The new Getting Started Checklist breaks down how to implement the strategic guidance of the Opening Doors to Aging Services and Opening Doors to the Aging Services Workforce initiatives. The accompanying free QuickCast highlights key strategies and provides examples of LeadingAge member websites that effectively bring them to life. Get the Checklist and watch the QuickCast.

LeadingAge members are crafting their Careers web pages to align with the research-backed Opening Doors to the Aging Services Workforce strategies and messages. These pages provide excellent real-life examples of the communications strategies and messages to boost workforce recruitment. Take a look! 

Inspired by the Opening Doors to Aging Services strategies, members have elevated professional caregivers—a key link to the quality care that consumers seek and that drives confidence in aging services.

After joining the Opening Doors workshop series, United Methodist Communities, rolled out its MVP (most valuable professional) program that monthly recognizes an outstanding team member. Fun facts about the MVPs are featured on social media. Dorrett Hudson, CMA, is the focus of this news story.

Circle Center Adult Day Program seized an external opportunity to earn one of its outstanding nurses media visibility. Area readers voted Hazel Snead, RN, one of the region’s best nurses in the Richmond Times Dispatch’s reader’s choice contest. Hazel’s recognition boosts the sector and demonstrates Circle Center’s excellence.

“I first heard the presentation on Opening Doors to the Aging Service Workforce at the Leading Age national meeting in Denver and then again at the Leadership Summit. I was impressed the first time and have been trying to change our hiring processes and expectations ever since. I believe I am finally gaining some traction, and the tools provided with the presentation have been invaluable. I hope to report back that we have instituted these changes and stabilized our workforce. Thank you so much for all the work and thought that went into the project.”

— Marje Marje Murray, BSN, MBA, Chief Operating Officer, Oakwood Lutheran Senior Ministries  

Members highly valued the virtual workshop Opening Doors to the Aging Services Workforce: Strategies to Boost Workforce Recruiting that explored the research findings and best practices for developing effective recruitment communications. If you’re looking to recharge your recruitment communications, this workshop can provide the fuel.

The workshop is available through the LeadingAge Learning Hub, at a reduced cost for members.

Rob Love shared Opening Doors to the Aging Services Workforce data and recognized the communications guidance in his blog recapping the strong LeadingAge 2022 Annual Meeting. Love is the president/CEO of Love & Company, experts in advising and guiding senior living executives and communities on a mission to help seniors experience a better life every day.

To bolster our members’ recruitment efforts through the post-pandemic workforce shortage, LeadingAge produced Opening Doors to the Aging Services Workforce. Built on national market research, the initiative includes communications strategies, tested messages, and insights on what potential employees seek in good jobs. The easy-to-use materials guide members in developing workforce communications that best resonate with potential employees for roles across your organization. They are available online and in the downloadable Workforce Recruitment Communications Toolkit.

The new resources received immediate positive feedback at their debut.

“Opening Doors to the Aging Services Workforce is an extremely strategic, impactful and practical resource to all Member organizations.  The well-researched and timely information should enable immediate integration into existing human resources plans, as well as in constructing entirely new approaches to the universally important priority of workforce recruitment and development.”

— Roger L. Myers, president & CEO, Presbyterian Villages of Michigan, Southfield

Understanding potential aging services employees is vital for all LeadingAge provider members. That’s why LeadingAge expanded our Opening Doors to Aging Services initiative to explore potential employees’ perceptions of aging services jobs and how best to talk to them about employment in our field.

New Opening Doors to the Aging Services Workforce research finds strong openness to work in a range of jobs at aging services organizations and identifies potential employees’ preferences of job attributes and benefits, beyond wages. Read all the findings from our national market research. 

LeadingAge member Catholic Health Association published an article on the Opening Doors foundational research in the Spring 2022 issue of its journal Health Progress. 

Senior Director of Communications and Marketing Susan Donley authored the piece, Age Friendly – Public Has Mixed Perception of Aging Services, But Current Moment Provides Opportunity to Improve Understanding. 

Donley’s article was among a package of Health Progress articles that earned first place for Best Reporting on a Special Age Group in the 2023 Catholic Press Awards magazine division!

McKnight’s Long-Term Care News was all ears to learn more behind the Keep Leading Life public service campaign, after seeing it splashed along subway posters and bus shelters outside the Leadership Summit. “Keep Leading Life features beautiful images of seniors thriving and receiving care in a variety of settings, ranging from a senior living swimming pool to a nursing home bedroom to hospice. The broadsides and related digital assets can be used by state affiliates and members to bring attention to the good work providers are doing — and underscore the idea that aging services are deserving of more public and governmental support.” Read the article.

Assets for LeadingAge members only are online.

LeadingAge members are enthusiastically adopting the new strategies outlined in Opening Doors to Aging Services, the initiative to introduce our sector to the general public and improve perceptions of aging services. Members are using the strategies to frame their communications in ways that research tells us will resonate more strongly with U.S. adults. Click the link abovce to see how members River Spring Living, A.G. Rhodes, and Brethren Retirement Community have used the guidance to tell their stories.

LeadingAge unveiled Keep Leading Life, its new public service campaign to raise awareness about the range of aging services available to help older adults grow old their way.

“The need for aging services is growing, and dedicated professionals deliver quality support daily in every community across the nation. Yet too many Americans experience confusion and frustration when seeking help,” said LeadingAge Senior Vice President, Communications and Marketing Susan Donley. “Keep Leading Life seeks to inform Americans about their options, provoking curiosity and confidence that the right solution exists for their family.

The members-only resources were developed in line with the strategic recommendations in the Opening Doors to Aging Services initiative. Members can access customizable assets for use at no charge.

“In an illuminating presentation, LeadingAge shared numbers that stunned me: only 20% of the public sees Aging Services unfavorably, while 45% are aware of Senior Living’s benefits and a whopping 35% has no opinion,” wrote Oliver Hazan, vice president of sales and marketing at Cross Keys Village in York, PA, after attending the first Opening Doors workshop. Hazan was quickly sold on the approach, commenting, “I look forward to further training on the subject and to the opportunity to educate the 35% still without an opinion. This will involve finetuning Cross Keys Village’s message in alignment with the comprehensive findings of the opinion survey.” Read Hazan’s post.

Hundreds of members eager to put Opening Doors strategies to use joined a four-part virtual workshop series, starting with Getting the Word Out. The overview focused on key Opening Doors strategies and messages and how to apply them across communications channels using member examples. The series also covered:

• Messaging that Moves Perceptions
• Building Partnerships and Events
• Public Service Campaign

All the highly rated workshops are available on demand, at a reduced price for members.

McKnight’s Senior Living was on-hand as LeadingAge President and CEO Katie Smith Sloan highlighted Opening Doors to Aging Services during the 2022 Annual Meeting. The piece, picking up a key finding—to know us is to love us—noted that LeadingAge encourages members to tell their own story to help shift the narrative.

“There is no fast way to change widely held public views, but if we speak with the same voice, with messaging informed by research, we have an opportunity to proactively define the aging services sector for millions of people across the country,” Sloan said.

LeadingAge released Opening Doors to Aging Services, a research-backed communications initiative to help providers introduce older adults and families to the vital care and services they provide and improve perceptions of the field. Members now have a roadmap for more effectively telling our story: the strategies, messages, messenger and design guidance to reclaim the narrative and showcase all the good we do for older adults and families. Find the free resources, including the LeadingAge Language Guide and Dos and Don’ts tip sheet. Want a overview? Check out this QuickCast series in the LeadingAge Knowledge Center.