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11 Truths No One Tells You About Being an ED...with Kent Mulkey

• Erin Thompson

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Behind the polished lobby and the corporate metrics is a world of constant pressure, emotional resilience, and the unspoken challenges that senior living leaders face every single day.

In this powerful conversation, Erin sits down with Kent Mulkey, Founder of Elevation Coaching and Membership Sales Executive for One-on-One Sales Academy, whose viral LinkedIn posts have resonated with tens of thousands in the senior living industry. Together, they pull back the curtain on the truths no one tells you about leadership in senior living—truths that could save a career from burnout.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

  • The difference between passion and purpose—and why getting this wrong can drain even the best leaders.
  • The unspoken tension between resident needs and corporate pressures, and how to navigate it without losing yourself.
  • Why personal and professional growth are the same thing—and why separating them is costing leaders their well-being.
  • The mindset shift that can help EDs let go of control, build trust, and empower their teams.
  • How vulnerability and sharing your story can open doors, build influence, and restore joy in leadership.

Why You Need to Hear This:

Whether you’re an Executive Director, a corporate leader, or an aspiring senior living professional, this conversation will challenge how you think about leadership, success, and self-preservation in a demanding industry. Kent’s wisdom, combined with Erin’s hard-won insights, offers a roadmap to not just surviving—but thriving—in senior living leadership.

Connect with Kent:

Resources & Links:

Here is a link to an article Kent referenced in this episode he wrote: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/should-i-even-talking-kent-mulkey/?trackingId=azfxmFVcSmK%2BM4T2I9ktTw%3D%3D

Connect with me on LinkedIn


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Join my email list where I will lift you up, and send tactile advice weekly to support you to grow your experience in your senior living career.


Erin:

This is gonna be a great episode. Look, most people think they know what executive directors do until they actually step into the role. In fact, we all thought it could be easy. But we all know that it's not. What you don't see is the tension, the pressures of trying to meet residents' needs while hitting corporate metrics. The emotional toll of being the first one in and potentially the last one out and still. Feeling like it's not enough, the quiet moments of holding it all together while your team, your residents, and your company all depend on you. a few weeks ago, a post on LinkedIn caught fire. 11 simple, raw, surprising truths about executive directors, and it lit up the senior living world on LinkedIn because finally, someone said the quiet part out loud. And that post was written by my guest today, Kent Mulkey, and today he's here with me to talk about what it really means to lead in senior living. We're gonna unpack some of these 11 truths. Talk about passion versus purpose, which I am excited about, and to offer every ED out there. One thing that they rarely get validation. So if you are a leader. A corporate role leader or someone who just wants to understand what it really takes to run a successful and sustainable community, this episode is for you and I'm so excited. Welcome Kent. Thank you so much for being here. I appreciate it. Yeah, thank

Kent:

you for having me. Appreciate it. It's great to be here with you.

Erin:

Yes. So I recently started following you on LinkedIn and you're writing just pretty much all the people in senior living world that follow you really strike a nerve and that's, that's important because I think it really showing this shift. This shift that we're seeing for a more people centered, senior living industry. So what inspired you to write that post and quite a few other big posts that you wrote?

Kent:

Yeah. Thank you. So I, I reached a. I reached a point, I wrote the article originally a couple years ago for Senior Living Foresight, and it did real well on senior living Foresight again, so I edited it and re reinvented it for LinkedIn a few weeks back. Got 22,000 impressions, hundreds of comments and emails, and it's just like you said, it was just unbelievable what happened. I think you're right. It hit, it hit a nerve that somebody's speaking up on behalf of the executive director, and I think it's an industry that cares very deeply for people, but for the residents. The employees in particular, the ED is utilitarian and, very often their needs, emotional needs, their practical needs are, largely ignored. And so I grew, my growing frustration was to, to sit down. I sat down one day and wrote that article in probably 20 minutes. Just what are the, what are the things that I see in the ED that they could really be, I didn't even think about who might even read it. I wrote it really for myself originally.

Erin:

Mm-hmm. I have found a lot of things that I do like this particular episode to be very therapeutic as well, and especially because, you're a man and so. Old ways of thinking are men are a little bit more transactional and can handle the pressures differently. not housing the feelings as much as, as women do, or specifically me as what I did. And so to, and I think that is another component of it for you to be a man and to be able to talk about it so succinctly And so empathetically and compassionately is, um. is important, and I know that's what draw me to you. And if you wanna know the truth, I actually saw it on Facebook. Somebody that in my world, in the Alabama world, copied and pasted it somehow made its way to her Facebook page. And I was like, that looks really familiar. And then later I was able to connect the dots and I was like, oh my gosh. yeah.

Kent:

There's been, there's been a number of people who have taken it and copied it in and, uh, one person I called out, and I wish I hadn't done that'cause she was just in good faith. She just loved it so much. She wanted to share it. She wasn't trying to make it her own. she just loved the content. So it's really cool that it's out there.

Erin:

Yeah. I mean,

Kent:

it just got, it just got republished on Senior Living Foresight. Did it, um, just the other day.

Erin:

Yeah. The, um. I, I noticed that she, the person that I'm talking about did say this was stolen.

Kent:

Okay, cool. Nice. Yeah, there was

Erin:

no name on who it was stolen from, but yeah. But she said that it, it was stolen. So what part of your ED journey or your senior living journey, prompted you to write that?

Kent:

Yeah, you know, probably, um. 15 or so years ago. I've been in senior living for 25 years now. Probably 10 to 15 years ago. I had a major mental emotional breakdown where I couldn't work for six months, and one of my articles that's on LinkedIn today still getting views is called. Should I even be writing about this? because it's, it's really pretty raw, pretty vulnerable about my own journey with mental health and burnout and leaving the industry for a time because I was, I was so fried and so when I came back, I, that's kind of what led to me eventually sitting down and saying, okay, what's it gonna take for me to make it. Going forward, I need to be honest about the factors that go into both on the good side and the challenging side to make it in in this job. So I wrote that article.

Erin:

It's so true though. as the opening of this episode says, like we have to prepare leaders coming in. Like when I look at these 20 something year olds coming in to become executive directors or. Licensed nursing home administrators. I wanna go up to them and I wanna be like, you have no idea what you're about to get into. You have no idea. You're gonna get lots of training, but they're not gonna tell you what you need to know to succeed. and I think that, your content and stuff that I do and episodes like this, like we have to start preparing these young leaders on what it really takes to succeed.

Kent:

I'd love to, I, if I could wave a magic wand, I'd love to see whether it's my content or some variety, some version of it that that'd be something, a document you give to new, new executive directors when they start. Okay, here's, here's what they're not telling you.

Erin:

Yes.

Kent:

It's not that they don't want to tell you, I just think, don't think we're, we live with awareness in the industry and so we go to trade conferences where we hear about compliance and we hear about staffing and we all the things that we need to hear about, but we don't hear really about the personal side, the emotional side, the mental side of. Of, of the job and the role. Um, I think that if, if they could find a speaker for a, our gen conference or a assistant, you know, a CALA conference, something like that, I, I think it would be packed out. Oh

Erin:

yeah. Every stage I get on, I talk about all the things on that topic that I did wrong, and then how I fixed it or something because, so they can see themselves in, in, in my content, just like I saw myself in your content. And I think that is what's taking fire and I think that's really important. So which of the 11 points do you feel like, like for you to write? Stood out the most for you?

Kent:

Sure. Well, I live with a, uh, I live with a belief, a, an irrational belief that I've carried with me my. Uh, my life and have worked on feverishly to minimize and to, I haven't done away with it, but minimize, and that is the, just the feeling that I'm never doing enough. And it's a job that'll, it's perfect for a guy like me in a, in a not so good way.'cause it'll continue to throw things. The corporate office will continue to throw initiatives and emphasis and projects and just stack and stack and stack'em up. and so, so for a guy like me who's never doing enough for years, I just dove in headfirst to all of those until I I, until I couldn't do it anymore.

Erin:

Yeah. Ugh. Can I just say that hearing a man say that is so nice.

Kent:

Oh, thank you.

Erin:

It just normalizes it. And I think it's not necessarily senior living's fault. It is corporate a corporation's fault. It's driven by always having to increase, and so naturally it's the trickle down of. We have to do better than we did last year. We have to do better than we did last month. We have to do better. senior living gets a bad rap, but that's I guess capitalism, at its finest and we don't want to settle. But can it be that you can want more from the place of being enough, or is it improvement and not more? I'm enough the way that I am, but I still wanna improve. Sure. is that a better way of looking at that?

Kent:

Sure. I think there's a difference between being enough and doing enough. And so, I have come to a point in life where I think I, I am enough. My, my talents are, are very clear. My purpose is clear, my values are clear. I bring a lot to the table and to the lives of people with whom I interact. But to feel like I'm doing enough, I still struggle with that. Yeah, me too. Yeah.

Erin:

Yeah, me too. And as an entrepreneur, that's really scary.

Kent:

Sure. And you're, and you're running a business and so am I. And so I, I work at it, I work at it. I work at it. At the end of the day I go, I don't think I did it enough. Yeah. So I work at it some more and it's hard for me to relax and then anxiety kicks in and, and, uh, all this kinds of stuff I'm working on.

Erin:

Yeah, so true. All right, so let's talk about point number one. Okay. Balancing the resident's needs with corporate pressure, which goes to constantly all these initiatives changing, which, did you work inside of a community during COVID?

Kent:

Yes.

Erin:

Okay, so like before COVID it was, sales this and events this, and like every month you have to have all these big things. Going on, which would could cause your head to spin. And then all of a sudden you've got COVID going on, which the sales component went away. It took a backseat to the constant changes that COVID brought every time, all the time. And then once you get out of COVID, then it's the staffing crisis. And, and then it's the companies trying to recoup. And so it's always this tension of. Trying to get more being and doing more. Like we get that confused, right? So how I really love that, by the way. I want to, I don't have to be more, I just have to do more. And there's a huge delineation for that. So how can you take that mindset and apply it to point number one, right when you're having to do more all the time.

Kent:

It's very, well, I'll say this, I'll, I'll state the obvious. It's very difficult, because you answer to, to a corporation and, and I, I worked for a publicly traded, very large company during COVID and um, there was just. Even though it was COVID, there's always more, more initiatives, more things to emphasize, more projects to work on. And it's very exhausting. And I chose, I chose to step away from, from that job and from that company.'cause I, it was, I. It was just really unrealistic. And so I think that's, unfortunately, that becomes kind of the, the main number one option for people is that I, rather than burnout, I think people get out. And I think, and that's what we're of course still seeing post COVID, five years post COVID. We're seeing people, we see it on LinkedIn, we see it on Facebook. People just, just out there crying out. And crying out for a job outside of the industry because they're just so. I don't know that it's anybody's fault. Nobody's doing it consciously on purpose. Nobody, no company would want that in their people, but until we really develop and address the personal side of people and not just the professional side of people, it's not that we, not that we run counseling organizations for people that, but that we address what's going on inside of people in their emotional world. Yeah,

Erin:

I will tell. I will tell you, my growth, my, my personal growth took a backseat. It was never a priority for me because caregiving was my coping mechanism. So I have my community that needs me. I have my family that needs me, and the only things that I really did for myself. That brought pleasure would be eating, shopping, and working out because it, I had to work out in order to lose some of the anxiety that I had inside. And I realized that that was a healthy coping mechanism, but my professional growth was top priority. and to what extent? I have no idea. I don't really know. I mean, I grew in, in capacity of solving problems inside of a community and knowing, so seeing the patterns that made people wanna choose my community and being able to create stories like I had that skill. I was good at that skill. Um, but I didn't realize the lid, right? Like the leadership lid. And from a growth perspective, I didn't realize that my, my personal. Limitations, the limiting beliefs, were preventing me from growing. Now I understand that, and, and I don't think that senior living understands that either, because I was talking to somebody recently and the recruiter said to send an email and said, you need to work on your professional and your personal growth, and that, that lit a fire underneath me. Like I, I was just like, really? W when. When do we do that? When do we have time to do that? When do we have time to make that a conscious effort? But people like you and I who understand this, who have the experience, understand that actually personal and professional growth, there is no difference. And you can infuse them together. But senior living doesn't try to do that because they, they haven't had the opportunity that they do now with people who have invested in themselves and understand. Had I done things differently, I probably would still be in a community. Had I done things differently, I would not have been so fried. I couldn't walk outta the house for six months.

Kent:

Mm-hmm.

Erin:

we can keep more people in if we let them teach them how to grow their capacity, because things aren't gonna change. People aren't going to change. I'm not gonna be able to change the people coming in to work here, but I can change me. That is where senior living is missing the mark. Yes,

Kent:

I do

Erin:

believe that. Yes. Where I miss the mark,

Kent:

yes. That's

Erin:

good. That's the people business.

Kent:

Mm-hmm.

Erin:

Piece of it. That is my soapbox. I'm sorry that fired me up this week.

Kent:

I cannot, I cannot.

Erin:

Get that out of my mind.

Kent:

I love it.

Erin:

it is the difference of being more versus doing more, and we get trapped that we think it's the same and it's not. We can always do more if we're strategic about it. or do we delegate it anyways? That's probably a whole, well, a

Kent:

lot of that, a lot of that can be delegated. I think the, uh, on a podcast with one-on-one sales academy, I talked about this, the role of the ED and the sales operation and there, the ed carries a radio, carries a big wad of keys. has to be kind of the. It feels like they have to be the center of everything. And they're not trying to micromanage, but they're trying to be involved in all these details and you cannot do it. There's just too many balls in the air and that's what really wears people down. And so I think that if the ED can recognize that they're not the most important person, they're important, they have a very, a really vital role But if people are, I don't like the word, but if people are, are really empowered. To do their jobs. And we treat, we treat our managers. When we treat our staff as professionals, the more mature you can let go of a lot of those things and let people make decisions and let people run with their, with their area of, of discipline or their department and, uh, and put some limits around their job. And I found that I, once I was able to, to do that, I was able to survive.

Erin:

Yeah. Oh yes, definitely. Uh, I was, it was just recently at, uh, my ed launch lab meeting and, and we were really dissecting this very concept, right? What you're talking about, the delegation piece and, going from control based leadership to influence based leadership with management based leadership being in there and. Someone was saying that it was hard whenever it was her license on the wall. how many times do you hear that?

Kent:

it's not true though.

Erin:

I know it's not true. I want you to answer that question.

Kent:

Yeah. So it's, um, it's a, it's an ego thing for somebody to say that the, the license on the wall is the license of the community in the company. They're not typically gonna come after them. Ed, although I, I'm in California. In California, we are seeing some of that happen where eds are, are targeted, but it's really not typically the case. I think that they over, they overemphasize their importance.

Erin:

Yeah. And it's a nurse thing to say that too. And, and my response to her was because I, you hear that all the time and I have said it, and to some degree I believe it in Alabama. They will take away an administrator's license, but that's a fear-based mindset, which will default you to control based leadership, if that's even a term. It may be control based management, I don't know. But the regulations never say that you have to control everything. Regulations and expectations say that you have to respond appropriately. And where I have seen people get in trouble is when they don't respond appropriately or it's delayed or it's ignored. That's when your license becomes a problem. Not in somebody making a horrific judgment call and you have no warning and you couldn't do anything about it.

Kent:

Sure. I don't, certainly don't know. I've, I've had an administrative certificate in three different states, California, Colorado, and Idaho. And in all three of those states, I have found that the state, uh, licensing analysts or inspectors or whatever you call'em, really wanna work with you. They're not out to get us. Right. And they're, they're really not. And there's been a huge shift in a good way, even though kind of the paradoxes that the regulations have become a lot tougher. in California, they've tripled in thickness over the years since I've been doing this, if not quadrupled in thickness. Yeah, but the licensing analysts really wanna work, work with the communities, and they're not, they're not out to get us.

Erin:

Yeah, it's true. It's fear based, and when we're scared we create all kinds of stories. Mm-hmm.

Kent:

And meaning,

Erin:

All right. So which of the 11 points that you wrote. Do you think that, Ooh, this is a hard question. The corporate teams misunderstand the most.

Kent:

Gosh.

Erin:

I know, right? But the

Kent:

corporate team misunderstands the most.

Erin:

Yeah. Like they don't value, maybe they don't even value it as much as they should.

Kent:

Well, I think, um, I think it's just so typical. Unfortunate that when Eds are hired, a a, a company says very proudly and boldly, you're gonna be on call 24 7. That's part of the job, and I think what a tragic thing to say to somebody because nobody can sustain. Yeah. That kind of a schedule. To carry your phone with you and have it by your bed all the time. And the over-functioning workaholic ish, ed, who doesn't have very good limits or boundaries loves it because they feel needed and important and they've got their phone with them all the time and they're losing sleep, but they just think that that's the, the best thing until you can't do it anymore. Yeah. Because that inevitably, inevitably comes. which is why we're seeing people leave the industry in record numbers because it's just, it's so unfortunate and I think there's gotta be, there's gotta be, there's good companies out there and they've gotta be becoming aware of, of this kind of trend and, and hopefully responding to it. Yeah.

Erin:

So good. Okay. This may be my favorite topic that we're gonna talk about, which is passion versus purpose. And I just want you to give me your, your, a monologue about that. Like what makes you So, I mean, I have a lot to say about this topic, but I want to, I want, I really wanna go off of like why you are so purposeful and passionate about this topic. And, I wanna hear what you have to say.

Kent:

I've been so fortunate because I've been mentored by really good people in the industry and, uh, from David Smith at one-on-One Sales Academy, for many years have been trained and mentored by him. My first boss at Ageist, Dwayne Clark, who was very good to me, in fact, made me take a week off and doesn't count against vacation. Made me take a week off. and after filling a building that we opened, he just said, you're tired. You need a week off. and he really looked after my wellbeing. So I was really fortunate to be mentored by some really good, good people. So that's the other, that's the other side of burnout. So the, the burnout didn't come from those people, it came from other situations, That were unfortunate. but I think what really carries people is they're well thought through, developed conviction about what their purpose is on the earth. Passion, I think, is a little more fluid. Um, I can lose. Or my passion can kind of waver at times, depending on a mood or the circumstances or what's coming my way, coming down the pike. but purpose is what carries us and along what, what comes along with purposes or certain habits that we put into place. I think I wrote an article about, six habits that are gonna carry your organization to success. That's somewhere on, out there on LinkedIn right now. Mm-hmm.

Erin:

Yeah, I don't think I ever really knew purpose the way that I do now when I was inside of a community. And why, like I believed passion was the engine. I, I believed passion was my engine. Um, it was always inside of me. And it came out when I first walked into a community, it was the thing that I knew that I had, that was my point of difference. And I, I confused passion with purpose because like you said, passion wanes. And I feel like if I, if I wasn't passionate about what I'm doing was doing, then I wasn't mean. And so I always needed to be passionate about it and I was, and that's exhausting. And then there's the other side where you weaponize passion. Where I fight for what I believe to be true, which is passionate mentality. And really what I had was purpose. That I viewed as passion and I am a passionate being, but I used it the wrong way, Interesting. And I just didn't get it.

Kent:

Here's an example. Probably 18 years or so ago, I trained for several years for a cross country bike race. I rode on a team, a relay team across the country. It was an actual race. I trained for two solid years, and my purpose. Was to be able to train sufficiently so that I could do that race and complete it in, in a reasonable time. we had a goal, but that was our purpose. But my passion for cycling waned with saddle soreness, with hot weather, with rainy weather, with cold weather, with just my energy level. If I had relied on my passion for cycling. I probably, there's a lot of times I wouldn't have gotten on the bike to train, but I had a very clear purpose in mind and that kept me going.

Erin:

yeah. So true. So purpose is the engine and passion is the fuel, like that. and when I can de, when we can delegate those things out, it makes sense, like my purpose. Was to create an environment where people wanted to live, right? A great place to work and live. and I was passionate about that, but it wasn't like the, it's not my passion, it's my purpose. And that's a completely different, mindset to have. It's the being and the doing. and I learned a lot of that from my friend Anna Hall, who's now working with Front Porch. But she started the purpose equation and it, it being in doing, it's a simple two different words. Right. It's Oh, so good. Okay. So what advice would you give the new Ed, who feels the weight but not the joy yet of the passion and the purpose? Because with purpose comes joy.

Kent:

It does. And that's, that's, that's number 11 on my 11 points about being an ED is that it's incredibly satisfying. there's no better environment for me in my career. I've done a variety of of things. I've worked in mental health. I've worked for a nonprofit, youth mentoring organization. Working with seniors is incredibly rewarding.

Erin:

It really is.

Kent:

And I want, I wanted to make sure in that article that's something that, that is noted. Uh, it's because a lot of people from outside of that ask or say to people like us, I don't know how you do it. Because it just seems so well, it is difficult, and so I'm not negating, all the things that are difficult, but there's such a positive, wonderful side to it that mm-hmm. That, uh, that really can carry you.

Erin:

Yes, it's true. So if you feel the weight, you don't wanna, you don't wanna get lost in the weight. You have to look for the joy, and you have to remind yourself of why you do this, and then be aware of your own. Reasons why you're trying to be more and doing more.'cause you don't have to do either. You have to figure out what it is that's driving you to be, need to be more and need to do

Kent:

more. Yeah. You know, really to be fair to the corporate structure, the people that the ED reports to up the ladder. they do get pretty, pretty heavy with initiatives and emphasis and projects, but I never had a boss tell me I needed to work more hours, right? That came from inside of me. My drive, as I've mentioned a few minutes ago, my belief that I'm never doing enough and I need to do more. So, to be fair, to the companies I've worked for, which have been several. Nobody sat down with me and said, you need to work more. Right. If anything, they said, you need to walk away sooner at the end of the day. And that's a, a maturity thing, and that's becoming an adult to have, uh, limits and boundaries around our job and step away from it. And that's a tough lesson.

Erin:

and it's the area that the companies need to invest in their leadership for.

Kent:

Mm-hmm.

Erin:

Because that's there's the root cause. There

Kent:

it is. That's

Erin:

why coaching is important. That's why awareness is important. That's why all the things that we're talking about is because if you don't have this, the awareness to even call it out by name, let alone the tools to correct it. Then that's crashing and burning,

Kent:

Yeah. I'm amazed with that. Be this article it catch caught fire out there on LinkedIn and, um, I, I am. Amazed, stunned by the number of comments. People made their own self-disclosure about their own struggle to me with direct messages, messages on LinkedIn, emails that I got from that. I'm still getting from people thanking me for it. And unfortunate, it's unfortunate that, I mean, it's, it's kind of a two-edged sword because it's great that people can speak up. There's a, there's now an, there's an avenue out. There I can, gosh, somebody took the lid off this thing and now I can, I can speak up. But it's unfortunate that there's so many people who are struggling.

Erin:

Yeah. It's a real, it's a real opportunity for senior living to invest in their leaders. there's so much to say with that. Okay. So when we talk about what needs to be changed in the side of the industry, this is a big segue. I mean. People centered for leadership as well as resident centered. And now you are working with a company that really is a people centered, sales driven or, organization, one-on-one sales academy, which I am truly intrigued by. And so we can do that for sales, but there's the operations piece, which I believe sales and operations are the same thing I do. Sales is influence, leadership is influence, it's all the same. so tell us more about that, and all the exciting things about what Yeah, I

Kent:

think so. I think, the credit goes to David Smith, who created the company one-on-one and began to do training years and years ago and had, uh. Really frustrating, limited success, trying to fill buildings. Got, you know, going on, I think at least 30 years ago now. he was really at the forefront and he began to study the psychology of change and how people make decisions and some of the thinking with one-on-one sales. Comes out of the recovery movement and a practice called Motivational Interviewing where we tap into people's own motivations for change and not telling them that they need to change and make a decision. And so it's, it's proven to be a. very effective. So David is looking at his legacy, decided to create a company that can train hundreds and thousands of salespeople out there in the industry to move the needle to, to be able to reach more, to more residents in a very human, very empathic trust building way to move them towards a decision to move to senior living. Yeah. So true. It's the only way I, I was just, sorry. I was gonna say, I was trained by David back in 2012. And it, it changed, radically changed my thinking about people and about, about selling to seniors. And I've been able to be mentored and trained by David and the, the one-on-one people. So to be able to go to work for them is a real privilege. Oh

Erin:

yeah. I've only known how to, I didn't have the words like, the motivation, their own personal motivation, but I only know relationship centered sales and relationship centered operations. And when you talk about change management or change motivation, that applies to operations 100% right now as well. You know, I mean, it's just. Yeah, I fought change tooth and nail because I was scared that I wouldn't be able to succeed in the new way That was, that was happening. And had somebody simply just said to me, don't you wanna move to the next level of your career? Just plugged into that one side of me instead of like. Change, forcing things. It would've been a much different response, from a highly passionate, fighter. It would've been very, very different,

Kent:

yeah.

Erin:

So what is your role with one-on-one Sales Academy and what are the big, what are the big, I mean, I see the benefit of it. I see it, I know it. I like, I like to watch. Their content on LinkedIn. So

Kent:

yeah, it's, it's, um, it's, a great, it's gonna be a, it's really just launching, just coming. July one was the launch of the company, so it's a whole package of podcasts and videos, uh, webinars. there's an an e-learning portal that people would be able to get on and, and do some training, and it's designed for the com, uh, to be, uh, training and encouraging community level salespeople, sales teams. as kind of at your own pace, learning and training, what's called prospect center selling model that David developed and is trademarked by David. he's, he decided to pass on a legacy. So he started this company and, um, it's, it is, it is catching fire already and we haven't even really, we haven't really even touched very many companies at this point.

Erin:

Yeah, it's going to, I have that same philosophy, that same legacy impact that I want from the, for the operations side. And so I, I saw it and I just thought, hmm. It's a great idea because I'm trying to do it myself on the

Kent:

s it's gonna be, it's gonna be really fun. He brought together a whole host of people in March in St. Louis to do a bunch of video recording, recording podcasts, and I got to be a part of that. And I left there thinking, I wanna work with David. I've always, actually, always wanted to. And so we created a way for me to do that and, and I'm, I'm really fortunate to be able to do that.

Erin:

which is a good point as we close out this episode, senior living is a big world, but it's very, very small. Mm-hmm. And so everywhere you go. You have to think with the end in mind because you never know who's going to be your boss. You never know who's going to have the next opportunity for you to go, so you cannot think such short term picture. You really have to think from a big term, right? Perspective,

Kent:

right?

Erin:

So you don't. Limit yourself. Is really important.

Kent:

We're really fortunate. We've got Reed Davis on board who's the chief learning Officer, and he's a master trainer of Prospect Center selling. He was with a Align and with Sherpa doing their national training and so he's, he's on board with us as well. Yeah. So we're really fortunate to have him.

Erin:

That's great. That's great. okay. Leave us off with something. you are working with one-on-one Sales Academy, you're also an elevation. You founder of Elevation Coaching, you do one-on-one coaching. I love to bring coaches on, my, my podcast because we do offer insights and people need to hear the story of, of lessons learned, hard lessons learned, and and resilience wins on the way back up. What is something you're passionate about? You know, I know we talked a little bit about what leaders need to know, but what do you. What are some wise words you have for us to close

Kent:

this out? Sure. Well wise words, we'll see. We'll let the listener decide that. Right, I am, um, very enthusiastic about midlife transitions and really they, they start. Sometimes sooner than people think. It's not necessarily midlife crisis, although some people go through, what you'd call a crisis, but everybody faces midlife. Midlife transitions with their career. Maybe with a relationship with kids, there's oftentimes a period of disillusionment or questioning, uh, asking themselves what's next. Sometimes people asking, is this all there is? and I think that when people are spec senior living, specifically executive directors for example, and regional people say, is this all there is because I'm tired. There's a way through to learn to put limits on the job, to get some help, whether that's hiring a coach, going to therapy, talking to a friend, um, and even. Even taking the risk and sitting down with your boss and saying, I, I need help in order to make it in, in this job. Because I think that, I think that there's starting to be openings in companies where people are, are open to hearing what's really going on in the life of an ed.

Erin:

Yeah. So true. It's so true. Don't, I hate to

Kent:

see, I hate to see people leaving the industry unnecessarily or out of, out of bitterness or burnout.

Erin:

Yeah. Oh, that's good. Unless you take the scary leap to invest in yourself with a coach or a mentor, you don't know how life changing it can be. But you have to be ready. I work with three different companies now and I told one of the CEOs, don't give me somebody who doesn't want it. Okay. It has to be somebody who wants it and they don't even know what they want because coaching is such a foreign practice. It was for me. but I, I took the leap and it changed my life. It did. And I recently just saw a quote that says. And this was me inside of a community. If you are your own mentor, you are being run, you know you will fail because you only know what you know. Yeah. You only know what you know.

Kent:

Yeah. Just continue to live out of our blind spots that way. Yeah.

Erin:

Well, okay. Where can they find you? more about you, Ken?

Kent:

uh, one on one-on-one dot com slash academy. One-on-one dot com slash academy and uh, elevation coaching.net.

Erin:

Okay. Alright, well thank you so much for Thank you. giving us your wisdom and talking about this and all the content that you're putting out on LinkedIn. It's so refreshing. We appreciate it. And again, coaching is something that is worth investing in. Kent is a avail, is available. I am available. We have. leadership courses, the ED launch lab. Invest in yourself because you are worth the investment and you will take yourself wherever you go. That's the key thing to remember. I like it.

Kent:

Thank you very much. Thanks for having me on today, Erin. I appreciate it.

Erin:

You're welcome. You're welcome. Yeah. Have a great day everyone. Always aspire for more for you.