In senior living, we’ve all heard the numbers. We know that the senior population is exploding (pun intended) and that our organizations have the opportunity to serve a much larger number of people. But what most senior living leaders don’t realize is how different that population will look than it does today. In 2040, there will be approximately 44 million more adults aged 65 and older than in 2022. Of those, more than half will be people of color. The baby boom generation will be the last in which people of color are a minority of the older population.
This change in demographics poses a major challenge for senior living organizations, which have served an almost entirely monochromatic population for decades. To effectively grow and expand their mission to serve new market segments, home and living leaders must fully understand what inclusivity and equality really mean, and how to create a truly inclusive culture. Only then will our field be prepared to serve the growing demographic of aging Americans. And for those organizations that don’t adapt, they will be faced with the challenge of serving a smaller part of the market, not a larger part.
What is a culture of inclusion?
Over the past decade, a significant number of senior organizations have begun developing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs. For some, the primary goal was to attract more residents of color. While race is certainly a piece of the DEI puzzle, it is only one of many. Our communities already segregate people based on age, so changing that paradigm can be part of an inclusion program. Many communities also have the opportunity to better serve the LGBTQ population.
My focus is on inclusivity, on creating a sense of welcome that someone – whether a resident or a staff member – truly feels like they belong in your community. Inclusion creates diversity, not the other way around. I like to call inclusion “the big tent.” It is a growth strategy that enables organizations to invite more people into their tent. Ultimately, inclusivity is about welcoming more individuals into your community.
What we as seniors need to understand and embrace is that in today’s world, people have so many choices about where they want to live or work. If they don’t feel welcome, they won’t come to your community. That’s what inclusion is all about: making people feel like they belong.
How to develop a culture of inclusion
Developing a culture of inclusivity is not easy. It’s not like ordering a new CRM or rolling out a new menu, and it’s not a “program” you can implement in a short time. It is an all-pervasive thing that requires a lot of dedication over a long period of time.
Lily Zheng (they/them), the author of DEI Deconstructed: Your No-Nonsense Guide to Doing the Work and Doing It Well And Reconstructing DEI: A Practitioner’s Workbook, provides excellent guidance on thinking about and building a culture of equality and inclusivity. Zheng underlines the crucial role of trust and makes a strong case that efforts to become more inclusive will not be successful if the organization’s leadership does not have the trust of stakeholders, such as residents and staff. If you start and stop, or don’t do things right, you won’t gain confidence and you won’t be successful.
This is why I founded my company W Lawson to increase the number of leaders who are aware of the implications that certain decisions can have, and know how to remove barriers to inclusion that may already be present. Leaders should look carefully at their organization’s policies to ensure they don’t create barriers to inclusion. Let me give an example of what I mean.
Many organizations conduct drug tests before hiring someone. But what if your community is in Maryland, the District of Columbia, or another state where recreational marijuana use is legal? You have to ask yourself, “What is the reason for testing for cannabis?” Does drug testing artificially reduce the size of your potential workforce? For this reason, even many faith-based organizations in Colorado, another state where recreational cannabis is legal, have stopped drug testing for cannabis. Additionally, many organizations test before hiring, but don’t test again afterwards. What kind of statement does that make to staff about the organization’s leadership and commitment? And remember, this isn’t about judging right or wrong when it comes to drug testing. The point is to ask the question: What is our goal in maintaining a drug testing program? If the answer is to protect residents and ensure a safe workplace, then it is our responsibility as leaders to ensure our policies prevent harm. And a drug testing policy that only tests at the time of employment does not meet this goal. So the next question is: why do we have this policy if it doesn’t guarantee a work environment that is free from restrictions?
The benefits of inclusion
There are many benefits of a strong inclusion program. Your community will become more attractive to a broader base of potential residents, not just the typical monochromatic group that most senior living communities serve today. And you also become more attractive to potential employees. In fact, organizations with a strong DEI culture have been found to have stronger retention and better recruitment.
There is not always a direct connection between the implementation of a DEI program and retention and recruitment; It doesn’t ‘just happen’. People apply for a job based on some kind of invitation. Maybe they saw an ad you posted online, or maybe a friend told them about the position. The key question then is: do they feel welcome when they first come into contact with the organization? People tend to stay where they feel included and where they feel like they belong. If employees do not stay, it is because they no longer feel at home there. Some of today’s workforce challenges are due to healthcare workers realizing they have more career choices than ever before. They need a sense of belonging to want to stay somewhere.
The Longevity + Inclusion Alliance Fellows Program
What has proven to work in building effective DEI programs is building a cohort of individuals committed to making a difference, and then starting to build a new one. The cohorts begin to work together to create change. That’s what I’m doing with W Lawson’s Longevity + Inclusion Alliance Fellows program. By launching the Fellows Program, we are working to create leaders who have a clearer vision of how to create a more inclusive environment, gain and/or improve their cultural competency in understanding other lived experiences, and joining a growing cohort of leaders seeking new experiences. equality in an aging population. You can learn more about the Fellows program here.
We will be holding an inclusion retreat with our current cohort class on April 18 and 19, and I’m excited to share that Lily Zheng, the author I referred to earlier, will be one of our speakers. We are opening the retreat to a limited number of people from outside the Fellows program, so please Contact me if you want to know more.
An exciting future
I am very optimistic about the potential that serving a more diverse aging population has for our organizations. We see a lot of movement toward creating intergenerational and middle-income communities that will help meet this need. The next step is to build a foundation from which our existing Life Plan Communities and other senior organizations can serve the broader population in the coming years.
