What $15M Senior1Care Did When Culture Started Falling Behind Operations (Jane Francis)

Miriam Allred (00:01)
Welcome back to the Home Care Strategy Lab. Thank you for tuning in week after week. I'm so glad you're here today. This is going to be a good one. I have been trying to get someone on from Senior1Care in Indiana for some time now. And after meeting today's guest, it has been worth the wait. So in the lab today, I am joined by Jane Francis, the Executive Vice President of Senior1Care. Jane, thank you for joining me and welcome to the lab.

Jane Francis (00:30)
It's an honor, I feel like I'm with a movie star and a friend at the same time.

Miriam Allred (00:34)
That is, okay, that I love. When people say movie star, I blush and I get uncomfortable. But a friend, I want you to feel like you know me because you have been an avid listener, consumer of this podcast for a very long time. And then I got to know you and we met and I'm like, I want you on the show tomorrow. When can you join me? But you're busy, but the timing is right. So I'm so excited to have this conversation.

Jane Francis (00:41)
Exactly.

Miriam Allred (00:57)
I want to give a little teaser of your background and then I want you to fill it in with some of the details. But when we met a couple of weeks ago, you gave me the long version. So I'm going to give the short version and then you can kind of fill it in. you were born into a big family. I think you said nine of 13, born creative in a family of maybe like right brain people. So you started out as a hairdresser, turned nurse from degree from Purdue, turned top sales rep in the jewelry industry.

and then went on to lead Bus Dev at a huge senior living business And then you channeled all of that and now you are growing a home care company like crazy. And I want to know what you're doing and how you're doing it. So before we get into that, highlight some of your lessons learned in your career that have led you to where you are today.

Jane Francis (01:51)
Well, you I always say, when you look at life experience, and I think of our clients, you know, one of the first questions we ask our clients when we get to know them is, tell me about your life. And, what's neat about that is you learn, number one, how remarkable they are as a person and what they've accomplished in their life. And it necessarily wasn't always easy, right?

But the common denominators that I would hear over and over and over again, working with our clients is, is they had, a belief system. they, had either someone believe enough in them to start their journey, whatever, their career path, or they just had that belief already innately inside themselves that they could just, that was their launching pad. And then the next step was, is they connected with

people in their life that you always hear about people who say, if it wasn't for Blake, they really made an impact on my life. They made me a better version of myself. They invested in me. And so that connection of mentorship and people who are going to to invest in you. And then the third was is really that same successful person has that grit and tenacity.

You can just see it there. They're they're failing forward. They're taking it and they're just going to keep repeating they're honing need their craft and they're not going to quit until they get there. And so I look at kind of my journey of where I started and vulnerability. I will tell you I was a person that didn't believe in myself. I had a lovely upbringing. I love my family, but I I had.

suffered from like I would compare myself to other people. And so I had to have someone believe in me until I could believe in myself. And my family did great, but it was all in my head. It was my husband, we said, know what Jane, you are a great hairdresser, but boy, you would be an amazing nurse. And I was fearful, because I'm like, well, I don't know if I could start an IV or I don't know if I could, you what happens if something happened in.

You know, I kept thinking of all the what ifs. But what I would say to all that is, I did that, I became a nurse, and it really is the backbone of who I am. I love helping people, I love serving. But then it got to the point where I still had that creative side of me. I had that entrepreneur side of me. that, I wanted to keep growing. I wanted to keep learning.

And I was 34 years old. I was the director of a very progressive surgical center back in the 90s when that really was when surgical centers were just becoming surgical centers. I had a great job, but I felt like something was missing. A part of me, like I needed to do more. I wanted to have a little more flexibility as well. And so,

I was introduced to a direct sales company and this direct sales company was based out of Dallas, Texas. And at the time I started, they had been in business for about 15 years and they had a top reputation and their values aligned with my values. And I thought, I think this is a place where it's going to make me a better version of myself. I could see myself.

really learning how to build a business. And I knew nothing about jewelry or sales, but other than the fact that I knew I was drawn to the mission of enriching lives and making a difference. And they called it direct service business, not a direct sales business. So for 19 years that I worked with Premier Designs, it was all about your serving.

Serving, serving. We weren't selling anything. So with that, I think it's really important that I note that these 19 years were probably the most crucial building blocks for me personally as a person. I became a better wife, a better mother, a better leader, a better everything because of this company.

invested so much on the inside of us to make us a really good person that allowed us ultimately to create pretty large profits. When you focus on the people, the profits come. And so that's really what happened. But when I was at 34 years old, when I started this business, I still had my full-time nursing job. I did not leave it right away because I wanted to make sure I could be successful in this.

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