By Steve Moran
This is the start of a new series at Senior Living Foresight. I am constantly stressed that
I can’t interview as many people as I would like. I borrowed this idea from a friend of New York Times writer Paula Span (with permission of course).
Denise Boudreau-Scott is President of Drive, a company that helps aging services organizations improve the resident and staff experience, and the bottom-line, through more engaged leaders and employees. She is a former nursing home and assisted living administrator and serial volunteer. She started her work in senior living as a dietary aide and nursing assistant and was inspired by her grandmother for whom she was a caregiver.
1. What is the most important leadership lesson you have learned?
That my ego gets in the way too often and that even though I think I’m open to hearing others, ego plays a role in shutting down those ideas, even if it’s just silently in my head.
2. What has surprised you most about being a leader?
How much people watch your every move. They are always watching whether you know it or not.
3. What is the best leadership advice anyone ever gave you?
When you are trying to solve issues quickly in crisis mode, you miss valuable information from others, which leads to decisions that aren’t the best, that circles you back to being in crisis mode.
4. When you are faced with impossible challenges where do you find strength?
Writing down at least three things that I’m grateful for each morning and spending time in meditation.
5. If you were to compare yourself with a historical, movie, or storybook character as a metaphor for how you lead who would it be and why?
Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz for my ability to help people recognize their strengths and believe anything is possible.
