How Do Geriatric Care Managers Give Quality of Life and Joy to LGBT Clients?

June 14, 2019

As June is LGTBQ Pride Month, let us celebrate it by being aware that Senior LGTBQ Elders are bullied, isolated, lonely just like LGTBQ younger people.

A recent report found that LGBT elders tend to have more medical problems, higher poverty levels social isolation than straight elders. Same-sex partners are not allowed many of the resources afforded to spouses and biological family members during the aging process. LGBT elders tend to lack support from many mainstream aging programs such as senior centers and places of worship or they are afraid of the stigma and discrimination that could result from joining those programs.

Mainstream retirement communities often deny LGBT elder couples the right to live in them. They often continue to live on their own, even if they need access to the services offered by those communities. These elders may fear discrimination and being ostracized by housing staff and often stay in the closet to obtain housing. Because large numbers of gay elders choose to live alone, they have fewer opportunities for social interaction than their heterosexual peers.

As a result, many LGBT elders live in the community and can really benefit from the quality of life activities that geriatric care managers can bring into the home through a personal assistance service and reminiscence therapy

One LGBT program in California created social connections by arranging dinner parties, shopping trips, and grocery shopping.

Finding activities that help elders grow and nurture their emotional, intellectual, physical, and/or spiritual quality of life can help to nurture an older person’s whole life and bring back joy.

Escorting LGTBQ Elders to movies about gay elders or renting them through Netflix and watching with them is a great activity. There are terrific, even academy award winning film like Beginners, you can watch together and talk about, as activities.

But what about the quality of life for LGBT aging clients. This recent article in the New York Times shows how one retirement community responding and found joy for LGBT clients, where many LGTB aging clients have to fight for acceptance.

If aging life or geriatric care manager want to find resources for LGBT aging clients or more about their issues, The Journal of Aging Life Care has an article with many resources to help you serve these vulnerable clients in finding Joy and acceptance.

The Journal Of Aging Life has a resources list for a research tool for aging LGBT clients edited by Jennifer Crittenden

The Handbook of Geriatric Care Management 4^th edition has a seminal chapter written by geriatric care manager Nina Herndon with a quality of life assessment to help you pinpoint the quality of life needs of all clients.

Nina also has developed the first activity kit for the quality of life, Joyful Moments .
Care Managers can use this activity kits to develop quality of life activities with their clients and home care and care managers that have home care can utilize the kit to teach their careproviders to create quality of life activities that give seniors they serve Joy in addition to care ‘

My GCM Operations Manual includes a product Concierge Companion that offers geriatric care managers a quality of life service that provides quality of life activivies to seniors through rereactional therapy aides who follow a GCM Care plan to indivualize quality of life activities for elders at any stage of their aging including dementia.

6 Emotional Quality of Life Activities to Sell Care Management to Assisted Living

June 3, 2019

What is emotional Quality of Life

What is emotional quality of Life? It is a connection with others. We all, including older people, crave human contact. The professional relationship a care manager has with an elder is emotionally caring, just like a concierge physician. It trumps personal chefs and shoppers because you assess their problems and actually have a deep relationship.

In a world where the family no longer lives next door and supports each other, geriatric care managers can give elders that human contact and support that is gone in most sandwich generation families.

Emotional connection to pets ¨

Emotional connection to grandchildren ¨

Peace with oneself

When older people move into Assisted Living they frequently do not feel that emotional connection. They may have to leave their pets behind, the family does not live nearby or is overwhelmed with work and younger family members. If the older person just moved to Assisted Living they often feel like they landed on Mars and are not sure how to make friends or socialize with the Martians. They are not at peace with themselves

How Do You Find It

This is where a geriatric care manager or ALCA member can come in. By working with the Assisted Living facility and the family, the care manager can bolster the sagging quality of life of an elder who is unhappy with Assisted Living. They can do an Assessment for Emotional Quality of Life and create emotional connections –

For someone who just moved in assisted living, plan a tea party or cocktail party and invite new neighbors
Assess what activities the new resident likes, escort them to the activity and ask the instructor to pair them with a buddy.
Enroll the resident in the local Osher program and let them pick out a group to join. Example lunch group, dinner group, play reading, Dickens, New Yorker, Arrange transportation if necessary
Enroll the client in a group at a local senior center that reflects what they like to do, like knitting, needlepoint, poetry, and memoir writing gentle yoga, if that is not offered at the facility. Arrange senior transportation
Enroll a homebound client in Senior Center Without Walls .
Arrange a visit by Pet Therapy Dog to visit the older person, who left a pet behind or arrange for the elder to visit the local SPCA with an escort and transportation where the escort can interact with the animal.

Find out how to market GCM /ALCA Services to Assisted Living

10 Steps to Success in Selling Care Management to Assisted Living

FREE WEBINAR- 10 Steps to Success in Selling Care Management to Assisted Living

THIS WEBINAR BEGINS: Monday, June 24, 2019, 2 PM PST Ends 3:15 PM PST

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DURING THIS FREE WEBINAR YOU WILL LEARN

How to Make a Winning First Impression at Assisted Living Sales Meeting- Preparing Presentation

What Referral Triggers to Use When Selling Geriatric Care Management to Assisted Living

What Feature to use When Selling Geriatric Care Management to Assisted Living

What Benefits to use When Selling Geriatric Care Management to Assisted Living

How to Close the Sale of Geriatric Care Management to Assisted Living

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What Kind of Care Staff Do You Need for an ALCA / GCM in Assisted Living Program?

May 30, 2019

What Type of Person To Recruit?

Are considering designing an ALCA or Geriatric Care Management program for Assisted Living? Here are some suggestions to consider when putting a job description for staff who will deliver the services.

Older generations, especially entitled clients, can be likely to be less trustful of an individual with numerous visible tattoos and a Mohawk. Most would rather have a clean-cut employee. This depends on the culture of your area of service. You want background checked employee with

Recreational Therapy background ideal preferred
College background or college student in, psychology, social sciences, pre-med, recreational therapy, Nursing, Social work, arts
A retiree with interest to be trained or some prior recreational background or aging background
Background in music, dance, recreational therapy, reminiscence and storytelling, rehab, sports, arts crafts gardening, board games, recreational activities, writing or ability to help senior use their former interests and their present level of functioning

What will Assisted Living Companion Do?

For COMPANION CARE hire

Plan and implement individualized activity sessions for a diverse range of clients, conducting sessions one-on-one with clients in their places of residence or in community
Accompany to events like theater, musical event, recital, baseball game or venue of clients choice
Follow care plan designed by GCM
Excellent communication and people skills
Ability to connect and engage with a wide range of individuals.
Understanding and compassion for the care needs of aging clients including those with cognitive impairment or mild
mental illness
Ability to work independently as well as under supervision.
drivers license with agency automobile insurance as required by the State
A car available for daily work and client transportation and automobile insurance as required by the State
Ability to learn and use designated software programs for the workflow process

Would you like to start a program like this and do not know how to market it to your local Assisted Living Facilities?
New Free Webinar To Market ALCA/GCM To Assisted Living

10 Steps to Success in Selling Care Management to Assisted Living

Find Out More

FREE WEBINAR- 10 Steps to Success in Selling Care Management to Assisted Living

THIS WEBINAR BEGINS: Monday, June 24, 2019, 2 PM PST Ends 3:15 PM PST

DURING THIS FREE WEBINAR YOU WILL LEARN
How to Make a Winning First Impression at Assisted Living Sales Meeting- Preparing Presentation
What Referral Triggers to Use When Selling Geriatric Care Management to Assisted Living
What Feature to use When Selling Geriatric Care Management to Assisted Living
What Benefits to use When Selling Geriatric Care Management to Assisted Living
How to Close the Sale of Geriatric Care Management to Assisted Living

3 Award Winning Ways to Get Your Care Management Contract Signed

May 8, 2019

If you are a geriatric care manager, do you want to get your client contract signed? Harry Beckwith, who wrote one of the 100 best business books, “Selling the Invisible, has some great ideas to get that signature.

Since ALCA members and geriatric care managers sell the invisible-

Listen up to Harry Beckwith

To make the sale on a care management service that folks cannot touch or see

Fix your service- Do it before you even think of making a sale. Make sure it is gold standard like the top 10% of adult children want for their parents. Fix it and fix it until it is “Flawless “Service – just the way the top 10% expect it to be -like that 5-star hotel they are accustomed to and will buy when you try to sell to them.
Let your clients’ set the standards. Your clients in the upper 10% want the best of the best. They want you to fix their mother’s care but equally fix their life as a caregiver. So, find out how you can help them as a caregiver in the inquiry call and explain how you will make their life better as a caregiver to make the sale.
Give the prospect one good reason to sign your contract. Tell them the first thing you will do to relieve the pain they feel in caregiving. Give them that one good reason to sign up with you by explaining how you will remove their pain in caring for their aging parent. t

Join Me in My New Free Webinar

Conquer Care Management Sales- 5 Steps Close the Sale

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Sales is a client ‘s journey from realizing the need for your product /service (care management) to making an actual purchase (closing the sale.) Closing the sale means the client signing your contract and giving you a deposit. Most care managers are untrained and terrified of this process. Learn the 5 steps to make and close a care management sale to get that contract signed, get a deposit, grow your business, bolster cash flow, make payroll and stop you from being one of the 50% of new US businesses that fail after five years.

You will Learn

How to get your contract signed by giving the client one good reason to sign it
How to make the sale in the inquiry call -with a complimentary consultation
How to ” Identify needs using client” challenge questions” to find the problem you need to solve to make the sale
How to present your offer by selling solutions to the problem with a mini care plan
How to manage objections if the caller has concerns about price or product
How to close the sale with non-aggressive closing questions to have your contract signed, get a deposit, and grow your business with a new client
7 more days left to
Keyboards with key for closing sale
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How to Sell Care Management Services to 3rd Parties Through a Relationship

April 7, 2019

Why Refer to You?

Consider sales a relationship. Why would third parties like trust officers, elder law attorneys, conservators or guardians refer a care manager to their aging client and family? If you have an Aging Life or GCM business you need to know.

Most care managers think it is their expertise that will ensure the referral ¨But third parties cannot evaluate your expertise. Most do not know what a really great care plan is ¨If you are selling a service like geriatric care management you are selling a relationship

You are Selling a Relationship

Why do you need to know this? First, you need to create a practice that meets the needs of your clients and major referral sources. Many clients- usually adult children, call you to start services on their own. But a good majority of clients will call you because their attorney, bank trust officer, CPA, Financial Manager referred them. These third parties need to have a relational ship with you and know you are going to meet their needs if they are to make referrals to your agency. On the feeding chain of referrals, they are one of your most important sources to feed income into your business. You have to deliver what they need to make money and that is first creating a relationship by knowing what their needs are.

Let’s start with a first impression.

Most people make snap judgments on a first Impression and it “ anchors” every impression afterward ¨Expertise, statistics most features are not as important to your sale as first impression ¨Make a great first impression- with a third party- warm, helpful –someone they want to have a relationship with -just like care managers do in nursing or social work

Sales Meeting a Relationship Building Meeting

When you are finally in a sales meeting with a third party who might refer a client to you-

Do not to call this encounter a sales meeting, For the care manager with “intangible” services this as a relationship-building meeting.

Most Important Message to Third Party

¨You are presenting yourself and your services to a potential customer or referral source. ¨If you were selling widgets, you would have some various sizes of widgets to show. ¨Because you are selling care management services- Intangible products

**woman holding brown cardboard with people buy from people the trust message**

Your most compelling sales message to a third party is not that you have something wonderful to sell, it is ” I understand what you need.” The only person in that sales meeting who really matters is the third party who will make the referral and what the third party needs. Find out what they want, what they need, who they are. In the words of Harry Beckwith in his classic book, Selling The Invisible- Don’t sell your service – sell your prospect

Sales classes for social workers and nurses and few and far between. Do you need help to market master sales and run a profitable care management business.?

Do You need a class in closing the sale?

Join me in my new FREE Webinar
Learn to Market Like Your Business Depended on it!
When: May 15, 2019
2PM-3:30PM PST
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How to make the sale of your ” Intangible GCM Service” that the potential buyer cannot touch or feel
How to make the sale in the inquiry call -with a complimentary consultation
How to ” Identify needs using client” challenge questions” to find the problem you need to solve to make the sale
How to present your offer by selling solutions to the problem with a mini care plan
How to manage objections if the caller has concerns about price or product
Understand how to close the sale with non-aggressive closing questions to have your contract signed, get a deposit, and grow your business with a new client

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