Reducing staff turnover in the care industry
Colin Stevenson, the founder of Notable Change International recruitment and consultancy services, tells editor Victoria Galligan the need for selecting the right candidate through an effective screening process to make the much-needed changes in the care industry. Currently the care industry as a whole has an extremely high turnover of staff, especially true for the businesses employing care workers. The usual recruitment process at the moment is: advertise for the role, sift through CVs, carry out credentials and qualifications checks or a reference check, interview, possibly offer a second interview, then a job offer. If using a recruitment consultancy, employers are passed on applicants based on their CV and interview bias (if the consultancy likes someone and think they will suit the role, they will be passed to the employer). If recruiting in-house, it is the same process. If the CV, face and interview fits, a position will be offered. This is how it is in most industries – but this inefficient method is costing the care industry a fortune in both time and money. Personality traits, both internal and external, mean a picture presented in the interview process may not be a candidate’s true self. Internal traits make up who we are, while external traits are who we would like people to think we are in order to get somewhere or acquire something. As a result, many staff leave or are asked to leave their roles within a short period of time. From this we have a clear picture that something has to be done to ensure maximum time and money can be spent on service users rather than a failing recruitment process. How does this happen in the care industry? The interview process is the same, an applicant who does well in an interview shows their external traits, maybe exaggerates or even makes up traits to suit the position. What is hidden is their internal traits which will determine how they work, interact and most importantly care for the service users. The applicant sails the CV sift, sails the qualifications, sails the interview and becomes employed by the company. However, soon the employer finds the applicant is over-dominant, which can mean they are hard to manage, or has a low-patience threshold with service users – and traits such as these usually cause work-based conflict. A CV, two interviews and a qualification paper would not have recognised this. Hiring this person would have caused upset to the workplace dynamics, staff and service users, and inevitably the staff member would leave or be asked to leave as they were unsuitable for the position and the process will begin again – trying to look for a suitable staff member. Notable Change uses a profiling system for applicants, finding out their internal and external traits after the interview process to ensure the applicant will suit the role and the care home dynamics through answering a series of questions that produces a report. To make this even better, an employer can design their ideal candidate, using the model of their best member of staff or creating a profile with traits they wish their ideal candidate to have. This ‘ideal candidate profile’ will be used as a template for future candidates, to ensure complete peace of mind, close the profitability gap and most importantly allow employers to spend the time and money saved on recruitment on the service users, without hiring the ‘wrong applicant’ for the job. See notablechangeintl.com for more details.
What to consider when extending care home services
James Thomas, QFP, Commercial Manager at d&t business planning, discusses the need for careful planning when extending care home services. The expansion of care home services requires the mitigation of risk through analysis and proper planning both to protect the business and those it cares for long term. Extending an existing facility by nature often requires significant investment and therefore, commercial backing. Securing appropriate funding will be a key part of the successful expansion of services. Here, a balance needs to be struck between the need for borrowing and the income likely to be generated from providing care services. An independent funding sourcing organisation that has relationships with all the main banks, satellite lenders and funding circles will be able to secure the best deal possible. A funding sourcing organisation will initially undertake a viability check prior to approaching any lenders, in order to assess the likelihood of securing borrowing. They will look at an individual’s or company’s background, assets and liabilities and the business idea. Because they understand the criteria for lending from numerous financial organisations, they can help set expectations. Here it is important to provide accurate information to ensure a realistic evaluation and assessment. Armed with this information, they can select the most appropriate lender to potentially back the project. To secure any business borrowing it will be necessary to provide a detailed business plan. This is a document setting out goals for the future and the strategy to reach those objectives. It will need to include information on cash flow, budgets and projections, but also an analysis of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Business plans should be realistic and achievable using existing financial records to help with forecasting. They should also detail milestones and set out a roadmap indicating thresholds when, for example, additional staff can be taken on, or when the business can afford to expand further. The starting point with any business expansion plan is analysis of existing figures. So, step one of the process of expansion is to ensure accounts are fully up to date. Getting to grips with the technology to enable regular reporting online will be something everyone needs to get used to and we recommend getting in the habit of keeping your information up to date so you are ready to complete the quarterly submissions when they are required. Key performance indicators (KPIs) are also an essential part of business planning. Monthly Turnover, Cost of Sales and Gross Profit will always be the most important key performance indicators, as at a glance, you get a good idea of how a business is performing at a high level. There will, of course, be some more specific metrics that are tracked behind these, which might include for example: variable and fixed costs such as staffing, training, recruitment, heating, cleaning, marketing, etc… Tracking back KPIs helps with planning. Consider a target of increasing residents in a care home by 30%. Work back and isolate what can directly affect the goal and monitor these metrics. • 30% growth = 10 more residents = 5 more staff, 10 more beds, 5 more items of equipment etc The same logic can be applied to marketing. How many leaflets and adverts are needed to create xx number of enquiries which ultimately become xx number of residents? So, whether you’re starting out, looking to grow, or an existing business, raising finance requires a workable and detailed plan tailored to your goals. This will help you source funding from the most suitable lender, and using an independent funding expert will help you shop around and secure the best deal for carefully managed expansion. For further information on independent funding and business planning when extending care home services please see: team-dt.com
Improving residential care through digital transformation
Colin Yates, chief support officer at WorkMobile – an award-winning mobile data capture solution – discusses the links between going paperless and the quality of residential care. Over the past few years, digital transformation has become an increasingly hot topic in business circles. There is a very good reason for this: done well, digital transformation drives efficiency and improves productivity, saving a business both time and money. Enterprises in almost all industries stand to benefit from their own digital transformation projects, and the residential care home sector is no exception. The question is, what would this look like? At its most basic level, digital transformation is the use of digital technologies to solve traditional problems. So, there is a need to identify which areas of a business have historically proved challenging and could be improved by incorporating new technology such as cloud computing, artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things. Residential care homes are often very reliant on paper-based processes. From care plans and risk assessments, to safeguarding reports and health assessments, there is inherently a lot of paperwork involved in the day to day running of a care home business, and given that there didn’t use to be an alternative to physical documentation, many have continued to operate with traditional processes. However, a heavy reliance on paper can cause significant problems. If essential paperwork is not completed and filed in a timely and correct manner, this can lead to standards of care slipping and concerns being raised by the CQC. As a result, some forward-thinking care home operators have begun their digital transformations by implementing cloud-based electronic care record software. This type of software has the ability to completely eliminate the need for paper, with all documents being completed digitally instead, often via an app on a mobile device or tablet. The information in these documents can then be saved automatically to a central reporting platform, that can be accessed instantly by all authorised members of staff, wherever they’re based. Modernising care home businesses by going paperless can have a host of wide-reaching benefits for all of those involved. Care workers For staff working on the front lines, outdated paper-based processes create an unnecessary administrative burden. Completing all paperwork by hand takes time, and each document must then be filed away carefully. In some cases, the information in this paperwork is also manually inputted into a digital database, taking up even more time and being open to errors. With digital alternatives, documents can be accessed much more easily and filled in much more quickly, with no need for any time to be spent on filing. Information can be recorded in real time as staff go about their duties, meaning that data held about residents is more likely to be complete and accurate. Where appropriate, certain sections can also be pre-populated to save time and unnecessary repetition. This means that care workers don’t have to worry about having to stay late after their shift to complete outstanding admin tasks, offering them a better work-life balance and giving them more time to concentrate on providing the best possible service to those in their care. Residential care home operators For care home operators, one of the main benefits is a significant reduction in operational costs. Relying on paper-based processes is expensive, with one study suggesting that it can cost even a very small business as much as £14,616 each year. Implementing a digital care record solution can greatly decrease ongoing expenses, by minimising or even eliminating the need for paper, printers and physical storage. One major problem caused by relying on paper-based processes is that it can be difficult to ensure the confidentiality of patient information. Digital solutions can allow management to set permissions dictating who has access to which levels of information saved on the system. For care homes that experience a high turnover of carers, or rely heavily on agency staff, this is an easy and effective way to protect patient confidentiality. It can also be extremely difficult to keep large amounts of paperwork organised. This makes it much more likely that important documents will be filed incorrectly or misplaced altogether. Missing paperwork puts patients at risk, and leaves care providers vulnerable to compliance issues which could negatively affect their CQC rating. Digital systems eliminate this issue, while also making it much easier for staff to interrogate previous reports and see any outstanding tasks. With this additional safety net, care home operators can feel confident that they are providing the best possible quality of care and meeting the CQC’s high standards. It’s clear that embracing digital transformation is a relatively simple way to overhaul a care business. Just by going paperless, it’s possible to improve working conditions for staff, reduce costs, and increase CQC compliance, making it worth serious consideration for care home operators looking to improve their excellent standards of care. For more information on Improving residential care through digital solutions, visit www.workmobileforms.com
