Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

This is Valerie VanBooven with the Senior Care Industry Netcast, where leaders with three or more years of experience in the senior care market share their advice. So, let’s get to it. In a few sentences, tell us who you are and what you do.

Stacey Golden-Lisnock: https://www.gotittogethernow.com

Well, Valerie, thanks for having me. So, I am the founder of Got It Together Now and also I have a podcast called Legacy Therapy. And my background has been over 30 years as a certified financial planner, but in this role, I’m a financial advocate.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

Oh, very nice. You want to tell us a little bit more about what a financial advocate does before I go on?

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

Sure. So a financial advocate is that I am researching and putting together programs so that people can actually get stuff done. And this first program is called Got It Together Emergency Info File. So, it’s specifically to do one thing and that’s to get this emergency info file ready in case something should happen to you, an illness or a death.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

I love that because everybody should have a financial emergency file no matter how old you are, if you are married or divorced or whatever, and you have children, then you should have an emergency financial file. So especially if one person in the family is the bill payer, investor and the person who kind of takes care of everything, that other person is going to be instantly lost if you don’t know … if you have life insurance, they don’t know if you … how to pay the bills or you know.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

So, I totally agree with you. We have talked about this a couple of times on the show. And one of the most important things is, and every time somebody passes away, whether they are elderly or not in our family, I always ask my mom, “Do you …” Because she did send me all of her information, her trust. I got all that. But I said, “Do you have a burial plot again? I can’t remember.” She said, “Yes, I do.” So she reminds me that, yes, she has got it together, but I need [crosstalk 00:02:18]

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

And that’s how I got my name.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

Yeah, that is-

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

Got It Together.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

Perfect. Yeah. But you got to know where to find all that stuff.

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

That’s [crosstalk 00:02:26]

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

So important. So thank you. I’m glad we’re able to talk to you today because I know people will be interested in finding out more about this. So what is the best thing about serving aging adults and their families?

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

Well, I really like making things easier and you have to do that, in my opinion, through education. So, if the parents and then their children have this information and the resources, then they can actually get something accomplished. I think the biggest problem in what people say is they just don’t even know where to start. And so what happens is people are then stuck and they end up going into stress mode rather than being able to focus on the people and not the paperwork when a health issue happens or somebody passes.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

Yeah. Stress mode is crazy when someone has a medical emergency or … and you add to that, not knowing where things are. So I mean, this is great. I love this being prepared. You can never be too prepared for stuff like this.

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

Yes.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

All right. Tell us in your lifetime, in your professional life or in your lifetime, there’s probably been some people who’ve been very influential in your life, maybe a mentor or maybe an organization that you really like or could be your parents, your grandparents, or someone that you have been around for your whole life. So who would you like to talk about?

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

Well, you know what, I wanted to talk about an organization that I’ve recently joined. So this is kind of not my whole life, but here, I’m in California and I was introduced to this … it’s a nonprofit called Senior Specialist Group. And they’re part of the foundation for senior services. And really their whole mission is to provide seniors in their families with education, options, and resources so that they could get the assistance that they need, right? And a lot of it’s guided towards keeping their independence. And what they do is they vet each person before they can actually join the group. And so it’s a marvelous group of really heart centered service providers. And that’s been really a great joy to find them this early on for me.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

Nice. That’s very nice. I’m glad that they take some time to vet people and that people have to meet certain criteria to join. That’s excellent. Well, thank you for telling us about that. That’s awesome. All right. Let’s talk about online marketing for a second. It can be confusing. It’s ever changing. And right now, we are not able to do as much in-person or maybe any in-person networking. Hopefully, we see the light at the end of the tunnel on that, but for now, what has been your experience or your thoughts with online market?

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

Yeah. Well, I have quite a few senior clients, as you can imagine from my financial services days, but as time goes on, just seeing that more seniors are able to navigate the internet. They’re actually more willing. They don’t get frustrated as quickly I’m finding, because they’re having to use that tool in order to be able to integrate with what’s going on in society right now. So I think while we’re in COVID, this is really what people have to do. And I feel like they’re really embracing it. And then they get excited when it works.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

Yeah. They do get excited when it works, and they’re very, very malleable and able to do just about anything we ask. So tell us, what piece of advice would you give to other senior care providers?

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

I just want to encourage seniors, have everybody encourage seniors to stay active and to participate in things that are mind expanding, because they get so much joy when they’ve actually reached a milestone and they’ve had actually help to get there, which is pretty much the key. And if they can continue to learn and grow, that would be my advice to be the catalyst for that.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

Yes. That’s a great piece of advice. Thank you. Yeah. Learn and grow all the time. You never can know enough about … You can be an expert, but continuing to learn more about your trade or about the people around you, the people you serve, better ways to serve them is amazing. So, thank you. And when you have a win in life or in business, how do you like to celebrate?

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

Well, I have a hard time celebrating, because I’m such a workaholic, right? But I’ve really learned to … when something does work well, to reflect on the journey of where I came from to this day when it finally actually happened. And so I’ve been able to do that quite a bit and see the progress that I’ve had and the people kind of along the way that have helped me. And really one thing that inspired me to do this course was that I took a course in order to get my podcast going. And it was like a four week course. And at the end of the four weeks, I had a podcast. So it was just so exciting because I kept saying, “If I didn’t have that course, I’d still be talking about doing a podcast.”

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

Yeah. You’re right. Absolutely. So that inspired you to say, “Okay, if I have a course, then by the time they get done, they’ll have that file completed, right?”

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

Exactly. It’s like you take a driver’s training class and then you know how to drive. So this is like at the end of this course, you actually have a physical thing that you can be proud of.

Valerie VanBooven RN BSN:

Very nice. I love it. All right. Well, we’ll be sure and put your website along with the recording of our interview today. I want to thank you for doing the show and for sharing your wisdom and advice with us and sharing with us about your business because I think that’s super important. So, thank you.

Stacey Golden-Lisnock:

You’re welcome. I really appreciate what you’re doing. Thank you.