You certainly don’t need to have a background in healthcare to open a Right at Home franchise. After all, our franchisees come from virtually every field, career path, and area of expertise. That said, coming from a nursing career certainly does have its advantages.
Just ask Lisa McComb, who launched her Southern Milwaukee home care franchise in 2016. As Lisa explains, “I am a retired nurse, and I was looking for my semi-retirement dream job after working many years and raising a family.”
“I was looking for my next steps,” Lisa says. Those steps ultimately led her into the Right at Home network.
Pursuing a Passion
“I wanted to pursue my passion,” Lisa tells us. “My passion was always senior care. I started out as a CNA back in the 80s, and really loved it.”
So Lisa did her homework. She explored a variety of franchising opportunities in the senior care space. And ultimately, she landed on a model that aligned with her values. As Lisa recalls now, after discovering Right at Home, “I thought, well, let me get back into doing what I love, and I have not regretted it since.”
Keeping a Packed Schedule
Lisa may be retired from nursing, but in many ways, her daily to-do list is longer than ever. As she explains, that list “starts with making sure that all of our seniors are cared for. Shifts are pretty much 24 hours, and a lot of our shifts start at eight or nine in the morning, so we’re there to make sure that our caregivers are clocking in.”
Lisa says her days are largely spent in face-to-face meetings both with members of her team and members of the community. As she explains, “We do a fair amount of assessments throughout the day – going to all types of individuals throughout the Milwaukee community and developing plans of care for them as well as meeting throughout the day with folks in the office and reviewing ways to improve our quality.”
In addition to these scheduled tasks, Lisa explains that a big part of each day is also dedicated to problem-solving. For example, says Lisa, “In Milwaukee this winter, we had a lot of snow. So I was just about making sure we could get our caregivers to our clients.”
Connecting with Clients
Lisa’s schedule may keep her busy, but she is more than grateful to spend her days helping clients, their families, and the broader Milwaukee community. And the joy that Lisa takes away from her work is about more than just care.
As Lisa tells us, it’s about building connections and nurturing relationships with “everyone from a 50-year-old who has a compromising illness to a centenarian who’s been through World War II, been in fighter planes, and lived a very full life.”
“The biggest takeaway,” says Lisa, “is that we’re not only providing that quality care, but we get the opportunity to go into our seniors’ and our disabled clients’ homes. It’s a privilege, and we get to spend a fair amount of their journey with them. Sometimes, we even help them complete their journey in life.”
Doing It for the Right Reasons
Not only is Lisa passionate about the work she does, but she also looks for that same internal drive in the members of her team. She explains that “Quality is so, so important to us as an organization, and to everyone who works for us. Really, that’s what we look for in our administrators and also our caregivers, is that they have a passion, that they want to be here for the right reasons.”
Speaking to prospective franchise owners, Lisa advises that, ultimately, if you do it for the right reasons, you get to make an incredible impact on the lives of your clients, and they will make an incredible impact on yours.
“They share a lot of that with us,” Lisa says of her clients. “So that’s a huge takeaway for me. I just love doing it.”
To learn more about franchise opportunities with Right at Home, visit https://rightathomefranchise.com/.