The Future Leaders Awards program is dropped at you in partnership with PointClickCare. This system is designed to acknowledge up-and-coming trade members who’re shaping the subsequent decade of behavioral well being, senior housing, expert nursing, dwelling well being, and hospice care. To see this 12 months’s Future Leaders, go to https://futureleaders.agingmedia.com/.
Shannon Novak, Senior Managing Director of Advertising at Arrow Senior Residing, has been named a 2024 Future Chief by Senior Housing Information.
To turn into a Future Chief, a person is nominated by their friends. The candidate have to be a high-performing worker who’s 40-years-old or youthful, a passionate employee who is aware of put imaginative and prescient into motion, and an advocate for seniors, and the dedicated professionals who guarantee their well-being.
Novak caught up with Senior Housing Information to speak about her bittersweet entry into senior dwelling, the evolution of know-how and the way working within the trade has been a “wild” and generally “bumpy trip.”
What drew you to this trade?
I really feel just like the trade had its plan in place for me earlier than I even knew it existed. I visited the native nursing dwelling with my mother quite a bit as a child, and it hit each stereotype we combat immediately. The residents there have been lonely. The odor was … not nice. It left me feeling unhappy, even at 5 years outdated. Quick ahead to my first time visiting an Arrow neighborhood, and I actually cried. The neighborhood was so clear. The reminiscence care was so considerate. I knew I’d discovered the place I used to be presupposed to be.
What’s your greatest lesson discovered since beginning to work on this trade?
Your expectations of senior dwelling will not be actuality. Till I used to be in senior dwelling, I didn’t understand how a lot of what I assumed I knew was based mostly on stereotypes, and I’ve by no means had extra enjoyable being flawed. I be taught new issues and listen to new tales and meet new individuals every single day. Senior dwelling is a supply of pleasure. It’s a spot to thrive. And the residents dwelling in these communities are vibrant and completely energetic.
In the event you might change one factor with a watch towards the way forward for senior dwelling, what would it not be?
Senior dwelling is consistently evolving, and I like being on the trip. What I need to change isn’t concerning the trajectory of senior dwelling itself. If I might change one factor, it will be the notion of senior dwelling now and sooner or later. I need to see individuals embrace it, and I need to see it turn into extra accessible.
What do you foresee as being totally different concerning the senior dwelling trade waiting for 2025?
I see a stronger deal with connection as know-how helps to bridge the hole and automate the processes that pull workforce members away from direct care. Know-how is now not coming. It’s right here. And we are going to all be higher for embracing it early and as usually as attainable.
In a phrase, how would you describe the way forward for senior dwelling?
Revolutionary
What high quality should all Future Leaders possess?
Empathy. Nearly the rest might be taught, however you, at your core, must imagine in and care about individuals to be a profitable chief.
In the event you might give recommendation to your self trying again to your first day within the trade, what would it not be and why?
Brace your self. Once I began in senior dwelling six years in the past, I couldn’t have even begun to guess the place I used to be headed or what I’d encounter. It’s been bumpy. It’s been wild. And each second has been price it.
