Former Harmony Ceo, A Place For Mom Exec Rejoins Brookdale Senior Living To Lead Sales

Brookdale Senior Living has hired Margaret Cabell as chief sales officer, welcoming her back into the company after more than half a decade away.

Cabell previously worked at Brentwood, Tennessee-based Brookdale for 16 years across various roles spanning operations, marketing and sales. She left Brookdale to lead sales and marketing at Harmony Senior Services in 2020, where she ascended to the CEO role two years later. In 2024, she joined private referral service A Place for Mom as chief community relations officer and head of sales. 

Cabell is returning to the nation’s largest senior living operator to help deepen the company’s alignment between sales and operations.

“Senior living is about helping people make an important life decision, so success comes from aligning people, processes and technology around the customer journey,” Cabell told Senior Housing News.

At A Place for Mom, Cabell said she had a “front-row seat” to how customers interact with senior living today as families are more informed, do their own research and start looking into senior living prior to reaching out to a provider. 

Those changes reinforced the “importance of responsiveness and transparency” and connecting with older adults in their current situations. This shift in how prospective families and residents interact with senior living also shows the value of data-driven insights, she added.

“I believe the biggest opportunity for our industry is using technology, data, and AI to better understand consumer needs and remove friction from the journey, not to replace relationships, but to strengthen them,” Cabell said. “The providers that succeed will be those that combine sophisticated consumer insights with authentic, consultative sales experiences.”

With senior living sales becoming more “personalized, data-driven and consumer-centric,” families expect the “same level of responsiveness and digital engagement” that they experience in other industries, but still need guidance on making a “complex and emotional decision,” Cabell added.

Her appointment comes at a time of change for Brookdale as the company has reached its “fighting weight,” slimming down to 517 communities. 

In a news release, Brookdale CEO Nick Stengle said that Cabell’s leadership will “be instrumental in advancing our sales strategy and improving alignment” across the company.

“Having a chief sales officer with Margaret’s demonstrated capabilities will continue to drive Brookdale toward operational excellence with a sharp focus on our operational priorities,” Stengle said in the news release.

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