Staff Shortages? Find The Right People, Fast.

Let’s face it – aged care staffing is an age-old problem in New Zealand. A quick search online will bring up news articles going back years – each headline addressing a looming crisis in healthcare staffing. Today there seems to be little chance that anything is changing in a hurry. So what can you do to ensure you’ve got the right staff in your rest home? And how do you ensure the good ones will stick around?

In 2020 seek.co.nz, New Zealand’s online employment platform, listed the country’s top 20 most-needed jobs. Admin assistants were number 2, with warehousing jobs and developers and programmers 3^rd and 4^th respectively. And number one? Obviously, it was nursing.

Aged care has always struggled not just to attract people but also to attract the right people. Finding those who have the right amount of discipline, passion and expertise can be problematic in the best of times. With a labour shortage and an incredibly challenging global landscape, it can seem near impossible.

Here are a few ways to ensure you can have both happy and healthy residents and happy and healthy staff.

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Attitude is everything (and so is the job ad)

Low retention rates within the aged care industry are typical around the world, and this is certainly the case in New Zealand. As rest homes look at ways to retain qualified and experienced staff they are also looking at different ways to recruit the right people.

The process of recruiting great team members starts with the all-important job advertisement. Here a misleading job ad isn’t going to help anyone. It will only lead to false expectations for both the employer and the applicant.

When it comes to describing the position, don’t sugarcoat it. Be clear on what challenges there may be, truthfully represent the company culture and set the standard early. If this is done accurately the person who shows up to apply will know precisely what they’re in for and won’t be in for a surprise on their first day.

It also pays to avoid overpromising and under-delivering. A no-nonsense, straight-talking approach from the start is important when it comes to advertising for and interviewing staff.

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To recruit or retrain, that is the question

It takes a long time to get a new employee fully trained up and competent in all aspects of the role and the company. And those who have come from out of town or out of the country face even more challenges as they settle into a new town. The settlement curve published by the Department of Immigration is a good way to consider what some of your team may be facing in their daily lives.

Source: https://www.immigration.govt.nz/employ-migrants/guides/aged-care

This highlights the value of retaining staff, and staff retention can be linked to job satisfaction. Initiatives like employee surveys and ongoing training and development programs are a good way to monitor how things are going for your team.

An OECD study revealed several areas where rest homes often fail to maintain a high level of staff satisfaction. These include difficult working conditions, exposure to physical and mental risk factors and lack of support on the job. The COVID-19 situation added further challenges for workers in aged care, impacting both their physical and mental wellbeing. Addressing these issues and being aware of the effect wellbeing has on job satisfaction is essential.

High staff turnover not only impacts the quality of care but also affects the bottom line. The costs associated with hiring new staff include advertising, interviewing staff, training on health and safety and work procedures, and a period of understaffing, which may result. All up, it’s better to focus on keeping your team rather than finding a new one.

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Doing without makes it difficult throughout

The temptation to add to an employee’s workload rather than hiring additional team members is always there, especially when there’s a ready-made excuse due to a shallow labour pool.

Yet short-staffing is short sighted. It creates a hostile and often unsafe working environment. And the long-term effects can be disastrous. Understaffing hits hardest on quality of care. In 2019, a report on staffing levels in aged care revealed that 73% of the nurses and caregivers felt there was not enough staff to provide an adequate level of care to residents.

When staffing levels are low, things can go wrong easily. A resident may require help to stand or use the bathroom. If staff are not able to quickly assist the resident may attempt to do it themselves. These falls and accidents can have ramifications both for the resident and the rest home.

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Build your culture

Commonly, aged care workers carry out shift work, which can take its toll. Shift work disrupts people’s home lives and is associated with burnout. Organisations can ease the load on employees by creating a supportive and healthy workplace culture. Employee frustration, stress and lack of job satisfaction are often a result of a poorly run organisation.

A focus on building company culture and taking care of employees can help boost employee job satisfaction and, in turn, maintain a good work-life balance for staff.

Employers who go the extra mile to take care of the mental wellbeing of their team will be rewarded on many levels (including financial ones).

When Xero and the NZ Institute of Economic Research undertook a study on wellbeing in the workplace they found that every dollar a small business invests in the wellbeing of staff sees a return of up to 12 times back within a year.

It takes very little to give staff recognition for their hard work – but it has a huge impact. It’s why something as simple as an unexpected staff morning tea or a reward card can go a long way to putting a smile on someone’s face.

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Keeping healthy makes happy

It’s not just the health of your patients and residents to consider.

Staff in aged care must be driven by care and compassion for their residents. They devote their entire day to taking care of others. It only seems fair they should be taken care of themselves.

As Covid-19 spread rapidly around the globe, the spotlight was on rest homes and the devastating impact the virus could have it managed to infiltrate its way in. This situation highlighted the critical need to take care of the health and wellbeing of everyone within the rest home from staff to residents to visitors.

Covid-19 caused many aged care facilities to take a hard line on hygiene practices to keep everyone safe. Staff should be at the top of the list.

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Use your network

When it comes to keeping staff and residents happy and healthy, consider your network of suppliers and partners as a possible source of assistance. During the Covid-19 pandemic, aged care facilities were suddenly forced to ramp up the supply of personal protection equipment, cleaning supplies and cleaning equipment.

Suppliers to the industry have been quick to increase their supplies of these essential items to support their customers. In many cases, suppliers have also extended their product lines to address the Covid-19 situation. It’s worth talking with your suppliers to see what’s on offer and how they may be able to help.

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Whether it’s under normal circumstances or global pandemic circumstances, rest homes are under enormous pressure to ensure the wellbeing of their residents and their staff. It’s not an easy balance to strike, but with the right priorities in place and the right partners by your side, it is possible to maintain a happy and healthy rest home for all.