Duration: 17m 05s
Description
Mark and Rachel Reynolds launched their Right at Home franchise in 2020. In the five years since, they have become a vital part of their Rockwall, Texas, community. Their Right at Home franchise connects a close-knit network of caregivers, clients, and their families.
Indeed, personal relationships are at the heart of everything for this family-owned franchise.
A Helping Profession
Mark and Rachel both worked for years in education–Rachel as a special education teacher and educational diagnostician; Mark as a high school basketball coach and special education behavioral specialist.
In one sense, home caregiving may seem like quite a leap from special education. But Rachel explains that it was actually the next logical step for their family. Both had recently retired from education, but as Rachel remembers, “We knew we were still young enough to work and contribute, and we wanted to do something in a helping profession, since that’s where our hearts and our backgrounds lie. So it just seemed like a natural transition.”
The Search For a Home
Though the transition to home care felt like a natural one, the best pathway into the field wasn’t as immediately obvious.
Rachel, who retired from education a few years before Mark, tells us that Right at Home wasn’t the first franchise system they explored. “I knew that I wanted to go the franchise route, because we have no business background,” says Rachel. “We knew how to love people and take care of people. We didn’t know how to run a business.”
The Reynolds were searching for a franchise model that prioritized personal relationships the same way they both had during their own careers in education. They spoke with several different franchise systems in search of this very thing. They found it with Right at Home.
As Rachel recalls, “We really connected with the people at Right at Home, and saw a very similar vision, and knew that it just felt like home.”
Team Building
Of course, what really makes a great home is the people you share it with. Mark tells us that the real secret to their franchise’s success is the makeup of their team. The first step, and the most important ongoing priority, is to build and keep a culture of caring, compassion, and complementary skills.
“You’ve got to create a team that can deal with all the different people. We all have different skill sets. We all connect with people in different ways,” says Mark. He stresses the importance of assembling a diverse team, one that can “handle roles like recruiting, onboarding, training, coaching, and the relationship between the client and caregiver.”
Building a great team should ultimately translate to the highest level of care, says Mark. Fortunately, this is a philosophy that the Reynolds carried with them into franchise ownership.
“Like Rachel mentioned, we’re not business-minded,” says Mark. “We’re people-minded. And I think if you can take care of the people–your employees and your clients–-then things are going to work.”
A Family Affair
The truth is, home caregiving can be unpredictable, and so can running your own business.
“There probably is no typical day,” says Rachel. “You never know what to expect. And you wake up and you look at your phone and you say, ‘Oh, what caught on fire while I was asleep?’”
But, adds Mark, “We’re lucky enough to be in a family-run business. And so for us, it comes naturally, and we can all just pitch in wherever.”
In fact, says Rachel, her sister does marketing for their franchise, and their daughter also recently joined the team. So it truly is a family affair. Indeed, the Reynolds run their business with a shared commitment to each other and their long-term goals, the way a healthy, functional family might.
Rachel offers a few examples, telling us about the time the Reynolds helped one of their caregivers find new housing. She also shared a recent experience in which several members of her team worked together to help a paralyzed client adjust to using assistive technology.
“So,” says Rachel, “it’s a lot of troubleshooting and putting fires out, but at this point, it’s just kind of whatever’s needed.”
Day Or Night
This approach toward care has endeared the Reynolds to their community in ways that go above and beyond the typical client-caregiver relationships. For instance, Rachel relates the story of a military veteran that her team serves.
“He tells people all the time that we’re his family,” says Rachel. “His birthday is coming up, and we’ll all go over there with balloons and cake, and make a big deal.”
This emphasis on personal relationships is not a business decision. It’s just who Rachel and Mark are. The Reynolds have built their franchise on the strength of human connection. As Rachel notes, “The clients and the caregivers both know that they can call us day or night if they have a need and we’re always there to answer.”
Tapping the Network
That’s how the broader Right at Home system works, too. Mark and Rachel agree that the level of support they’ve received from corporate has been incredible. Not only that, but being a part of the franchise system has given them access to a whole network of other business owners.
Mark explains that there are roughly 12 or 13 Right at Home offices in their surrounding North Texas region.
“We’re all very close,” he says. “We’re in a performance group, and that guidance is great. Our meetings together are great. It’s always fun to go to Home Improvement and get all the new ideas and see people.”
And ultimately, that’s what it’s really about. Personal relationships form the core of everything– from the connections that owners build with each other (and with corporate) down to the way caregivers and owners like Mark and Rachel forge lasting ties to their own communities.
As Mark says, “There’s just a great excitement about helping people and about the mission to improve their quality of life.”
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Meet the Family | Rosaleen Doherty
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