Page 2 - The Clare Connection_Summer 2020 Flipbook

LETTER FROM
KYLE
Kyle Exline, Executive Director
Gold Coast Retirement Living Your Way
55 E. Pearson Street | Chicago, IL 60611 COVID-19. By March 13, the state issued another warning that congregate
312.784.8100 | info@theclare.com
www.theclare.com
Editor: Kourtney Liepelt
Strategic Communications
& Relations Manager
Designer: David Hunter
www.dhdd.net
Copyright ©2020
“Our world has changed, and The Clare
has changed with it. You should have great
confidence in knowing The Clare will
consistently rise to the top.”
Managing COVID-19
D uring my six years as the Executive Director of The Clare, my focus has
always been on taking one step at a time, remaining focused on challenging
the status quo and moving The Clare forward. This has meant solving the
day-to-day issues that arise, creating opportunities for our workforce and
delivering a level of service to our residents that is unmatched. Back in
February, The Clare had a fantastic month of operations. We recorded several
sales and move-ins, occupancy was at all-time high levels and all of our staff
positions were filled. I anticipated that 2020 would be another extremely
successful year for The Clare.
Then COVID-19 happened.
When I step back and think about what I look for when I hire directors, managers
or employees, I assess their character and potential based on one question in
particular: If they fell into the deep end of the pool, could they survive? To
me, that means if everything they know falls apart, are they able to quickly
adjust? Can they be creative? Can they think outside of their current job and
do somebody else’s? How resilient are they? Now, in this scenario that I play
out during an interview, I am mostly thinking about day-to-day operational
challenges, not a pandemic. But the reason The Clare has managed COVID-19
successfully is that our team was unknowingly built for it.
As of this letter, The Clare has dealt with 16 positive employee cases of COVID-19,
and four positive resident cases. We have not had any deaths associated with
the virus, and 90% of the positive cases were asymptomatic and identified
during mass testing. I am not willing to “celebrate” our overall good record,
as we have learned COVID-19 is seemingly lurking around every corner and
constant vigilance is required. For transparency, I think it is important to share
what I think were critical decisions we have made, some that in hindsight were
right and others we might have carried out differently.
Service Adjustments
On March 9, Illinois issued a state of emergency related to the spread of
settings were considered very risky for the spread of the virus. Within a few
hours of that release, Francesco Tardio, Director of Dining Services and Hagop
Hagopian, Executive Chef already had a plan in place to shift dining operations
to delivery and pick-up only.