Is Your RAL Team A Dream?

Is Your RAL Team A Dream?

Most of us have had the experience of being on teams that just don’t work. Whether from poor leadership, inadequate training, no team member buy-in, or individuals simply in the wrong positions, a team can only achieve maximum potential when it is working together. How is your team?

It was 1992. Four years earlier, the United States Olympic basketball team had been defeated by the Russians in the 1988 Olympic games.

It was considered a colossal nightmare. Americans invented basketball. How on earth could we lose in our own game to the Russians?
The correction was made, a change of course put in place. No longer would the United States send amateur basketball players to face mature professionals.

We played by the rules and were beaten by those who broke them. We fixed it by assembling “The Dream Team.” Operating a residential assisted living home can get better results from considering these Olympic team experiences. Assembling the proper “Dream Team,” takes a particular degree of insight into what makes teams operate effectively. It also entails being aware of what makes teams ineffective. Below are seven key steps to take when assembling and managing your residential assisted living “Dream Team.”

7 Steps To Building The Team You Need To Start Your Business

Most new entrepreneurs prefer to work alone – they like autonomy and independence. However, this is contrary to what it takes to be successful as an entrepreneur. It’s not a lone walk, but a collaborative one. Nothing is truer than this in the residential assisted living industry – the team makes the difference. As a residential assisted living homeowner, you cannot possibly fulfill the extensive requirements of operating such an enterprise, independently. It takes collaboration, synthesis, and harmony among a core group of people to make a residential assisted living home a viable business. Team building is far more than “feel good” sessions and empty commitments to help one another. It is a concerted effort to operate as one with many parts. Teamwork is understanding and appreciating the contribution others make for good for the whole of the team. Team building requires members to see beyond themselves and value the whole more than its individual parts. There are seven steps to building highly effective teams. Adhering to these steps will ensure your residential assisted living home operates in a spirit of excellence.

  1. Milestones Are Like Three-Point Shots

Your vision must be supersized, but you must also empower your team to create action plans to accomplish milestones. This process allows small wins to become great victories. It allows the team to get excited about every three-pointer. Celebrate every milestone and collectively examine every failure. The failures become lessons which lead to success in the next milestone. This will fuel your team and make them a cohesive and inseparable unit.

  1. A Shared Purpose Energizes the Team

A team can only build a successful business when the members are all receptive and focused on the same vision. Make sure the vision is huge. Highly functional teams thrive when vision is beyond the norm, causing the members to dig deep and wide.

  1. Team Effort Demands a Collective Contribution, Involvement and Connect

Each team member must be determined to bring their best to the table and bring the best out in their teammates. Partnership must transmit across any individual’s area of expertise. This is also called synthesis. In other words, team members must prioritize the tasks of another teammate if it is for the good of the whole team. Everyone succeeds together, as one, not individually.

  1. Break the Barriers That Hinder Process

Be prepared to empower every team member to excel beyond barriers, even with limited resources. Make sure members are empowered to move across institutional barriers in order to improve the complete functionality of the business. Remember, some barriers are merely perceived, but they must be dealt with as well. Do not allow systems and processes of yesterday to hinder the progress of your team today.

  1. Create a Winning Culture

Identify people who actually fit on your team. The first step is to assemble people who are willing and able to work together as a team. Getting subject matter experts is necessary but not sufficient. There must be collaboration beyond expertise. There must be a commitment to “do this together” and desire the team “wins” not the individual.

  1. Ensure That the Team Embodies a Common Definition of Success.

Find people who share your vision and passion of success. They should also exude confidence in you and what you are doing. Teams that do big things do not function haphazardly. They operate intentionally and keep the vision in the forefront of their minds, hearts and actions. All team members operate with the vision as their guide.

  1. Foster Solid Relationships Amongst Teammates

Team members must first respect one another as individuals and professionals. No team will be effective with petty bickering and jealousy. Eradicate these fallacies by building a new team if necessary. Magic happens when teams are professionally and personally integrated. These steps should be your guidebook for building successful teams associated with your residential assisted living home.

Creating a culture that is team oriented eliminates the ideology that it is someone else’s responsibility. Instead, it is the team’s responsibility and all members will make it happen one way or another. Finger pointing goes away, gossip dissipates, and the old fashioned “blame game” is nonexistent. Your residential assisted living home will be one of camaraderie, compassion and collaboration. The residents will appreciate and value the team and respect each person as much as another. Your residential assisted living home will be atypical. It will become the standard to be achieved because your team is highly effective.

Building An Assisted Living Care Team With Your Family

There is nothing more emotional than watching parents and senior loved ones give up their independence and require round-the-clock care. When families and seniors select an assisted living community, it’s a life-changing decision. Families want to know that their loved one will be cared for by more than just one caregiver. They want to know that 24-hours a day, their loved one is a priority. This cannot happen with one caregiver, but a team of care professionals. In your residential assisted living home, every employee is a care specialist of some sort and a part of the team. Below are four strategies that you should employ in your residential assisted living home to ensure your team is operating optimally and your home is in full compliance with state regulations.

  1. Going Beyond Basic Standards of Care

Regulations that are state-mandated must meet basic requirements. However, going beyond these standards of care is what each residential assisted living home should do. Why settle for the standard? The Residential Assisted Living Academy model is about a higher threshold of quality care.
Families are delighted; residents are comforted, and state regulators are elated. They brag on these homes and the commitment displayed by the RAL Academy brand. Going beyond the norm takes committed teams. Therefore, building effective teams is not an option. The future of senior living is in the residential assisted living home and the coming “Boom” will require excellence.

  1. Ongoing Care Training Matters

Both the community management staff, as well as medical professionals, need to meet state-mandated standards of care in addition to continuing education programs and training. A good team consists of knowledgeable individuals who are informed, motivated and who remain current with their certifications and licenses. In the residential assisted living model provided by the RAL Academy, this is basic. This is not excellence. Pushing the boundaries of the certification in real world practice is key. It is not good enough to be CPR trained, but can your employees conduct training? Go beyond the norm. This takes teamwork. It takes building and sustaining a “Dream Team.” You can look at https://www.c2cfirstaidaquatics.com/ to get the best training in life-saving skills and to learn skills to act in an emergency.

  1. Maintain a Team-focused Staff

Good care requires teamwork, bottom line. The residential assisted living home managers need to be on the same page as the event and kitchen staff, and the medical teams to keep everyone informed. Quality of life for residents also includes camaraderie and community harmony, and good teamwork is the heart of each of these things. Employees should find themselves on more than one team. Because functions cross one another, teams within your residential assisted living homes are “living teams.” They are not stagnant. Stagnation breeds atrophy and atrophy death. Therefore, build teams that are fluid. Employees should be aware that their skills and service is required in more than one area. This also exposes employees to different roles which becomes an informal type of training. In the event of an absence, your residential assisted living home is not hindered. There is someone present who can “fill in the gap” temporarily. This is the result of building effective “Dream Teams.”

  1. Never Underestimate Good Communication.

Families and residents rely on assisted living care teams to not only inform them of their loved ones’ medical conditions but also work within their teams to provide stellar care. Whether that’s a computer system for tracking care and medical treatment or good email and phone communication to help keep everyone informed of each care choice in addition to fun events; good communities have a consistent flow of information to families. “Dream Teams” also integrate families within them. That’s right. Your resident’s families are a part of your functional teams. They provide much needed insight, especially as it pertains to personality and the other intangibles of residents. Families should also be kept in the loop within your residential assisted living home. Remember, Mom is best cared for when everyone involved functions as one unit, as one family, as one community.

Building Your Dream Team

When the Russians met the Americans in the 1992 Olympic Games held in Barcelona, they did not meet young men growing into adulthood. They met:

  • Michael Jordan of the Chicago Bulls
  • Scottie Pippen of the Chicago Bulls
  • John Stocken of the Utah Jazz
  • Karl Malone of the Utah Jazz
  • Magic Johnson of the Los Angeles Lakers
  • Larry Bird of the Boston Celtics
  • Patrick Ewing of the New York Knicks
  • Chris Mullin of the Golden State Warriors
  • David Robinson of the San Antonio Spurs
  • Charles Barkley of the Philadelphia 76ers

This “Dream Team” was coached by the infamous Chuck Daly. This Dream Team taught the Russians how basketball is played by professionals, who function as team players. What will be your seniors’ experience in your residential assisted living home? Will they experience life in a home where the “Dream Team” works? Visit www.RALNA.com for additional tips on how to build a professional dream team to ensure the success of your residential assisted living business.

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