  one for sure. But how do you go about finding
• 35:18
  those folks? And once you've found them, what
• 35:21
  what do you do to hold on to them?
• 35:23
  Very good question, Anthony, because you're right, getting
• 35:27
  clients is a definite challenge on a day-to-day basis, right?
• 35:31
  But recruiting is even more challenging because everybody is
• 35:36
  going to the same pool of caregivers, right?
• 35:38
  Everybody is approaching the same pool of caregivers.
• 35:42
  When I first started the company, it was me.
• 35:44
  I was a recruiter every evening. This is what I did.
• 35:47
  I was on Apploid, which is a recruiting tool right now and we
• 35:50
  are looking for something that's a little bit more diversified.
• 35:53
  But but Apploid works just well enough that I was calling
• 35:57
  recruiting. I would interview in the office,
• 36:00
  Orient them and then we would find the caregiver would work
• 36:03
  with us for a while and then suddenly they were gone.
• 36:06
  So we had to now figure out retention because it's so
• 36:09
  expensive to spend the time to recruit somebody, train them,
• 36:13
  Orient them. Now the client likes the
• 36:15
  caregiver and now they're gone. So now I have to find the
• 36:18
  retention tools. So that's when we started
• 36:20
  creating programs about rewarding people because I think
• 36:25
  we are very quick to reprimand staff.
• 36:28
  I think retention does not just come with that extra $1.00 all
• 36:31
  the time. Sometimes it comes just from
• 36:34
  essentially being appreciated. A caregiver needs to.
• 36:39
  Every caregiver wants to go and do a good job.
• 36:41
  They need to be guided as to what they expected to do so that
• 36:44
  there is no room for reprimanding.
• 36:47
  They need the support. If they cannot clock in, clock
• 36:50
  out or they had a problem with something that day or some the
• 36:54
  car broke down instead of us coming at them.
• 36:57
  Though we are desperate now to fill that slot, we still need to
• 37:00
  spend that time with them to make sure they understand we are
• 37:03
  right here for them. It could be just retaining them
• 37:07
  by making sure that the owner calls them once in a while just
• 37:11
  to say, hey, how are you doing? No, I don't need anything.
• 37:14
  I'm not here to reprimand you. I'm just reaching out to say,
• 37:16
  hey, how are you doing? Sending out little recognition
• 37:20
  appreciation cards. I'm a small company, so my gifts
• 37:23
  are smaller, but people like it. People like being told you're
• 37:28
  doing a great job, especially when they get a card at home,
• 37:30
  right, that says job well done. The family sees it, they feel
• 37:34
  proud. So it's a lot of retention tools
• 37:38
  we create. And the other tool we've
• 37:39
  created, actually Synergy has, is about Care Academy.
• 37:42
  It's like an online learning course, so our Cnas, our home
• 37:47
  health aides and Pcas can actually get online and get
• 37:51
  educated. Activities to do with people
• 37:54
  with early onset dementia, activities to do people with
• 37:57
  people when you take them out or some kind of different training
• 38:02
  body mechanics. So they like that part and we
• 38:05
  make sure that we help them through that.
• 38:08
  We do meetings once 1/4. We want to make sure that they
• 38:12
  see because home care is in the homes.
• 38:15
  They hardly get to see us. And it's so important to pull
• 38:18
  them back so that they know who they're working with.
• 38:21
  And I am very, very, very blessed.
• 38:24
  I have a very good team. My scheduler who is doing all
• 38:27
  the scheduling. People love her because she
• 38:30
  takes that time to build a relationship.
• 38:33
  When she knows somebody's child is going back to college, she'll
• 38:36
  come to me and say, hey, can we send them a small gift card for
• 38:39
  the kid? Absolutely.
• 38:40
  So things like that is retention, and it's so important
• 38:44
  to do retention in today's industry.
• 38:47
  Amen to that. Like you said, you know
• 38:50
  recruiting people, finding them in the first place can be
• 38:52
  expensive. You're running job ads, you're
• 38:54
  doing interviews. You know, only a certain
• 38:56
  percentage of those people are going to meet your requirements.
• 38:59
  And then once you've found that person, you don't want to have
• 39:02
  to repeat that process over and over and over again.
• 39:04
  So, yeah, if you can do just a little bit extra to show them
• 39:08
  how much you value them, how much you show them how much
• 39:10
  they're worth, you know, it, it goes a long ways to reducing
• 39:14
  that turnover. So I it's a smart approach.
• 39:18
  Yes. You know, Uma, one of the things
• 39:20
  that I've learned personally and certainly I've heard this from
• 39:23
  lots of guests, is that growth often times comes from our
• 39:27
  biggest challenges. I'd be curious to hear about a
• 39:30
  serious challenge that you've had to overcome, either in
• 39:34
  business or your personal life, and what you did to get through
• 39:39
  that and some things that you learned coming out the other
• 39:42
  side. A little bit about my personal
• 39:46
  life. I was going through a divorce
• 39:49
  and at the same time it was a year that all rehab companies
• 39:53
  were under the scrutiny by the government.
• 39:55
  So we had a lot of work to do with attorneys and things.
• 39:58
  And same time my kids, obviously one was getting into high school
• 40:05
  and the other was getting into their 7th grade.
• 40:08
  So there's just a lot going on in my children's side.
• 40:12
  The divorce was happening. I'm from an Indian family, so
• 40:15
  you can imagine the drama that was being caused with a divorce.
• 40:18
  So I had my mother to take care of.
• 40:20
  And then there was my job because I was the CEO, president
• 40:24
  of that company, and we had a lot of work to do with
• 40:26
  attorneys, just like every rehab company at that time.
• 40:30
  And what I learned was, again, I'm going to come back to take
• 40:35
  two things, taking a moment to really look into yourself and
• 40:40
  say, do I need to be worried? Am I on the right path?
• 40:43
  The situations that are happening are not right maybe,
• 40:47
  and they might be turbulent, but am I on the right path?
• 40:50
  If I'm on the right path, I got to keep moving.
• 40:53
  Because at that point you're also trying to move everybody
• 40:56
  with you, whether it be your employees who are nervous,
• 40:58
  whether it's your mum, whether it's your attorneys who's doing
• 41:01
  your divorce or your kids who are going through the mental
• 41:03
  stress of a divorce. All of that pulled together.
• 41:06
  You've got to hold yourself steady.
• 41:07
  You've got to take a moment and you've got to say, am I on the
• 41:10
  right path? And again, I would fall back on
• 41:13
  network of people, people who can, because you will have that
• 41:17
  moment in the middle of the night when you're like freaked
• 41:20
  out or you're going to cry and you pick up the phone and that
• 41:23
  person who picks up the phone and says, hey, what's up?
• 41:26
  That's all you need is hey, what's up?
• 41:28
  And they'll hear you, they'll listen to you, they'll guide
• 41:31
  you. But it's just so critical that
• 41:34
  network of people and taking a moment for yourself.
• 41:38
  And now that I look back, if I can come out of all of that and
• 41:41
  be where I am today and have two strong children who stand by me
• 41:46
  no matter what, my mom who still loves me, and a career path that
• 41:50
  is not blemished, I say we need to invest in that network of
• 41:55
  relationships and the time to take about yourself.
• 41:58
  So it's been a journey. It's definitely not been an easy
• 42:02
  one. So asking yourself that
• 42:05
  question, am I on the right path?
• 42:09
  How do you, how do you, how did you arrive at an answer on that
• 42:12
  one? How did you know that you were
• 42:14
  on the right path? The only thing that answer I got
• 42:19
  was do I have any regrets? The attorneys who were helping
• 42:24
  us with our company at that point, the one comment they all
• 42:27
  made to me was you seem confident.
• 42:30
  And my theory is if I can look into myself and I know I have no
• 42:33
  regrets because I haven't done anything wrong, that's what
• 42:37
  keeps me on the right path. Mistakes happen.
• 42:39
  Everybody makes mistakes. Companies make mistakes, I make
• 42:43
  mistakes bringing up my children.
• 42:44
  I don't have a Halo around my head.
• 42:46
  I'm sure I participated in the divorce just as much as my ex
• 42:49
  pals did, but we've made mistakes.
• 42:51
  The question is, am I on the right path?
• 42:54
  Because I have no regrets of every decision that I'making
• 42:57
  every single day. And it's one day at a time.
• 43:00
  You've got to deal with one day at a time.
• 43:02
  People try to think about five years later, where, where will
• 43:06
  you be? And my question is, 5 minutes
• 43:10
  later, where are you going to be?
• 43:12
  Are you going to be still doing what you're doing?
• 43:14
  I can you stay focused? So that was my question.
• 43:17
  Do I regret any of my decisions? Do I regret any of the things
• 43:20
  that I've done? And my answer was no.
• 43:23
  Yeah. You know, it's interesting
• 43:25
  because what you describe, like any one of these events is like
• 43:30
  an enormous life stressor. And you had multiple things
• 43:34
  going on at the. Same time at the same time.
• 43:36
  The divorce, you know, dealing with your kids who, who have to,
• 43:40
  you know, experience their own emotions through the divorce.
• 43:44
  Like you said, you know, your culture, the your Indian family
• 43:46
  background, you know, lots of drama there.
• 43:49
  You have to take care of your mother through this.
• 43:51
  One of the things that I've certainly noticed about myself,
• 43:53
  and I've heard this from lots of other folks going through really
• 43:56
  challenging times, is that, you know, when you're going through
• 43:59
  something really difficult and you feel like you're kind of
• 44:02
  spiraling down the drain, there's this natural human
• 44:05
  tendency to just sort of want to withdraw like into yourself at a
• 44:09
  moment when what you really need is that human support and human
• 44:13
  connection. It can be really hard to
• 44:17
  actually, you know, pick yourself up and do that and
• 44:20
  reach out for help. I'm curious to hear as you were
• 44:23
  going through all these difficulties that, you know, we
• 44:26
  had the the divorce that you were dealing with, that your
• 44:30
  kids are obviously have lots of emotions that they're dealing
• 44:33
  with. You're taking care of your
• 44:34
  mother. You have, you know, the scrutiny
• 44:37
  that was going on at work, you know, lots of things piling up.
• 44:41
  Did you have sort of this, this, this reaction of kind of wanting
• 44:45
  to withdraw into yourself? And if so, how did you
• 44:48
  breakthrough that and and force yourself to reach out and ask
• 44:51
  for help? That's true.
• 44:54
  The first thing that comes to you is I can deal with this
• 44:57
  alone because I'm independent. I can handle it.
• 45:00
  I don't need anybody. I don't want to talk to anybody,
• 45:03
  right? Because you're focused.
• 45:04
  You don't want to discuss your problems.
• 45:06
  You don't want to do anything. And you slowly start feeling the
• 45:08
  weight of it all. And you're right, you don't want
• 45:11
  to reach out to anybody. And then you realize for the
• 45:15
  sake of sanity and the first sake of survival, you need that
• 45:18
  one friendly voice from someone you trust just to say hello.
• 45:22
  You don't want to discuss your problems.
• 45:24
  You don't want advice, you don't want anything.
• 45:26
  What you need is that lifeline, a normalcy lifeline which you
• 45:30
  don't have around you at that point.
• 45:32
  And I think that's what I forced myself to break out and do it.
• 45:37
  It was hard. It was so hard to make that
• 45:39
  phone call because I didn't want those questions.
• 45:41
  I didn't want any issues or hey, I haven't heard from you in a
• 45:44
  long time. I didn't want any of that.
• 45:46
  So I had to, in my head, think about the one person I would
• 45:49
  make that one phone call if I got arrested.
• 45:52
  I knew who it was, the closest friend I have, and that's who I
• 45:55
  reached out to. And you know what?
• 45:58
  She knew better than to ask me what's going on.
• 46:01
  She kind of knew what's going on.
• 46:02
  So she was just, hey, how's life?
• 46:04
  What's going? You know, what's happening here,
• 46:06
  What's happening there? You want to go for a movie,
• 46:07
  something, let's go for a coffee.
• 46:09
  It just felt normal. And then that just gives you
• 46:13
  that strength for the next day and the next day and the next
• 46:16
  day. And I think this is so important
• 46:18
  for people listening who are going through something really
• 46:21
  tough right now. And you, you feel sort of stuck
• 46:23
  and you're in sort of The Cave of your own mind.
• 46:26
  I've seen this over and over again myself as well as friends,
• 46:30
  you know, a guest that I've gotten to know personally on
• 46:32
  this show. The the most therapeutic thing
• 46:36
  is safe human connection. And when you can reach out,
• 46:41
  because not everybody is going to know that you're going
• 46:43
  through something. If you can reach out to a
• 46:45
  friend, a trusted source that you can open up to that you can
• 46:48
  go out and go see a movie, go to dinner, do something normal,
• 46:51
  make you feel human. It's amazing what what medicine
• 46:54
  it is for the soul of the mind. So I appreciate you sharing your
• 46:58
  story there. You're so right though, the
• 47:00
  energy piece, it's like a new battery charge recharge happens
• 47:03
  and then you can fight again because it is a battle during
• 47:06
  that phase every single day. You don't know what's going to
• 47:08
  come your way. So definitely.
• 47:11
  Yeah. Uma, do you have any daily
• 47:14
  practices that are helpful for you and kind of maintaining your
• 47:18
  sanity and, you know, allowing you to kind of be the best
• 47:21
  performer that you can be? Absolutely, I've had this for a
• 47:25
  while now. My morning is mine.
• 47:28
  I have three dogs at home, so when I get up, my first thing to
• 47:33
  do is actually time for myself. Whether my husband's at home, I
• 47:37
  am remarried to a wonderful person, he goes to work or
• 47:41
  whether he's at home, he knows my morning ritual is my time.
• 47:45
  When the weather's nice, I'd like to sit outside.
• 47:47
  I have wind chimes that helps me.
• 47:49
  I meditate, I journal, and I have to have to constantly focus
• 47:57
  on today. Not tomorrow, just today.
• 48:01
  And I want to make it a good day so you can say, you know, I do a
• 48:04
  little bit of everything that you can read and listen about.
• 48:07
  It's about visualizing you're going to have a good day or just
• 48:12
  meditating to feel like a calmness around you and be away
• 48:16
  from the noise. I do worship, I'm a Hindu.
• 48:19
  I do worship at home before I leave.
• 48:21
  So I have the morning about an hour and a half.
• 48:23
  That's my time. And some days when I'm rushed, I
• 48:26
  don't have the hour and a half, but I need at least 20 minutes
• 48:29
  of that time because if I start my day, get up from bed and do
• 48:33
  just, you know, people have different ways of relaxing.
• 48:36
  Some people go out of workout, that's their time.
• 48:39
  Some people meditate, that's my time.
• 48:41
  Some people journal. Some people like to have their
• 48:44
  coffee and sit for the newspaper.
• 48:45
  That's their time. But that's important because
• 48:48
  that's their grounding time. That's their getting their
• 48:50
  energy back time and then going. So that's what I do.
• 48:53
  I journal, I meditate and I pray and hopefully I get to do all of
• 48:57
  it. But some days not all of it.
• 49:00
  I'd like to, if you don't mind, Uma, I'd like to hear a little
• 49:02
  bit more about how your faith plays a role in your mental
• 49:08
  health and your motivation and sort of your core, your center.
• 49:11
  I, I have a lot of guests on here that talk about their
• 49:15
  Christian faith and how that's important to them.
• 49:17
  This would offer a really interesting perspective if
• 49:20
  you're open to sharing. Absolutely.
• 49:23
  My name, Uma, it's the goddess of strength, goddess of power
• 49:27
  from India, and I guess my mom set my destiny right up front
• 49:32
  when she gave me that name. I've been in the strength field
• 49:36
  and funny enough, my sister's named up the goddess of literacy
• 49:39
  and learning, and she's a PhD doing research.
• 49:41
  So I don't know, I think she set it up for us, but I think the
• 49:45
  faith is I don't have to sit in front of my temple, but just the
• 49:50
  upbringing of knowing there is a power greater than me.
• 49:54
  Because when all else fails, you need we.
• 49:57
  I'm a human being. I'm not strong enough to think
• 50:00
  that's just it's me. I need that power that some
• 50:03
  people call it universe. I call it Lord Shiva because I
• 50:07
  believe Lord Shiva. But it's that strength, that
• 50:10
  power. Something that's beyond you,
• 50:12
  something that's bigger than you.
• 50:14
  Who is holding on to you so you can walk?
• 50:19
  You just have to have the faith. And I think that's really pulled
• 50:23
  me through my hardest times, Anthony.
• 50:24
  It's like if I didn't have that, I don't know what everybody
• 50:29
  calls it, but deep inside we are a reflection of that person.
• 50:33
  He created us or she created us, whoever we are.
• 50:37
  In Hinduism, there's multiple gods with different kind of, you
• 50:40
  know, there's goddess of power, goddess of destruction, goddess
• 50:42
  of creation. It doesn't matter.
• 50:44
  Whatever you believe in, that's what you need to hold on to.
• 50:49
  You have to believe that something is there.
• 50:53
  I for me it is the God has handed me a pen for me to write
• 50:58
  my life every day. I can choose to write it good.
• 51:01
  I can choose to write it bad. He's right there.
• 51:04
  I just need to trust it and write it with all my honesty.
• 51:07
  And you know what? That's taken me through so much.
• 51:13
  I like that. So the knowing that there is a
• 51:15
  higher power there and, and, and for you and a higher purpose
• 51:19
  and, and for you. There's a sense of you.
• 51:22
  You've been given a pen to write each day.
• 51:25
  You, you can write a bad story for that day, or you can write a
• 51:28
  good story. It's the powers within your own
• 51:30
  hands. And it's, it's the best way for
• 51:33
  me to keep my thoughts focused on the positive because why
• 51:36
  would I want to write a bad story for me, right?
• 51:39
  I mean, people talk about manifestation today, but if you
• 51:42
  look at Hinduism, which is one of the oldest religions, there's
• 51:46
  Bhagavad Gita that always says do your work, don't think about
• 51:51
  the result, just focus on your work, right?
• 51:54
  So I know what I want in life. That's my goal.
• 51:57
  But I need to write, take the pen and write my story each day
• 52:00
  going towards that goal. So I have to do it.
• 52:03
  I can create it and that's what keeps me sane.
• 52:06
  I've taught my kids that they actually do it the same way they
• 52:09
  try to do it, and I think it helps.
• 52:12
  It helps knowing that there is a bigger power than you.
• 52:16
  They have given you the power to decide your life.
• 52:19
  Try it I. Like that?
• 52:22
  Uma, I've just got one more question for you.
• 52:24
  But before I ask it, I want to do 2 things.
• 52:26
  First of all, everyone listening today, I know that you love
• 52:28
  today's content because Uma has been a fantastic guest.
• 52:32
  Please hit the like, share, follow, subscribe button on your
• 52:35
  favorite podcast app so you can continue to get great content
• 52:38
  like this. Uma, I'm also going to let
• 52:40
  people know the best way to get in touch with you.
• 52:44
  And there is the synergyhomecare.com website that
• 52:49
  has all the franchise information.
• 52:50
  You are specifically the Greater Boston area.
• 52:53
  There's also your blog that we mentioned before, Leadership
• 52:57
  evolves dot blog. Is there anything else that you
• 52:59
  want to let folks know? They can call our office at
• 53:03
  781-762-1119 and they can call my cell phone.
• 53:08
  I don't mind giving out my cell phone number because it's out
• 53:10
  there posted everywhere. It's 774836 5643.
• 53:17
  I don't call myself that often, but they can reach us in any way
• 53:21
  they can and sometimes just reach out if you want to know
• 53:24
  your career in healthcare itself because I would love to be able
• 53:27
  to do that, help you with that. Oh, what a generous offer.
• 53:30
  Yeah. So not just if you're looking to
• 53:32
  be a a patient, you're looking to you just somebody who's got a
• 53:35
  question about, you know, working in the field.
• 53:37
  You can reach out to Uma and you've got our office number and
• 53:40
  her, her, her direct cell phone number.
• 53:42
  We'll include those in the show notes.
• 53:44
  So last question for you, Uma. As you look ahead, what emerging
• 53:50
  trends are you most excited about in the home care space?
• 53:55
  Growth, growth and helping adults stay at home and age
• 54:01
  well. I think that's what I love.
• 54:04
  I think every patient has a place in an industry.
• 54:07
  There's some patients who need a lot of medical care.
• 54:09
  They have to go to a hospital and then to a skilled nursing
• 54:12
  facility. Some will stay in the assisted
• 54:14
  living and independent living. But wherever there is that, we
• 54:19
  are creating an industry with home care that we can help them
• 54:23
  age in place wherever they are and keep them at the most
• 54:27
  functional, independent level so that they don't have to depend
• 54:30
  on a ton of people and yet get the support and keep their
• 54:34
  dignity and age well wherever they are.
• 54:38
  So that's the trend I'm so excited about.
• 54:41
  Well, and with the boomers retiring, there is going to be a
• 54:44
  lot of growth in, in this area. So feel good that there are
• 54:48
  folks like you Uma that are there to help our our older
• 54:51
  loved ones, you know as they need it.
• 54:54
  Appreciate that. I want to be the first Uma to
• 54:59
  thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us
• 55:01
  today. I really appreciate it.
• 55:03
  No, thank you for your time too, I enjoyed this a lot.
• 55:07
  Folks, that's a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories
• 55:10
  podcast. Thanks for listening to us
• 55:12
  today.