December 6, 2023
A real connection between leaders in post-acute and long-term care (PALTC) is not unlike a marriage or any other significant relationship. It requires mutual trust and respect, open communication, work, commitment, and more than a little laughter. Cindy Woodward, NHA, and Jamy VonBerg, RN, from Statesman Health and Rehabilitation in Levittown, PA, know this from experience. They will be sharing their insights, tips, and best practices during the More of a Good Thing roundtable discussion, Partnership in Leadership: An Administrator and DON Share Their Success Stories and Lessons Learned, this Thursday, December 14, 4:00-4:45 PM ET. Joanne Reifsnyder, PhD, MSN, MBA, FAAN, will moderate the discussion.
“It’s all about open communication, being comfortable saying things to each other, sharing ideas—no matter how crazy, and making sure we take ideas to our building and effect change working with the team,” said Ms. VonBerg. Ms. Woodward explained, “I can text Jamy at 6:00 AM with a thought, then we’ll talk about it later. We’ll spend time on it and hash through it. We unconditionally accept each other’s emotions throughout the process. We don’t take things personally, and we know that we are here to win the game.”
Inventive solutions, new ideas, and cutting-edge innovations call for creative thinking and often start with “crazy” ideas. However, Ms. Woodward stressed, “We can get ‘very dreamy’ thinking out of the box, but we stick with facts and techniques that will work within these walls. That takes strength and discipline. We can’t make assumptions. We keep asking each other questions about the goals and processes of any idea.”
As you’re working through ideas, solutions, and new programs or plans, it’s not uncommon to hit a wall or encounter barriers. “When this happens, we step back and we pick each other up with little things like the music we love, a favorite snack or lunch, or something that gets us moving and keeps us from getting discouraged,” Ms. Woodward said.
When a plan is fully formed, before everything gets written in stone, they reach out to their entire team and ask what they would do to tweak it. “We ask how it will affect them and what they would add or change,” Ms. VonBerg noted. Then they take the staff’s input and implement at least some of it in the final plan. “After the plan rolls out, everyone buys into it because they were involved. Then we have a party and thank people 50 to 70 times a day when we see them implementing the plan. Then 2-3 months later, we look at the results and celebrate again,” Ms. Woodward said.
The administrator-DON partnership, when successful, can have a powerful impact on all staff. “We hear from everyone that this is the best building they’ve been in. We have passed the concepts of welcoming and acceptance to staff, and we treat them like family. In turn, they pass this on to the residents and treat them with respect, kindness, and caring,” explained Ms. VonBerg. “We have a lot of long-time staff, as well as people who leave and come back. People feel at home here. We have to work, but there is no reason we can’t have fun and enjoy positive relationships with each other.”
Ms. Woodward said, “We hope participants at this roundtable discussion go away with an understanding that while partnerships can be hard, they can be tremendously effective if you work things through and stick with them. I hope other teams will be able to do what we do.”
More of a Good Thing: A Framework to Grow and Strengthen the PALTC Careforce is sponsoring this program as part of a series of roundtable discussions designed to highlight and share effective strategies being used to improve staff retention and recruitment in PALTC settings. Each roundtable begins with a brief presentation about a project or strategy that is seeing success in growing the PALTC careforce; then, participants can ask questions and share their own successes and challenges.
Get more information and register for this free program.