Dan Madsen is the chairman and CEO of Leisure Care, a Senior Living operator that has in recent years refocused its paradigm of aging and revamped its online presence to signal that it is ready to meet the needs of current and future residents.

Madsen began his journey in the senior living industry in the late ‘80s. Now, after 32 years in the industry, the Leader of Seattle-based Leisure Care, Madsen talks through the Changemakers series about his time in the industry and how the focus should always be on the residents.

How have you changed as a leader since starting in this industry?

It was 32 years ago, or almost 33, I guess, and I’ve learned tons. Every year I Continue to grow and learn as a leader, gaining a lot of empathy and understanding for people and their behaviors.

One of the greatest things I think I learned was the tolerance of — mine as well, that all people have seasons. We have such longevity in our company that people have really good years, and then they have life that happens as well, and to continue to support them is really, really important.

Obviously, we at SHN think of you as a Changemaker, but do you see yourself that way — are you always excited to drive change?

I’m always excited about change. I look forward to a lot of innovation discussions that I have with our teams and listening to our customers and looking at our future customers and trying to be ahead of the curve. We want to make sure that we’re delivering high-quality services that they’ll want in the future.

What are some ways you think senior living needs to change in the next 5 years?

I think we’re 10 years out. We look at the customers that are coming to us. We have really good research in this industry because we can watch how people behave 10 years before they anticipate moving in with us. We can watch the different trends in hospitality and in healthcare, and so on and so forth, and really watch the consumer’s behaviors.

That really helps to shape what we do. As we focus right now more and more on preventative wellness and different programs like that, that really we’re watching the baby boomers and their lifestyles today. We need to be really good at those types of operations before they start shopping with us.

As you look across the rest of the senior living industry, do you think that it’s changing fast enough to keep up with the times?

No, I don’t. I think there are a lot of conditions that inhibit our industry’s ability to get really innovative and creative, because we do get put in a box of sorts by a lot of different conditions, including sophisticated lending institutions and investors and so on, and lenders in general.

We do our business, we work in our business, and they’re used to a certain product that they finance, and it generally has to fit into that box. With creative investors, I think we can get a lot more innovative, but there’s always risk associated with innovation.

Can you talk about a time when you tried to execute a change and things didn’t go according to plan? How did you pivot, and what did you learn as a leader?

I think that it’s more internal than external. We continue to innovate, and it’s the acceptance in the field sometimes even at the general manager level to really support that change. That’s because it is general managers in the field in those positions who are dealing with their current customers and the current needs and the current wants and desires as they should.

From a home office level, as we continue to innovate and start new programs, we’re focused on the future residents. Sometimes those things clash and we need to drive that change to the field and get people inspired to grow and innovate to meet the future customer as well as continue to meet our current customers’ needs.

The types of discussions that we have when we get together and continue to push the envelope, and really, less agenda with discussions and more listening, and I guess, permission to play really helped us institute change in the field.

How do you think about timing, so that your company can innovate without getting so far ahead of the market that a new idea doesn’t work?

That’s the million-dollar question. I think, again, internally, we work through the bugs and the systems and we test the market out in the field quite often.

We will start programs in different regions, maybe at one property where we have a season general manager that loves to innovate. We meet with residents and do focus groups, and really test market things and try to predict timing through those experiences.

Changemakers tend to be risk-takers. Do you agree with that statement? How do you describe your own appetite for risk?

I’m going to say that calculated risks are necessary to leadership. I think that it’s very much you need to take risks as a leader. You are leading, not managing.

I think we can get in the habit of managing what we have as leaders versus leading change and looking into the future. The ability to lead would mean that you have good succession planning and good people that are operating current projects at a very, very efficient and productive level.

Well, if that’s being done, that allows leaders to lead and innovate and alleviate some of that risk.

What is a word of advice for managing resistance to change?

A lot of people, perhaps most people, don’t like change. I think as a leader you need to learn to push through and commit and persevere and complete. I think the other word is probably complete.

There are a lot of ideas out there that get half-baked. When you get a reputation of half-baked ideas, you lose followers as a leader.

I think it’s important to choose the ones that you can complete. They see the commitment that you have and the drive that you have for that success and understand the inspiration behind the innovation and what you’re trying to accomplish. Is it focused on the well-being of the customer and employees? Is it to better their lives?

Then you definitely have a good team behind you. If it’s focused purely on money, and that’s the driver, that’s when I see fallouts.

What is the single greatest driver of change in today’s senior living operating environment?

The biggest driver that we have was definitely the change we saw in behaviors and the focus on wellness during COVID, and we needed to meet that need in the future, and preventable of us, really getting active on lifestyle and not just taking care of people but helping them take care of themselves as they did before they moved in.

You can give them opportunities out in the community. They want to be out with the community. They want to be in the cities where they live and continue to be a part of a general community, not just inside of one of our buildings. I think that’s been a big driver of change, people want to live outside of our building, and yet, have an apartment with us.

Can you talk about how you see the need for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in the industry, and what you are doing to drive change in this regard?

We have an active group within our office. We focus on that program and continue to really study the programs as we begin more aggressive implementation across the board with our policies and so on.

Across the nation, we find it to be challenging sometimes due to regional preferences, not preferences, but just regions in general. Regional cultures, I would say, but we’re actively involved in making that happen better.

2023 is shaping up to be a year of growth and evolution for many senior living operators. In what way is your organization/company changing for the times?

2023 has really been focused on — 2022 was focused on regaining census, honestly because of the challenges that we had during COVID. Really getting people back living with us, and then focusing on the proper expenses.

The labor market has been a challenge in 2022 but 2023 is shaping up to be very, very good for us. We will see good employees doing great things. We continue to see movement in our census as well. As we move forward, that will give us the ability to implement new and innovative programs. Right now, our heads are down and focused on our business.

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