Not Your Average Origin Story
Centering a Senior Living Business on Our Family’s Values
By Milton L. Cruz, Founder and CEO of Insignia Senior Living
You’ve probably heard countless stories of family owned senior living companies that say the catalyst for opening their first community was the need for quality care for a family member. Many share that they were looking for a great assisted living community for a loved one and couldn’t find one that met their exact needs, so they decided to create one themselves. My case was NOT like that. And while my parents themselves benefit from the care of an Insignia Senior Living community, I must tell you that the creation of Insignia is not your average origin story.
Back in 2002, I had been working as a hospital executive for over 15 years. The hospital network I worked for was sold to a publicly traded company and I stayed with them as CEO of local operations for 6 years. In the meantime, while married with two sons, I decided I wanted to open my own business. While I loved the industry, particularly because it was centered around caring for others, I could not go into hospital management again since I had signed a non-compete agreement with my employer at the time.
My wife Aileen and I decided to look for a business where we could help people, and at the same time focus on the caring aspect of the hospital industry. After a year of analysis, we saw how fitting the senior living industry was to our criteria for a new business and decided that we wanted to focus on that. However, we wanted to do so with a big differentiating factor; we were to run it as a multi-generational family business. In other words, we were not of the Wall Street mentality and we were not going to sell our communities. We were going to create a business with a foundation on family values: our family values to be exact.
So what are those values, you may ask?
FAMILY PURPOSE
To achieve a fulfilling life by creating happiness that goes beyond our own.
FAMILY VISION
We will be an enterprising trans-generational family focused on fostering positive social and economic impact internationally.
FAMILY MISSION
Our family is committed to work towards our unified purpose, through continuous personal improvement, crafting the right positive attitude, being effective mentors and maintaining open and transparent communication with ourselves and others.
My wife Aileen, my two sons, Gabriel and Daniel, and I work hard every day to make sure that our family values shine through everything we do, and that’s especially apparent in the way we have developed Insignia’s culture.
Just as we as a family seek to create happiness and to care for others, we encourage our communities to do the same. That’s why Insignia’s mission cascades from our family’s own values.
INSIGNIA SENIOR LIVING’S VISION
Provide Safe and Joyful Environments where Seniors feel Loved and Valued
We hold this mission dearly and will do so for generations to come.
To find out more about who we are, click here.
MIlton, I can tell your note is heartfelt and exemplifies what you, Aileen, and the Cruz family are all about. Your foundation rooted in great core values and multi-generational focus will sustain your organization. Felcidades! Ed French