Turning Tender Care Learning Centers into a Healthy, Fun Culture
Frank Reabe is a folksy, affable CEO who converted a poorly run business into a thriving, successful enterprise dedicated to early education of children. He and his team accomplished this through sound fiscal management, a clearly articulated mission, action-oriented core values, and a passion for infusing fun into the everyday operations of each of their early education learning centers.
Tender Care Learning Centers (Tender Care) was established in 1982 to provide an educational experience to preschool children in the greater Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, area. The company grew quickly but ran into trouble managing its finances. The founders decided to sell its nine preschool learning centers to one of its investors, a post-secondary educational company that decided to expand into early education. Frank, an accountant with the new owner’s company, was offered the opportunity to join Tender Care as CEO, with the mission to incorporate sound fiscal management. Frank continued to grow Tender Care by closing unsuccessful centers and opening new centers in the Pittsburgh area. Tender Care also acquired early education centers in Iowa, Connecticut, and Massachusetts.
In 1995, the company decided to become a not-for-profit organization, allowing it to apply for grants to support its operations. While successful in obtaining grants, Tender Care became self-sufficient through successful marketing in the communities where it operated. Frank would say he led the organization with an entrepreneurial spirit, building a strong management team, and offering quality pre-school programs based on high standards, a great culture, and fun.
The move from a for-profit to a not-for-profit company played a significant role in the evolution of Tender Care. It allowed the organization to follow its mission, less concerned with profit than with providing the best education and care for its children and their parents. One of its early decisions was to gain full accreditation with the National Association for the Education of Young Children. Meeting the criteria for accreditation required Tender Care to maintain quality interactions between its teachers and children and maintain the appropriateness of each of its programs for children from birth through third grade.
Building a healthy culture was a major goal for Frank and his team. It was an intentional strategy to attract quality teachers, impress the parents of preschool children, and gain community support--all necessary steps to ensure financial success. The Tender Care culture incorporates 15 values, stated with goals for each value. These goals include full accreditation compliance, strong safety protocols, open communication, full enrollment, emphasis on preschool education, teamwork, treating everyone with respect, rewarding employees for excellence, a commitment to people development, embracing change, and seeking creative ways of serving the needs of children and employees.
The values are accompanied by a set of core beliefs that are the basis for the values and goals. It is noteworthy that these values and beliefs incorporate both business and culture concerns. Frank and his leadership team are clear in their belief that providing a safe environment and a great education for children, while at the same time making Tender Care a great place to work, will accomplish the goal of full enrollment and financial stability.
Tender Care realizes its teachers are trained as educators. To help school directors become better leaders and to learn Tender Care’s cultural norms and beliefs, they created a one-week annual leadership conference. The conference reinforces the organization’s values and beliefs and adds one important attribute: fun. It uses the Fish Leadership Development philosophy, based on the philosophy of Seattle’s Pike Place Fish Market, to demonstrate that work should be joyful and fun. In this spirit, Frank uses characters and stories from Dr. Suess to communicate the company values. Fun is a major theme in all that Tender Care does.
Frank takes personal pleasure in emphasizing the importance of fun as part of Tender Care’s culture. He reflected how his own early childhood and family experiences were filled with fun and laughter. He extends this passion for fun by planning activities around family field trips, picnics, a night at a professional sports event, and caring for Pittsburgh Pirate and Pittsburgh Penguin players children while attending the team’s home games. Tender Care has forged deep relationships with Pittsburgh’s professional sports teams, and the teams reciprocate by offering the organization memorabilia and game tickets that are in turn passed along to parents by a raffle or a drawing. There are costumes for the Tender Care mascot, Tender Teddy, who appears at learning centers and community events. Frank himself often wore the costume to witness first-hand the reaction of children to their mascot. He also likes to visit individual Tender Care centers, often bringing cookies as a way of conveying a caring attitude. In his words, Tender Care is not about making money but about having fun. “Our schools must be happy places,” Frank said, expressing his commitment to the importance of a fun culture.
As much as fun is baked into its culture, Tender Care is serious about safety. The centers serve 2,000 children every day. Managing this many children requires extensive training in safety--covering everything from changing a diaper to supervising play. This did not deter Tender Care from continuing to serve its children when it was forced to close its centers during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. This closure was both a threat to the business and a disruption of relationships that were important to the children.
How Tender Care managed itself during the shutdown gives insight into its culture and the dedication of its teachers, administrators, and parents toward the school. Each center and its teachers created content for children, including a YouTube channel, and read books and conducted classes on Zoom. Tender Care wanted its children to see their teachers and friends. To support its teachers and other employees, no one was laid off in the two months of shutdown, and full salaries were paid to all. When Paycheck Protection Program funding ended, 25 employees were furloughed or saw their hours reduced, but they retained full benefits. While furloughed, these employees were eligible for unemployment benefits, which helped to maintain them until they were called back to work. A decision was made by management to not charge tuition during the shutdown, but parents, without any solicitation, donated over $50,000 to sustain the centers. Most wrote letters of appreciation for how Tender Care managed its centers through the shutdown. When it was safe to bring the children back, all but eight of Tender Care’s 400 administrators and teachers returned to work.
Success is measured by classroom teacher/student ratios, enrollments, referrals, inquiries, and center visits. Beyond these metrics, the Tender Care organization prides itself in the long tenures of its administrators, which average around 20 years. The biggest competition Tender Care faces for recruiting teachers is public schools, which pay higher wages. While this competition leads to some turnover, Tender Care has little trouble hiring new teachers based on its culture. Although 2020 enrollments were down from previous years, the fiscal condition of the organization is strong. It is in the enviable financial position of recently selling its Connecticut centers to focus more attention on growing its Pittsburgh programs.
Tender Care is a good example of how a not-for-profit organization can benefit from a healthy culture to bolster its financial success. By maintaining high standards, living its core values and beliefs, and adding fun to its culture, it has thrived to the benefit of all its stakeholders: parents, employees, children, and community.
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