To understand the leadership priorities of Integral Senior Living, one must understand the company’s culture because after talking to President and CEO Collette Gray, it’s clear that culture is at the heart of the Carlsbad-based business that manages assisted living and memory care properties in 23 states.
In 2012 — “before culture was cool,” Gray says — at an annual leadership meeting, about 70 of the company’s executive directors and of its regional team brainstormed and produced 12 simple principles and philosophies.
These “culture keepers” include phrases such “Have fun and work hard” and “Work smarter, not harder.” The company, known as ISL for short, looks to identify and reward its community teams who best exemplify those principles.
This interview with Gray, who has been with ISL for 11 years, has been shortened for space and clarity.
What makes your company different?
Our culture and our people. Our culture is something we pride ourselves on. It’s our secret sauce, if you will. Anyone here at anytime can rattle off what their favorite Culture Keeper is and what it means to them. People have mission statements oftentimes but you don’t know it. Your associates don’t know it. It doesn’t mean anything, it doesn’t resonate. With our Culture Keepers, our executive directors are the ones that came up with that. They’re little sayings that people use on a daily basis.
It seems that culture bleeds right into your leadership philosophy.
It does. Our culture is in everything we do. Every other week I send out what we call a Friday Fish Fact because we incorporate the Fish! philosophy into our culture as well. (From the Seattle Pike Place Fish Market, Fish! is a business technique aimed at creating happy individuals in the workplace).
I think it speaks to my leadership style. I believe in fostering an environment where people feel comfortable communicating with one another for the betterment of the business. It’s not top down. I don’t make decisions in a vacuum. I involve people. But it doesn’t take us, you know, three weeks to decide something. We execute very quickly. But it’s not just one person making the decision. We really rely on one another.
Which of the 12 steps do you find yourself quoting the most?
Two of them — “Want to come to work everyday” and “Take something ordinary and make it fun.” I think we all have to work so if we have to work, let’s make it fun and not feel like a job. It’s not taking yourself too seriously. Being in an environment where you do want to come to work everyday because you like the people you work with, you have made friends with them, you like the environment you’re in — that’s what keeps people. That’s our “different and better” story.
What attracted you to the senior living sector?
My grandmother, who helped raise me. I was really close to her and had a hard time when she ed away. I started volunteering at an assisted living community near my home, which at the time it was in Las Vegas, and I started calling bingo and just fell in love with the industry. I can’t imagine doing anything else. You get back what you give. It’s just incredibly rewarding.
