Grow your organisation
Focus on what you can control to deliver quality care
Over the past year—and all through the pandemic—demand for care surged. It had emerged as a political priority, with a primary obstacle being labor shortages. Amidst the demand for care momentum, we expected 2022 to be the year when reimbursement rates for aged and disability care would climb, opening new doors, and enabling service providers to better compete for talent.
This didn’t quite come to pass. Today, care organisations are forced to focus on what they can control to drive sustainable growth and gain greater control of their own destiny. The most pressing areas will be fully realising new technology to shore operations, training and developing skilled staff, and leveraging demand for care to pursue new sources of funding or partnerships.
Here are my five most consequential predictions for service providers in 2023.
Adrian Schauer is the founder and CEO of AlayaCare, an aged, community, disability care software provider, delivering the next disruptive solution for the aged, community, disability care industry by combining clinical documentation and back-office software.
1. Declare war on repetitive tasks
Seize the power of automation in your software system
We estimate that most service providers spend as much as one-third of their gross profit in coordination and supervision. This leaves staff spending far too much effort on admin tasks and not enough on decision-making and building relationships with clients and care workers.
Service providers must dissect their workflows and deploy automation tools within their software to govern repetitive tasks. New AI tools can be set to monitor clinical notes and assess risk so that supervisors can manage deeper caseloads and respond quickly to clients in need. Scheduling optimisers and automated dispatch can save schedulers tremendous amounts of time, revolutionising back-office operations.
2. Simplify operations to become part of care delivery
Lose the friction, leverage the freedom
An efficient back office should strive for simplification—accomplished by making administrative efforts legitimate aspects of care delivery. To unlock this potential, service providers can strip away friction to invite new levels of efficiency and collaboration across the care ecosystem.
For example, software that seamlessly connects all members in a circle of care creates a clear bridge of communication and visibility for clients, families, and providers. Another simplify-able workflow lays within subcontractors. By automating offers and referrals, data captured at point-of-care (e.g., punch data or progress notes) can be synchronised through from the supply-side system to the demand-side system.
3. Offer continuous learning and growth opportunities
Upskill to attract and retain top talent
Globally, labour shortages remain the most persistent problem in aged and disability care—from care workers to registered nurses and allied health therapists. It will be crucial to invest more in continual upskilling efforts in 2023, to get a leg up on this ongoing challenge.
Today, employees throughout the industry seek opportunities to learn and grow. The key to attracting and retaining talent is by integrating continuing education tools and training resources into a platform that care workers can freely access on their own watch. This is supplemented by putting technology in place that makes care-worker’s jobs more efficient, relieves administrative burdens, and keeps them working at the top of their skills and licensure.
4. Empower your workforce to engage with clients to deliver the care and support they want
Leverage your people, watch them innovate
The Royal Commission emphasised the importance of a rights-based system that includes an entitlement to care and support based on the needs and preferences of the individual. To genuinely achieve this within the aged & disability care system, we need to enable flexibility and fluidity in how care plans are developed, enabling the individual to choose and be able to change what will meet their needs and whom they want to engage with—in their circle of support.
We then need to empower all care team members so they can easily pivot to meet these needs. This requires sound governance structures that minimise risk, with enough flexibility to enable staff discretion on how best to meet these needs and technology that supports them to do this all seamlessly.
5. Resist the commoditisation of our industry
Own our value, gain a true seat at the table
Finally, it’s time for a rallying cry. To build thriving service providers that work for all stakeholders and deliver on the promise of better care outcomes, we must trade in those outcomes—not in hours of care. Aged and disability care in Australia and New Zealand cannot be pushed down the value chain.
There is an opportunity for better collaboration between health and aged/disability care, particularly with the ongoing pursuit of a digital health system. We need to be activein this discussion and use our voice to advocate for the opportunities this offers in improving care outcomes.
We must encourage the government to pursue more flexible models to reduce bureaucracy and empower service providers to take a leadership role and guide care forward in collaboration with clients, families, and their care teams.
Are you ready to grow your organisation?
Against this backdrop for 2023, opportunities continue to emerge for providers of aged and disability care that could mark success for years to come. Success will require outside-of-the-box thinking, key internal investments that address removing repetitive tasks and offering upskilling opportunities for care workers, and strategic capitalisation to serve the surging public demand.
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