Comfort Life's Inspiring Leaders showcases the leadership behind Canada's most progressive retirement communities
Comfort Life interviewed retirement living thought leaders across Canada who shared their insights into how the active adult lifestyle and senior living sectors are responding to changing needs of older Canadians, and how companies and communities will evolve in the 2020s.
MISSISSAUGA, Ontario, July 1, 2021 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Comfort Life has just launched Inspiring Leaders, a series of interviews with the country's most innovative, insightful leaders in retirement living. In the series, company executives from across Canada discuss how the industry has progressed in recent years, responding to the changing needs of Canadians, and how it will evolve throughout the 2020s.
As Canada's baby boom population ages—now with an estimated 7 million people aged 65 and older—they look toward the future, wondering where and how they will grow old. Their concerns go far beyond safety and security—they're focused on living lives full of meaning, activity, and personal fulfillment. Karim Kassam of Optima Living, Kevin Pidgeon of Nautical Lands Group, and Elaine Wood of Delmanor Senior Living are among the leaders profiled in this series.
Kassam, vice president of the British Columbia Seniors Living Association and co-founder of Optima, acknowledges that the pandemic has been a litmus test. "If we can keep people safe and healthy during a pandemic, then we've shown Canadians that we can do so in any circumstance." Optima Living has indeed kept residents safe, and all those profiled in the series led companies that excelled at controlling the virus. An implicit message carried by the series is that many communities across the country were, in fact, safer than living in the general public. Other important ideas were more explicit, oriented to a bigger picture beyond the pandemic.
"Many people talk about aging-in-place," says Pidgeon, Chief Operating Officer of Nautical Lands Group, but communities like his offer "effective ways for residents [to do so] with the least disruption and discomfort in their environment." He speaks for others in adding, "We're always looking for ways in which to facilitate that transformation." In the series, he and others offer a look ahead at how aging in the proper place will improve older Canadians' lives in the future.
"I think it'll boil down to offering as much choice as we can for people," says Wood of Delmanor. Innovation is at the forefront of strategy for leaders like her. "You can never just rest on [what] was successful today," she says. All agree that the pandemic has sharpened their focus on excellence, and that it will lead to communities that will exceed the expectations of the country's aging population.
"There's going to be tremendous investment by the public sector and by the private sector," says Kassam. "Seniors' housing [and] senior living communities are going to be tremendously attractive two to three years from now because of all of the innovation and investment that's going to be coming into the sector."
Comfort Life has promoted retirement living in Canada since 2002. "We're happy to give focus to an alternative story to the one that's dominated headlines over the past 16 months," says Jim Huinink, director of Comfort life. "Working closely with this industry, we see firsthand how dedicated, deeply driven, and passionate everyone is. We believe that comes through in the series. That reassurance is important for people to hear."
View the series here: https://www.comfortlife.ca/inspiring-leaders.php
Media Contact
Jim Huinink, Our Kids Media, +1 (519) 577-5137, [email protected]
Agnes Stawicki, Our Kids Media, 9052721843, [email protected]
SOURCE Comfort Life
Share this article