SALLERSON SHARES HER SENIOR LIVING JOURNEY AND HOW KEEPING IN TOUCH MATTERS
BY PATRICK CONNOLE J
ayne Sallerson, president of Charter Senior Living, has an accomplished career in the senior living busi- ness stretching back the better part of three decades, a period that has been marked by her steady rise
in the ranks even when she was often the only woman in the C-suite for her employers. Speaking to an audience of senior living professionals as part of the Argentum Women in Leadership Zoom talks, Sallerson explained what she has experienced in her journey and how her understanding of the business of caring for America’s seniors has evolved along with her career. A sales and marketing expert, her first job in senior living
was as the regional director of sales for Emeritus Senior Living in New England. Admittedly a novice in the pro- fession then, she built her experience before heading south after Emeritus offered a spot in the Florida market, which was a fortuitous event both weather-wise and for her senior living education. After relocating to Florida, Sallerson stopped by a Sum-
merville Senior Living Community to visit a friend who was the executive director. It was coincidence that the vice president of operations was also at the community and at the end of the visit, Sallerson was offered a regional director of sales position for Summerville. “This is where I learned that you never know who you will meet and how they can impact your career,” she said. At Summerville is where she met Granger Cobb, her men-
tor. Cobb is considered a legend in the origination of the se- nior living industry and is honored as such by Argentum every year with the prestigious Cobb Cup awarded to the winner of the association’s advocacy-focused fundraising effort. In Florida, she also learned about how a company re-
structures and retools since Summerville was in the midst of reducing capacity and shrinking its sales’ regions. “It was really interesting because at that time they were getting rid of buildings and regions were getting smaller and smaller. It went from six regions to five regions to four regions. I was hanging on, but I wasn’t going anywhere. And then we started to grow again,” Sallerson said.
38 SENIOR LIVING EXECUTIVE JULY/AUGUST 2023 The changes at Summerville allowed her a chance to move
up, earning herself a promotion to vice president of sales be- fore the company was acquired her original senior living em- ployer, Emeritus. At the new old home of Emeritus, Sallerson became the executive vice president of sales and marketing. “I went back to where I started. So, I knew some of the people and communities. This was another great lesson about building strong relationships in this industry because you never know who you will be working with in the future. It's a very small industry,” Sallerson said. “Emeritus then was acquired by Brookdale and I was the only one in the C-suite who decided not to go to Brookdale. I just felt like the culture wasn’t a good fit for me. When you talk about women in leadership, it was a pretty male-dominated area and I said it’s just not the right fit for me.”
Launching a New Business Because of an 18-month non-compete contract after not going to Brookdale, Sallerson focused on helping to launch a software platform as chief executive officer of Sherpa CRM. “I helped launch the platform and after about 18 months, I was able to get back into the industry and move back to the East Coast, to Boston, where I’m originally from,” she said. Back home, Sallerson took the position of executive vice
president of sales and operations for Benchmark Senior Liv- ing, before moving to an opportunity with Charter where the “it’s a small world nature” of senior living opened more doors. “The founder of Charter was a regional sales operations
who I worked directly with at Summerville. So we had always stayed in touch. And then he called me, and he said, ‘hey, do you want to join me and work for Charter’? And I said, ‘well, I don’t want to work for you. I want to be part of Charter and I want to be an owner.’” The conversation progressed from there and she became
a partner at Charter. From that point around five years ago, Sallerson has spearheaded efforts to grow the organization from operating nine properties to running 42 properties now with five in the ground currently being developed.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60
