Senior Care Academy
Senior Care Academy is a podcast dedicated to providing valuable information and expert advice on navigating the world of senior care for both senior care providers, and families with aging parents. Hosted by industry professionals, each episode covers a wide range of topics including healthcare options, legal considerations, financial planning, and emotional support for caregivers. If you are a healthcare provider, have aging parents, or are a senior adult, this podcast is for you! Tune in to gain valuable insights and resources to help you make informed decisions and provide the best care for your loved ones.
Senior Care Academy
James Dismond on AI and Compassionate Senior Care
What if you could transform the landscape of senior care with cutting-edge technology and an unwavering commitment to compassion? This week on the Senior Care Academy podcast, we sit down with James Dismond, CEO of Hospice Care of the Low Country, to explore the intersections of technology, empathy, and leadership in end-of-life care. Growing up in a small town in Kentucky and being adopted into an older family, James's personal experiences have deeply influenced his professional journey. He opens his heart about managing the care of his adopted mother and the emotional complexities that come with grieving, offering listeners a poignant look at the human side of hospice care.
Ever wondered how AI could revolutionize senior care? Our conversation with James sheds light on this intriguing topic. We discuss how AI can predict care needs and prevent errors, ultimately enhancing the quality of care for seniors. James shares his insights on overcoming financial and regulatory challenges, stressing the need for understanding community demographics to deliver effective care. We also tackle the critical role of regulatory compliance in maintaining high standards, especially for smaller organizations facing increased scrutiny. This episode offers a balanced perspective on the promise and pitfalls of integrating advanced technology into a traditionally compassionate field.
Leadership isn't just about guiding a team; it's about creating a legacy. James delves into the principles that drive his vision for Hospice Care of the Low Country, emphasizing the importance of aligning a team with a leader's mission. He shares actionable strategies for maintaining team motivation through heartfelt stories and investing in staff well-being. James also speaks to his aspiration of fostering a community that is comfortable with end-of-life care, aiming to leave behind a strong, enduring organization. Tune in to discover how James's blend of compassion, innovation, and leadership is setting new standards in senior care.
Hey everybody, welcome to the Senior Care Academy podcast, a podcast focused on innovation, insights and industry leaders. Today, we are excited to welcome James Dismond, the Chief Executive Officer of Hospice Care of the Low Country. James leads a team of compassionate professionals dedicated to providing quality care for those facing serious illnesses, end-of-life situations and grief. With a robust background in non-profit administration, fundraising and senior leadership, james has made significant strides in enhancing patient care and organizational efficiency. Today, he's going to explore with us his journey and the impactful changes he's implemented in hospice care and his vision for the future of end-of-life services. James, it's a pleasure to have you on the show today. Thanks for being here.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me. That was a wonderful introduction. I hope I can uphold that.
Speaker 1:We try and treat our guests right. You have a lot to offer. Tell us a little bit about where you're from, Wimby, where you grew up and how you got started in senior care.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so James Isman, chief executive officer of hospice care at Lowcountry. Believe it or not, I'm a small homegrown country boy from the great state of Kentucky, but now I reside in the beautiful Hilton Head Island of South Carolina, which is where the organization is really had humble backgrounds, grew up in a town that had maybe one stoplight, so that was a great way to grow up. But I was adopted at a young age into a family where my adopted mom and dad were significantly older, so they were seniors entering their senior years of life when I was entering high school. So I got to see elderly care way before the average person does in the parent to son relationship, and so I think that's when I started establishing just being more philanthropic and understanding senior care and being adopted really led me to being in the nonprofit industry because I understood on a different level how compassion and empathy could really change someone's life.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's amazing. I had a similar experience. My mom was a caregiver when I was eight, I think, and we couldn't afford a babysitter give her. When I was eight, I think, and she we couldn't afford a babysitter. So she would take us to her clients' homes and we would sit down and sometimes we'd do some small stuff like replace the toilet paper in the bathroom or, you know, pick up something on the ground. So that's cool that you had like a similar story. How many years was that for you, with that early introduction into senior care?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I mean I I probably realized when I was about 11, that my parents were significantly older than everybody else's parent teacher conferences, and so you know my adopted father was 20 years older than my mother, um and and and difference in age, so like he was experiencing end of life when I was in middle school and so I got to see my mother become his primary caregiver and walking through and navigating oncology services and really experienced death at a very young age. You know the story is very deep, but I got to reconnect with my biological parents and both of them passed before they were 40. I got to reconnect with my biological parents and both of them passed before they were 40. And so death was kind of intermingled into me coming to age. It was somewhat a rite of passage which later transcended into. My biggest fear was death, and now that's turned into my greatest passion, which has really been cool.
Speaker 1:Where, would you say, you really first sunk your teeth into end of life care? Or was that first real experience where your reins were in your hand and you were able to take control of how things were done?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So my adopted mother just passed last March and she was, you know, my idol.
Speaker 2:She was my best friend, my everything, and that was the first instance that I really got to control and navigate end of life and have a voice from a family member perspective, but a decision maker, as someone who had the authority to make that, and at the same time I was guiding my brothers, my three brothers, through that, who were her biological sons. But I was able to be the one that was selected for her care, which is one of the greatest honors anyone could ever have in life is someone saying take over my care when I'm incapacitated? But I got to see services from a completely different standpoint. I'd been in hospice care and the fundraising aspect and business development for three years. But I'll tell you, when you step on the other side of the bed, it's a completely different ballgame. And I'm so thankful that I was knowledgeable because I was able to guide my family and I knew the steps to take. Because I was able to guide my family and I knew the steps to take and having that power changes the entire trajectory of that experience.
Speaker 1:Thanks for sharing that. That's a pretty recent passing. Since the passing, have you been able to communicate with your brothers, like steps that they can continue to look for? Have you been able to kind of show them what ropes to follow, what? What's the best solution for x, y and z? Like what? What was that process like?
Speaker 2:yeah, I wish I could say absolutely. We did step one, two, three and four, and it was one or more. Yeah, what I've learned in this process and and we hear and we speak it often in the end of life, yeah, we have different family dynamics and our grieving processes. Even though we're related and we grew up in a very similar kind of family network, we're all grieving completely differently and I've had to learn that. You have to respect that and you can offer resources, but at the end of the day, that person may take advantage, but they have to grieve in their way.
Speaker 2:And so, being transparent, I'm a very I work a lot, I aid in my family, providing me support, and I talk a lot about my mom and sharing her experiences. And that's my grieving process, right when some of my brothers are very excluded from that emotion side and they're kind of walking through their life. And it doesn't mean that it's wrong, it just means that we each have our own kind of path. But it's really interesting because when we come together we'll start storytelling and I think that's our way of like remembering our mom and grieving together.
Speaker 1:Would you say, maybe working through that grief or trying to maybe better understand how to manage your situation as influenced the direction that you take in your work at all?
Speaker 2:100% changed my complete, just outlook on even just leading. So before my leadership or just my work ethic was very. You know, here's your goal. Complete your goals, advertise that you completed your goal, move on to the next goal and share that experience and people will learn from it. Right, it was very. Do the action People will follow. Now, you know, I even dubbed a little name. You know, I even dubbed a little name.
Speaker 2:It's more of a compassion and accountability leadership style and by storytelling and sharing the experience with your staff members, making sure that they understand that I'm a real person and I have emotions and I'm going to make mistakes and they're going to make mistakes and it's this ebb and flow to make mistakes and it's this ebb and flow and so I'd try to share. You know things about my mom and or you know, if I'm having a difficult day or if someone else is, that I'm relatable and I understand. And you know Mother's Day was a very difficult day and me sharing that emotion and being relatable to the staff and just to my peers, I think is really a game changer for just my approach to many different situations. And when you sit down with a family and you can say I've had an end of life story. I've made these decisions too. I think there's a sense of comfort of I'm not alone, rather than trying to be the expert when you don't have the experience per se.
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely. I kind of fit into the latter part of your statement, where I may be in the situation to talk to someone about it, but I'm not the expert or nor have I had the experience. When you teach your staff or, I guess, your employees, your team when you teach them about like your experience having a compassionate accountability, what are do you kind of have like a list of things that you make sure that you see in them? Do you kind of have like a priority list of what to talk about? What's your thought process there when teaching others how to be compassionately accountable?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's really situational and probably depends really heavily on the department. But you know, specifically in patient care I try to remind the staff every single day that this journey of end of life the people that you're speaking to it's most likely their first time. It's their first time that they're coming to terms with it or that they're processing it, wherever they are in that journey. And we experience it every single day as professionals, and so sometimes you can become a little rough around the edges or you just say things with a dry tone. So to always be very conscientious of your tone and speak to that person like you're speaking to your loved one for the first time about a terminal illness, and it changes the whole approach to the communication. And don't just make it about the medical forms or the diagnoses. Make it about the family dynamic and what's happening and what we can provide to them to navigate this journey.
Speaker 2:The accountable side of that comes in when we all have a role to play in this journey. The accountable side of that comes in when we all have a role to play in this journey and when we say that we're going to provide this type of care or we're going to do this, we have to do it because I have the saying in the organization is it's urgency, it's not an emergency? But every single patient and patient family will always be in an emergency if you ask them. So if we just carry it out with urgency, we can take care of that emergency. It's a little it's a corny statement, but the end of life, there is no emergency. It's all about comfort care, providing them with the resources they need and then walking that journey with them. And so it's all about being urgently responsive and accountable while carrying out compassion and empathy, love that.
Speaker 1:Can you talk a little bit more about your current role? What's it called? What does it look like? Give our listeners like an idea of the responsibilities that you tackle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would. I like to think we're a little different down here in the low country, but specifically at hospice care of the low country, because you know chief executive officer usually means you know you're at the top of an organization. I think a lot of people think you know you're sitting in an office sending emails all day, but I like to think that I'm a working CEO and so I'm a part of the onboarding process for every single new employee because we're still at the size that I can do that and I really like that. I'm popping in the offices and meetings and really understanding and having a pulse on where we are. But my everyday duties are aligned around making sure the culture of our organization is very positive and healing and motivating, while understanding our business to make sure that we're financially viable and being innovative to stay relevant in our market and sometimes, especially in the nonprofit sector.
Speaker 2:I think people get lost in their not-for-profit. They give, give, give, but we're still a business. We still have to keep the lights on, we still have to have cash flow to be able to provide those services. So you have all the things that a for-profit would have of running your business, but you also have this community needs section that we have to keep our fingers on to know the pulse, to know what the community needs and what programs we need to be adding or taking away to serve the community for that nonprofit tax status and it's a bunch of different roles that are happening at the same time but it's a blessing.
Speaker 1:I think you might be one of our first guests on the show that has, like, a specialty in nonprofit. What is a really simple way to kind of distinguish the two in terms of services provided, expectations given or received. What's the big, what's a big difference?
Speaker 2:There's a few large differences. The main one that I think everyone can resonate with is that a nonprofit does not have stakeholders that make a profit off of our revenue. Right, that's the biggest difference. Service wise, we as a nonprofit focus on the community need, so when I'm making decisions, I'm not necessarily making decisions off the profitability of that decision. Our bottom line is not a budget. Our bottom line is patient care, and that's really the nonprofit difference is that if I have a break-even budget, that's a great year. If I have a negative year, that's still okay too. If we we provided great care because we have community support, that'll make it up. And that's a beautiful side of it is that every day I get to make decisions based off patient need, community need, and I'm budget conscientious but I'm not driven by a budget.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm sure, like just me thinking about it now, I'd probably struggle with, like the ambiguous nature of setting goals based off of qualitative, I guess statistics, so to speak, instead of quantitative. If we hire this person, they need to bring in X dollars for it to be worth it. Or if we buy this service, it needs to provide X dollars of value so we can make our money back on the hours we save from it. Did it take you time to adjust to that, to the nature of the way that you view success comparatively to a for-profit organization?
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I think that we're all naturally driven by numbers, right? Most of us. Even when it comes to your success, a lot of people associate success to money, to dollars raised, to how big your house is or what kind of car you drive. It's very, it's very asset oriented. And I would say over the past five years, my target of success has really been driven towards impact and those individual stories that we hear every single day, and I just told our board not too long ago that metrics is definitely one way to access impact and accountability, but nothing beats when you get a thank you card in the mail from a patient family member that said I don't know how I could do it without you. And so it's those stories that really navigate my success and how I feel internally and ethically. And then, as an organization, when we can say you know, as a nonprofit, we served 3,000 individuals last year. That's phenomenal, Knowing that, when I look at the budget, that 85 to 90% of what we brought in in revenue we delivered back to the community.
Speaker 1:Wow, that is really impressive. I guess you mentioned speaking to the board recently. I'm kind of interested, or like what are some of the more exciting projects or initiatives that you're currently working on?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I can't give off the competitive advantage, right, but yeah of course.
Speaker 1:I wouldn't want your playbook.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we are. We are really focused on quality of care, which you know most health organizations should be or are. But more recently my senior leadership team is really taking a deep dive into care navigation and caregiver support and really kind of gathering data to see how social determinants of health helps play a role in quality outcomes. And I think what's interesting and some people may call it innovative or just catching up is that you really have to understand your community and what your community is made up of and who and what to really determine how to deliver care. You know, for a physician office, you go to your physician, you see your primary care, you see the nurse practitioner, you check out, you go home. But for us we're going into someone's home and I don't know about you, Alex, but I don't just let anybody in my home.
Speaker 2:You have to be invited into my home, and so we're trying to determine through AI technology and data gathering and interviewing. How do we get invited into that person's home to deliver top quality care that's needed.
Speaker 1:Right Interesting. You mentioned AI. Not a lot of senior care providers utilize it to its fullest potential. I know I use ChatGPT and I guess that's the extent of my use for it. When you mention technology in that regard, what data is it giving you that you find valuable?
Speaker 2:So I'm going to have to dance around this just a little bit.
Speaker 2:But and it's not a secret, but we're working with some partners to figure out how to put our patient data nothing HIPAA-related but the demographics and diagnoses and symptoms to figure out how an AI component can tell us when to implement certain preventative measures, certain care plans, or to help us know when to transition someone from you know serious illness management to end of life services, but also to help create trigger points that like oh, did you know?
Speaker 2:Like oh, so, and so is experiencing this. If you use this resource, it could cause this outcome. So to help drive patient care, because the nature of the beast is that humans naturally have human error right, and so if we could help integrate AI technology in the correct way and not be afraid of it, or to use it as a crutch, it could really aid in helping us be creative on how to take care of the patient holistically, with some trigger factors to help implement some care plans, and it's going to be a game changer for the people that can implement it, but you also. It's going to be costly, but I think the outcome could be just a game changer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, how scalable do you feel implementing this change is now? Do you find yourself exhausting a ton of effort and work for maybe one or two successful outcomes, or do you find yourself implementing it and having tens, hundreds of successful outcomes? Has it been very scalable for you?
Speaker 2:So we're seeing some partners in, like New York City, who have made it completely scalable. It's not producing one or two outcomes, it's producing, you know, five to ten thousand outcomes that are very positive, and so obviously that depends on how big your patient network is. So for us, being smaller, we see it as actually creating efficiency so that our employees can work at a larger scale without the heaviness of the workload, because they have basically an assistant to help them drive care and it's not a tangible person that you're paying for. So it helps reduce overhead, increase efficiency. The difficulty that I think you were alluding to with the scalability is there is a significant financial cost to that type of software and intricacy, and so that's a difficulty for us and that's why we're working with partners to figure out what's the best way to deliver it, and then, at the kind of, the other side of the beast is the regulatory side of making sure it's compliant with all the regulatory standpoints of the market in our realm.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I recently spoke to a lawyer and he specializes in consulting for of being compliant and oftentimes the nature of overlap to how you must do things.
Speaker 2:Is there any difference there to the same standard with usually less resources? Right, because we're usually smaller or we're providing more services on top of those. So we hospice and palliative care are highly regulated organizations, more so hospice care. But that can be the difficulty in business and I'm sure the lawyer you spoke of spoke to it is when you're a smaller organization you're held to the same regulatory components as a large organization and you had to the same regulatory components as a large organization and you have to find the resources to do that.
Speaker 2:And unfortunately, with the recent hospice fraud that is going on, it's really putting the weight on smaller hospices because they're increasing audits and surveys and we're experiencing that too, and so when a surveyor walks into your business, it's basically, you know the state coming in and saying we're going to check all your best practices to make sure you're doing everything correctly. Our organization, from an administrative, shuts down to provide that surveyor with whatever they need, and the fraud is really targeting you know everyone like and they should. But new regulations come out and it makes it harder for us to deliver the compassionate care that we should. But luckily we have a dynamic team that is really providing top quality care.
Speaker 1:You know what? Who? I guess who, would you say in your team is their primary responsibility would be to stay informed, stay updated and kind of work with administration to ensure compliance standards are met. Is that is that you? Do? You have someone on your team who you work closely in conjunction with to achieve that? What's that dynamic?
Speaker 2:for you. Yeah, it's a big role, so we actually divide it because a regulatory standpoint doesn't just go for one department, it goes for the entire organization. So I'm really driving the care, driving the quality of care, with our clinical director and who we just promoted to chief clinical officer, so she's focused on the regulatory components that are as care delivery, and then I also oversee the financial aspects. So there's regulatory components that are as care delivery and then I also oversee the financial aspects. So there's regulatory components that are specifically associated to the financial side of our business and we have someone the director of administration is over that. Then you dive into just the state regulations and federal regulations around social workers, and so we have a director of social work that would focus on the social aspect and the spiritual aspect, and so there's many people who are responsible for their lanes and then communicating that to everyone and making sure that we're well trained.
Speaker 1:That's pretty cool. I guess kind of switching gears here. I'm interested to know what type of maybe people you tend to work with or collaborate with. Do they benefit you in terms of your utilizing the service they provide to enhance your care, or do you guys collaborate in the care of a patient? What type of companies maybe vendors do you guys work with, and why do companies end up working with you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we have quite a few partners. I definitely think community collaboration is where it's at as far as delivering top quality care and creating a network for a care continuum. Specifically, we work with a lot of senior living organizations. We'll be providing hospice care inside of their buildings and that helps them just have another layer of care, especially for terminally ill. Palliative care is, you know, caring for the chronically ill, but they may graduate from palliative care and go on to live a, you know, a happy and healthy life. That nurse practitioner in palliative care is the nucleus for that care coordination. So they're coordinating with the specialists, the hospitalists, the primary care, the PT, the OT and really sharing the message of what the patient's goals are to live a higher quality life. And so there's many partnerships in that we partner with the local hospitals. We have a program launching soon that our team will actually be inside of a hospital and providing chronic symptom management. So that's huge for the mutual benefit, the benefit of the patient, and sometimes you have to set aside what your competitive disadvantages might be.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what tends to be. I don't know if there's like a golden, like a smoking gun, or maybe that's the wrong phrase to use in this sense, but like maybe the golden bullet of why people choose to be with you. I mean being with a nonprofit. I'm sure it's great for image and I'm sure it's great for community influence. Are there other reasons why they choose you guys?
Speaker 2:I think it's two pronged. I think from the community perspective, people hear that they've had this great experience on hospice care and we were so compassionate and the level of care was empathetic and really top quality. So you know, they refer a friend and that's how they get to us. From a healthcare business perspective, I think it's responsiveness. We're super responsive to those physicians and you know the ER docs that are referring to us and so we help make their jobs a little bit easier by taking that patient in under our care fairly quickly. So responsiveness and then just top quality care from the community perspective and sharing that story.
Speaker 1:That's great to know. That's really cool. Where do you see the community five, maybe 10 years from now?
Speaker 2:You know I always like to say my go-to response is we're going to take over the world, right, but I think I'm five to 10 years. If I'm really thinking strategically specifically from a nonprofit not necessarily just from hospital care to low country is I think nonprofits are going to take back the hospice and palliative care industry. Right now I think it's 87% for-profit led, compared to 10 years ago where it was like 95% or 85% nonprofit led. So I think nonprofit hospice and palliative organizations are going to take that power back and be the leading influence in quality care, empathetic care, and really push for continuum of those hospice and palliative services. The side of my tech brain, though, is saying that we're going to incorporate that AI technology to help drive quality outcomes from hospital systems, to help identify those patients, so they know when to have that conversation and it's not as a difficult conversation, so that we get people on service early so they pass dignified and pain-free.
Speaker 1:Taking over the world's a pretty lofty goal. Yeah for sure I love that you have that vision for hospice care of low country. What type of team do you think you can tackle that big goal of yours? I guess not literally but your big vision, your big ambition with the team you have now, or do you foresee your team growing in any capacity?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're in growth stage. We you know our business hospice growth. Usually you have a few ways to grow right You're going to buy market share, you're going to just incorporate and grow your referral sources, or you're going to naturally grow. Over the past 18 months, we've grown by almost 65 percent, which is huge, so we've more than doubled, and so our team is growing, and I think we're going to continually recruit dynamic leaders that are progressive. They want to push the mold, they want to be innovative, because they do. They want to change the world, but their sense of changing the world is changing and impacting their community. That's what we're looking for. I want someone that's going to knock on my door and say you're doing it wrong, let's do it this way, and challenge me to be better and push our team forward. And right now we have a senior leadership team made up of six individuals, and they challenge me every single day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's good. That's good to be challenged. I think it's good to surround yourself by people who will kind of shoot it to you straight and tell you how they think it should be and then you kind of collaborate off of that. I watched a video recently about I think it was a hiring technique from another CEO and he talked about that. The people that he enjoys working with are the people that will tell him what's wrong based off of their specific, their specialty. If you have a lawyer come in, he'll tell you what's wrong with legal. You know you have a financial guy come in, he'll tell you what's wrong with finances, versus the guy that you have to tell what's wrong and then for them to go and fix it. I'm sure, Sorry, I think it goes back to like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, go ahead. Compassion and accountability right.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You got to have someone be like this is wrong, this is how I would fix it. That's the key, right? You don't want just someone to say this is wrong. This is how I would come about it. You reminded me one of the best leaders that I ever had told me that accountability is so important. It's one of the best things you could ever do for someone is someone who always has to be told what's wrong and how to fix it. You're basically doing their job for them, so the best thing you could do for them would be exit them from the company so they could find something that they're actually good at.
Speaker 1:That's pretty good advice. That is great advice. I'm sure you took that advice pretty well pretty to heart when you first started out. Was there any, I guess, consistent characteristics in the people that you chose to be a part of your team starting out that you still look for today?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say that all my team have dynamic personalities, but they are very outspoken, and it's not that they're all extroverts, but when they're working they're working. They're very driven, and so they do tell me what's wrong. They offer their opinions respectfully. And there's one similarity they all have and that's they can portray and communicate to you a compassionate tone and integrity across the board, and that's one thing I look for for every single employee that we hire. My team knows that. Hr knows that, from CNAs to volunteers to a senior level executive, that has to be in there, because if it's missed, it's. If it's missing, they're not going to understand our mission as an organization.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's pretty essential understanding an organization's mission. I think it plays a key role into efficiency. It plays a key role into being able to work with that individual because you kind of speak the same language. What advice would you offer, I guess, leaders or other CEOs in your position to maybe help convert their team to their vision? What does that take?
Speaker 2:Oh, it's a it's a dynamic process, but the biggest learning curve for me was I had to learn to listen intently to what my team was trying to tell me. So, transitioning into CEO, I would meet with people, but they wouldn't necessarily tell me exactly what I needed to know. They told me a portion of what they thought I wanted to know, right, and so recruiting those leaders that will tell you what I like to call the ugly truth. You have to know those pain points and then you take all those pain points and you start to work through them with solutions, with staff input, and that's going to help drive your mission. What you have to kind of go back to is what is your vision overall? Where are you trying to do? And you know we were joking that we want to take over the world. Well, how are you going to take over that world? Right, and put that into action steps and remind your employees every single day what that vision is, what that mission is.
Speaker 2:Whether you put it on the wall, on the back of t-shirts I do pulse checks when I'm walking to the office. I'll be like you know, hey, chris, what's our mission again, and they pop it off to me and when they can reciprocate that verbally, you know that's ingrained in their minds, that's ingrained in their, in what they're doing and they're ready for it. You make it fun, you make it exciting. I think one of the my least favorite things is when you know you go into an organization. You're like what's your mission? They're like blah, blah, blah blah. You know it's like so monotoned. When you ask our employees what our mission or vision is, they get excited about it because they're living it, they're breathing it and we make it fun. You got to make it fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely. I think it takes a lot of inspiration to make things fun. I know you have some pretty deep roots in end of life care and a lot of strong emotional ties. I'm sure that accounts for your why. What, if anything, helps keep you motivated or inspired in the face of setbacks or challenges that you face as a nonprofit?
Speaker 2:So we have some key stories that we go back to, which is pretty amazing, and these are stories that go back almost 40 years of just success in our stories, and we're working on creating this motivation wall in our corporate office where we will put these stories on them. But I remind myself of those. We got to marry a couple and the guy was on his deathbed and the staff came together and got her a wedding dress and him a white shirt and they exchanged vows and then he passed a couple hours later. But we've also done, you know, a last trip to the beach here on Hilton Head Island and where we physically had a stretcher a medical stretcher out on the beach, because that was the daughter and dad's favorite place.
Speaker 2:And I go back to those stories and dad's favorite place and I go back to those stories. And then, when I add that into, you know, getting to hold my mom's hand while she took her last breath, surrounded by family, that reminds me of why we do what we do every day, because death and dying isn't always great, you know. We want it to be beautiful, but it isn't always. It can be very emotional, it can be very heavy, and so there's days where I walk in the door and I can feel the emotional weight of what our staff is experiencing. It's my job to remember those stories and then portray that positivity every single day. If I'm having a bad day, that's going to go through the whole organization, so every day has to be a good day, yeah.
Speaker 1:I think that's a pretty powerful point to make is that the people who you work with they look up to to one degree or another and your energy kind of transfers. I think that's a principle seldom understood and, and I guess, seldom talked about. I think on our, on our last episode, we talked about how really understanding your why and understanding your motivation helps you to radiate positivity to where you go. A person who loves, I guess, manual labor and lives for manual labor gets the job and they don't feel like they're working and it helps other people around them kind of recognize like, hey, maybe this isn't as bad as I'm thinking it is. So I'm sure it's the same. When you get into the office and maybe you've had a couple of setbacks or a couple of big challenges that week that really put a damper on people's moods Do you have like a secret technique or I know you do pop-ins and pulse checks around your office Do you take your staff, how do you treat them well to keep the spirits up?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So investing in your staff, I mean it's literally a budget line item for us because you have to invest in your culture. So for me, you know I'm a funny guy, so like I'm always laughing and be bopping around the office and when I come in the morning I don't pass by an office without greeting that person, asking how they're doing. And it's not a hey, how are you? As I keep walking, it's a stop. Look at them, make eye contact. Good morning, how are you doing? Listen for the response. Follow it up with any other conversation you need to have, because even just taking that 30 or 40 minutes to get through the office is a game changer. But there's technology you can incorporate. We've incorporated a new technology that is completely electronic and people can thank people and pay gratitude to employee on employee, manager to employee, senior exec to employee, and they give points. Those points translate into Amazon dollars, which everyone loves, some Amazon right, and so that helps too. And then we do lunches, we give swag out, we just really make it fun.
Speaker 2:We do different type of holiday celebrations and I participate in every single one of those because I'm not going to ask my staff to do anything that I won't do and if you go into it with a positive uplifting, like you said, radiating positivity, that is contagious, it will go through. And some of the stuff is super corny and I'm sure my staff is like what is he doing? But they participate and they love it and it takes the edge off Like Halloween. I go all out for Halloween and it's corny but they love it and I think you have to take the weight off that it and I think it's.
Speaker 1:you have to take the weight off that. Yeah, I think that's a pretty good place to kind of pivot into. Our last question here is from our conversation today, I feel that you're very positive and influential person and I perfectly understand the joy that brings you working in nonprofit care and especially just working with seniors in their end of life. What type of legacy do you hope to leave personally behind at hospice care, low country for your community? In your personal life, what kind of legacy do you hope to leave?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I thought about this question a lot and kind of stumped me a little bit because I was like, oh gosh, I've thought a lot about end of life, but how do? What do I want to leave? And two aspects for the company. I want to leave a strong, viable organization that's going to be around for 40, 50, 60 more years, that continues to provide more and more patient care and reach more and more people. I would love to leave a legacy where people are open and comfortable with end of life care. But more importantly, as I understand end of life, I think I just want to be remembered as a happy person who did everything he could to change the community. And the key word is just be remembered. I just want people who knew me to remember me and understand that I was a good person and that that'll be enough.
Speaker 1:Oh, well, I don't think that would be too difficult for you to achieve. Yeah, I would say you're more than halfway there, for sure a lot more years before. Yeah yeah, no, not halfway there with your life, but in terms of your legacy, I think you've laid a really great foundation. You're probably a couple stories higher than than me, I would say so.
Speaker 2:I appreciate that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Well, everybody, this has been James Disman, CEO of Hospice Care for Low Country. Please check out his website and please check out his company. He's been an amazing guest, charitable, entrepreneurial positive. James, thanks so much for being on the show today. Pleasure to have you.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me. It's been a joy.