We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Ryan Iwamoto. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Ryan below.

Ryan, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Was there a defining moment in your professional career? A moment that changed the trajectory of your career?

My grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2005 and we were faced with the challenge of finding quality care for her. She was one of the inspirations for starting 24 Hour Home Care and an amazing testimonial for the magic of receiving home care. She lived to be 101 years old, living in her own home with a caregiver that entire time until she passed in 2019.

From my personal experience with my grandmother and from my former role working for Maxim Healthcare Services, I saw the large need for in-home care in the industry.

According to the Administration on Aging, people age 65 and older represented 16% of the US population in the year 2019, but are expected to grow to be 21.6% of the population by 2040. The 85 and older population is projected to more than double from 6.6 million in 2019 to 14.4 million in 2040 (a 118% increase).

In addition, according to a new AARP “Home and Community Preferences Survey,” data shows that 77 percent of adults 50 and older want to remain in their homes for the long term — a number that has been consistent for more than a decade.

“Maxim was a billion-dollar home health company and when I joined, they had just launched their companion division, aka their non-medical home care. After three years of working there, I decided to leave with my Manager at the time, David Allerby, to launch 24 Hour Home Care.

The in-home care industry is incredibly fragmented with mom-and-pop offerings, and then large home health companies that offer home care as only one small aspect of their business. We decided to build 24 Hour Home Care by taking a mom-and-pop approach, with the goal of having nationwide growth. I’d seen this being done in other industries, but not in the healthcare industry. A great example of this is Trader Joe’s, it has a very local feel at stores, but they have locations nationwide, competitive prices, quality goods, and the best people. When I think of a Trader Joe’s employee, I see someone who is engaged, provides great register conversations, is happy, and ultimately wants to help the customer. Their secret sauce is their people. We wanted to have the same disruption in the home care industry.”

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I am the President and Co-Founder of 24 Hour Home Care, a non-medical home care company that provides professional caregivers to seniors and individuals with developmental disabilities. The company was founded in 2008 and has grown to more than 20 locations across three states (California, Arizona, and New Mexico) providing nearly 6 million hours of care to 12,400 individuals each year while employing over 11,000 professional caregivers. 24 Hour Home Care’s services allow individuals to be cared for in the comforts of their own home versus being institutionalized or having to live in a nursing home.

24 Hour Home Care has also been listed on the Inc. 5000 Fastest Growing Companies list for nine consecutive years. Its phenomenal company culture has been recognized by FORTUNE as one of the 15 Best Workplaces for Aging Services for the last five years. In 2022, 24 Hour Home Care was additionally recognized by FORTUNE as one of the best workplaces for millennials.

24 Hour Home Care continues to grow by providing high-quality, WORLD-CLASS in-home caregiving services to our most vulnerable populations.

Our energy, drive, and “secret sauce” as I call it, is all about our people. The experience our clients receive is all through our people being friendly, motivated, and enjoying their job. Every one of our employees has a “WHY” statement, or why they work so hard in their role each day — this adds to their shared purpose with our clients and has proven to be a great formula for success.

Burgers generally taste the same, but sometimes what makes a restaurant different is the person you order from. In-N-Out Burger sets itself apart by caring for its staff, and as a result, they are some of the friendliest people to place your order with. In the same way, we place our staff at the center of everything we do, and their compassion and care for our clients is a testament to how we are putting people first.

Other than training/knowledge, what do you think is most helpful for succeeding in your field?

Our clients are our family, and through our team of caring staff, we have helped thousands of seniors and individuals with developmental disabilities remain healthy and safe at home. By providing the services and assistance they need to remain independent, we live out our mission and purpose of “impacting people’s lives by making a difference every day.” Our keys to success have been carrying out business with empathy for others, high standards, a proactive approach, continuous learning, and teamwork.

We’ve built an environment where people can be honest and feel safe speaking up. This has been essential in creating our collaborative culture so our teams feel they can freely speak their minds. It’s another one of our secret ingredients for success.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

My advice for managing a team and maintaining high morale is simply putting people first. What makes 24 Hour Home Care different as an industry leader is our people-centric culture — our service providers, families we serve, and employees are everything to us. We’ve partnered with world-class coaches to train and build leaders on the team who ensure our people’s unique needs always come first ahead of the business. Above everything else, we’re here to care for others. When you put people first, high morale, great teamwork, and success always seem to follow.

I’ve also been inspired by Best Buy CEO Hubert Joly and some of his principles for business, including pursuing a noble business purpose, creating an environment where every employee can blossom, and treating profit as an outcome, not the goal. We live out these principles through our mission and WHY statement of impacting people’s lives by making a difference every day, and our company principles of “Improve, Always” and “We Care” through creating space for employees to learn and grow in a positive way, and placing people’ s needs above profits.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.24hrcares.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/24hourhomecare/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/24hourhomecare
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/24hr-homecare
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/24hrhomecare
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/24HRHOMECARE
• Yelp: https://linktr.ee/24hrhomecarereview

Image Credits
Photo Credit: 24 Hour Home Care