Female Disruptors: Lynne Giacobbe of Kendal at Home On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry
An Interview With Candice Georgiadis
Check in with your colleagues. We come together as a staff every week to check in with one another and, at the end of the week, to check out. These sessions are for both managing the work and supporting one another as individuals. Our work can be very difficult. Our care coordinators are working with our members every day, and many are very ill, some at end of life.
As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Lynne Giacobbe.
Lynne Giacobbe has served as chief executive officer of Kendal at Home, a nonprofit pioneer of aging in place, since its inception in 2003. Through the development of Kendal at Home, which has recently expanded its one-of-a-kind program to Massachusetts, Lynne has helped to enable aging in place for older adults who prefer to spend their retirement years in their own homes.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?
I spent my early career in the victims’ services field expecting that would be the focus of my entire career. And when I joined Kendal at Home in 2003, I thought that might be just a detour. I would get the program up and running, rebalance my family life, and return to the field I knew and loved. Yet here I am 19 years later, and grateful for the chance to empower seniors to live the lives they want to.
The reason I’m still here is that the import of this work and the rewards are very similar to what I loved about victims’ services. Prior to coming to Kendal, I’d had the opportunity to develop innovative programs, to serve victims, and impact their lives in meaningful ways. That’s what my career at Kendal at Home has been as well, developing innovative programs and really changing the way we look at aging.
We’ve dismantled some stereotypes, including the notion that one’s later years are spent slowing down and disengaging from the community. For our members, it’s quite the opposite. One of our members is in Europe right now bicycling and kayaking, something that would challenge many people 50 years younger.
All of our members are actively engaged in life in meaningful ways and doing amazing things. Our program is about empowering them to be able to continue doing those things secure in the knowledge that they have a plan in place if challenges arise along the way.
Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?
We’re disrupting on two fronts. First, we’re disrupting the way people think about aging. The stereotype of a senior citizen is a frail, lonely, wobbly elder parked in front of a TV — not exactly the picture of aging that I think we want to foster. Nor is it accurate. I’ve known so many older adults who could run circles around us. Our first member was still out on the golf course every day and still enjoying life well into his 90s.
Even more importantly, we’re also disrupting the idea that aging necessarily entails leaving your home and entering a retirement community, nursing home, assisted living, or memory care facility. For many, that prospect is a great fear. Our goal is really to help people age in place where they want to be. And more often than not, that’s in their home. Fortunately, we’ve been extremely successful: 98% of our members have remained at home and not in a nursing home.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
I’m not sure if it was funny or just unsettling, but I made a memorable mistake 19 years ago when I was interviewing for this job. I had spent about 20 years in human services and had researched extensively for the interview. It was a lengthy one and throughout the process my interviewers kept mentioning the acronym CCRC. I had no idea what it was. So I made my way through that interview process and never asked. After the interview, I looked it up: CCRC=continuing care retirement community, a fundamental concept in our work. So it was like interviewing for a chef’s position, knowing a lot about the culinary arts, yet not knowing what EVOO is. The lesson was to do my best, and stay calm if I haven’t yet achieved perfection. Things will work out.
We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?
Mentors have made a huge impact in my life and career. When I started this role I was really struggling because Kendal at Home was different from the thousands of other organizations represented at the conferences I attended. Overwhelmingly, the others were retirement communities or facilities, and we were just a tiny minority of operators working to help people age at home.
Feeling disconnected from our field, I was preparing to return to victims’ services when our trade organization launched a leadership program, and I was invited to join. The woman who facilitated that program and still does today has become one of my strongest mentors and greatest friends. Her name is Judy Sorum Brown. She’s so many things, a poet, was a White House fellow, and an extremely gifted coach and leader.
She has opened a world to me that I never knew existed. Through that leadership program, I found my place and I found my chosen family, and it made a tremendous difference in my life, both professionally and personally. Today I work closely with Judy, and together we facilitate a leadership development program for Kendal at Home and all of the communities that are part of Kendal. I continue to learn from her every day.
In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?
Great question. I think disruption is critical. When there’s an opportunity to improve the human condition in some way, we should take it. And that’s especially critical in my line of work, but of course, we still are working within the confines of a healthcare system.
And that system, incidentally, is where I can find a personal example of disruption that’s not so positive. I had a routine checkup scheduled with my doctor’s office earlier this week, and when they were scheduling my routine lab work, I asked, “Could you order a throat culture? Because I think I may have strep.”
“Sorry,” came the reply. “We don’t see sick people in the doctor’s office anymore.”
Well. What do we do with that? If sick people can’t be seen in a doctor’s office, where do they go? I don’t have an answer for that right now. Although that kind of disruption that makes a certain kind of sense — in terms of pandemic containment — we also need to think critically about it.
Ultimately, we need to balance making progress through disruption with keeping a solid foundation beneath us. In my work, things that have stood the test of time include Quaker values, respect for elders, and support for their decision-making.
Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.
- Check in with your colleagues. We come together as a staff every week to check in with one another and, at the end of the week, to check out. These sessions are for both managing the work and supporting one another as individuals. Our work can be very difficult. Our care coordinators are working with our members every day, and many are very ill, some at end of life. We always start our check-ins with a moment of silence, a Quaker tradition. Some people think that’s prayer; I think it’s whatever you want that to be. But each of us comes into the session with a million things going on. It’s just taking a minute to clear our head and focus on the work at hand right now.
- Ask good questions. We go around the room at these check-in sessions. They work best when team members are asked not just the regular yes or no questions, but the kinds of questions that only the person being asked can answer. This invites their colleagues to really learn about that person or that individual. Examples: What’s weighing on you today? What’s holding you back? What can you do about it? Colleagues can answer any way they want and are not to be interrupted. It helps center all of us.
- Be vulnerable. Admitting vulnerability allows other people to relate to you and to be open themselves. It starts a conversation that can build a foundation of trust.
We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?
Although we’re primarily focused on our current program, which is extremely successful in enabling and empowering people to be able to remain at home, not everyone can afford this program. So we are exploring ways provide similar types of programs and services to both a middle- and low-income population. That would be a type of disruption that would create tremendous value for a lot of people.
In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?
I’m grateful that at Kendal at Home and other nonprofits, many women are successfully leading organizations and disrupting them in very positive ways. We’ve done that for a long time and are respected leaders across this industry.
As I think about diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging, I believe we all want to belong. We all want to build value regardless of the color of our skin, our gender, age, and ability.
Earlier in in my career, I faced some significant challenges building value. I was working in a male dominant field of law enforcement officers, district attorneys, prosecutors, and defense attorneys. Eventually, I learned how important was to be respectful as you demand respect in return.
And in the 10 years that I was there, I became a trusted partner. I had to demonstrate that I was worthy of trust and would not interfere with the work the others needed to do, but that we had a right to be present and support victims.
Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?
Like many people, I would say Brené Brown’s podcast on vulnerability made a significant impact in my life. And it opened my eyes to other powerful Ted Talks that I use quite often.
Another current favorite tool is a Springsteen video I found. At a live performance, someone in his audience requested the song “You Never Can Tell.” It’s an older song, and the E Street Band as currently configured probably had never played it together. “Well,” says Bruce. “Let’s see if we can do it.” In front of the waiting audience, he works with Stevie Van Zandt to figure out the chords and the chorus. Then they figure out the horn parts, and pretty soon they play the song and it is phenomenal. And it’s about teams, right? It’s about coming together and creating something that you’ve never done before — and being vulnerable in the face of uncertainty.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
Right now my passion is around leadership development and inspiring others to accomplish whatever work they’re passionate about. So many people positively impacted my life and enabled me to become the person I am today, so I try to pay it forward by working with emerging leaders today. I try to help them grow and become stronger leaders to achieve what’s important to them.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
“The past is a guidepost, not a hitching post.” It’s from Thomas Holcroft, a poet. And it is right in front of me here in my office.
I see mistakes as learning opportunities. We try not to repeat them. Rather, we try to learn from them and rebound to make a greater impact as a result.
How can our readers follow you online?
This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!
Female Disruptors: Lynne Giacobbe of Kendal at Home On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.