In Kind Dining, We Get to the Heart of Empathy

An important element of caring for older adults as they share meals together is for staff who serve meals to fully grasp their own changing role and responsibilities around the table. The cultural shift in service quality requires servers at all levels of care and from all departments to demonstrate empathy.

Listening to your own residents or watching short videos such as this together with your staff, helps to stimulate conversation about the challenges of aging, and how they can be of more help to residents.

Watch Video: On Life, and Death, After 85 By Nicole Bengiveno and Jessica Naudziunas

Related Article: What Homes Means to New York’s Oldest Old , New York Times

About Cindy Heilman

Cindy is the founder and owner of Kind Dining®, which she began in 2006. She’s traveled across the country and Canada working with and training senior living communities that want to create an exceptional dining experience for their residents and staff. In addition, she certifies select professionals in her Kind Dining® philosophy and provides tools, now in an eLearning format, that make learning stick and help people put insights into action. As a result of her work, clients often share their staff has a new sense of purpose, get along better and keep their focus and energy on what matters most. In fact, she wrote a book, Hospitality for Boomers on how to attract residents and keep good team members. In her free time, she enjoys walking Oregon trails and cheering on her favorite soccer teams, the Portland Thorns and Timbers.

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