Name: Merisa Kolenovic

Title: Senior Administrator

Organisation: Genesis Healthcare

With over 15 years of experience in Healthcare, my career started when I was in high school, working in the dietary department then transiting into the social service department, and finally becoming an Admissions director before becoming an administrator. After several years in the role and managing several different skilled nursing facilities I was given the opportunity to be the senior Administrator, providing support the to other Administrators in the region.

Thank you to the 2,000 leaders who’ve generously done the 7 Questions on Leadership!

I hope Merisa's answers will encourage you in your leadership journey. Enjoy!

Cheers,

Jonno White

1. What have you found most challenging as a leader?

In my experience and the current field I am in the most challenging part of being a leader is recruiting staff, this has been especially challenging during and post Covid. We have seen many healthcare professional leave the profession due to burn out.

2. How did you become a leader? Can you please briefly tell the story?

As the older child, born in another country and coming over to the United States with my parents from a young age success was the only option. I grew up with my parents working extremely hard to give their children a good life and instilling in us an extraordinary work ethic.

Naturally, as the oldest, and as Aries I was always a leader, and helping individuals always gave me a rewarding and warm feeling. I thought wanted to become a nurse but as I learned early on, I was not one that was able to handle blood.

As I explored my options, I interned with many healthcare professionals and found myself extremely drawn, interested, and motivated shadowing an Administrator, and at that point, I knew which direction I wanted to take my life. From there, my mission was to gain as much knowledge and experience specific to skilled nursing so that I am able to lead and support a team successfully.

In conclusion, I worked extremely hard as an intern and was hired part-time in the social work department. There I learned and became proficient in my role and was asked to take on additional tasks in the admissions department. Again I learned the role and was then asked to be an admissions director at a sister company, which I accepted. During the same time, I was working toward obtaining my Administrator license for long-term care.

Once I obtained my license I continued to follow my dreams and was hired as an administrator for Genesis.

3. How do you structure your work days from waking up to going to sleep?

Structuring your day is extremely important, especially for someone like myself who has to juggle work life and mom life.

During the week I am typically up between 5:30 am and 6:00 am. I start with morning stretches and affirmatory thoughts. I then get ready for work, and head out for the day. I start my work day by reviewing the task list that I had created the day prior and adding any additional tasks that have come up from the emails I read. I then join the team I am working with for their morning huddle and once that is complete I start on my tasks and provide any additional support the team needs.

Once done with work I get back home to relieve my husband from caring for our daughter while he goes to work. She and I then make dinner, I cook she plays with pots and pans. We then have some time to play and read together.

At the end of the day once my daughter is put to sleep I clean up my house and revise my task list for the following day.

The weekends are at a little slower pace for me. I like to get up around 6 am and do some yoga and a bit of exercise and have my coffee before my daughter is up. Once she is up, the world is hers and I just live in it.

4. What's a recent leadership lesson you've learned for the first time or been reminded of?

Recently I have been reminded of the importance of getting to know your staff and how far that will take you in creating positive change. When you ask staff to share personal positive experiences or something about their family you gain more trust with that individual and in turn, they will be more motivated to do a good job.

5. What's one book that has had a profound impact on your leadership so far? Can you please briefly tell the story of how that book impacted your leadership?

One book that's had an impact on me is The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey. I am a true believer that in order to be a successful leader you MUST work on yourself first. In the book the author speaks of several principles that to him are essential for a leader to be effective, these include, integrity, courage, patience, persistence, humility, empathy, synergy, and continuous learning.

6. If you could only give one piece of advice to a young leader, what would you say to them?

If there was one piece of advice I can give it is to not be afraid. Do not be afraid to dream big, make mistakes, ask for help, and be transparent. In my opinion, all of these things that frighten us make us better leaders.