Blog
5 Ways to Reduce Home Care Worker Turnover
In today’s environment, the importance of high-quality home care workers cannot be understated.
Home care staff represent a key component of the efforts to lessen the strain on the hospital system in the COVID-19 era and with the proportion of seniors over 60 expected to double by 2050 the need to hire and retain high quality home care workers to meet the growing demands has never been higher.
As revealed in the 2020 Home-Based Care Technology Survey, more than half of respondents chose caregiver shortage as a primary obstacle their home care agency faces today. Limited caregivers and high turnover rates can be very taxing and could have a dwindling effect on your business and healthcare infrastructure at large.
A common solution for this problem would be to incentivize employees with raises, benefits and other compensations, but this might not be an economically viable solution for your agency.
Here are some other practical solutions that could help you maintain or grow care worker retention without hiking up your business expenditures to show recognition for these extremely valuable employees:
1. Accommodating Scheduling: While ensuring patients are receiving essential visits and care is the number one priority, working with your caregivers to coordinate schedules that are manageable for them should also be of high importance. AlayaCare’s home care software optimizes scheduling with features like SMS notifications to allow caregivers to conveniently receive and accept shift offers on mobile for high accessibility and flexibility. By finding flexible options for caregivers, your agency can improve the caregiver work experience to increase satisfaction and make your agency a place where caregivers want to stay.
2. Performance recognition: A good way to boost your care workers job satisfaction is to give them recognition for providing high quality services to your clients. Positive feedback makes employees feel valued and appreciated for their work. AlayaCare’s home care software gives you full visibility into care worker activities, ultimately allowing you to easily complete performance reviews by seamlessly tracking and recognizing care worker feedback, notes and activities.
3. Listen to your care workers: If a care worker openly communicates their unhappiness with their work environment or any other difficult situation, make sure to give them your full attention, listen to them and respond accordingly. Providing a supportive work environment where care workers feel like their opinions and needs are heard will foster employee loyalty and reduce your turnover rate.
4. Learning opportunities: There are a number of certifications, credentials and licensing needs for care workers, which can be easy to lose track of. With a system like AlayaCare, automatic notifications are generated when care worker skills and qualifications are about to expire, keeping you and your care workers updated on their credentials. By reminding care workers of their job expectations and offering them ongoing training, you will show your employees that you’re thinking about their growth and development, and want them to feel confident in their abilities.
5. Give them the tools they need: In order to deliver the highest quality of care, having the tools to be the most efficient is crucial for success in the home care industry. With new home care systems and software solutions being introduced into the market, care workers have the ability to be more informed and prepared for client visits than ever before. With the AlayaCare home care software, care workers have complete visibility into everything they need before their visits occur, ensuring they can deliver the best care possible. Providing your care workers with effective tools and solutions will make their lives easier and empower them to provide better care.