On Wednesday, October 17, 2012, I attended a four-hour educational session entitled, "Keeping and Growing Your Staff."  This event was hosted by my employer, Healthcentric Advisors.  The focus of the training was to target staff retention issues among direct-care workers in long-term care facilities. 

This training is relevent to my educational goals for a couple of reasons: 1) long-term care facilities serve as home to our state's elders and/or disabled adults and 2) focusing on the retention and growth of low-paid workers direct impacts the health, housing, and well being of themselves, their family members, and the residents they care.

The objectives of the training were:  

• Recognize the key elements that support staff stability.
• Diagram the elements of a vicious cycle of staff stresses and their impact on census, staffing, and quality.
• Identify management practices that support the staff.
• Practice using the drill-down tools to determine the issues that negatively affect staff stability.
• Develop a plan for implementing strategies to correct turnover and instability in your building.

Key information:
The majority of our LTC workforce are:
·         Single moms
·         Living at or below the poverty level
·         Challenged by child-care issues, transportation, relationship issues

They need your help and support - one nursing home administrator said, “we’re dealing with their problems, because they’re dealing with their problems. It’s just a question of whether we deal with them up front or if we force them underground. When we force their issues underground, we wind up dealing with the problems in other ways, when they can’t come to work, or are carrying their worries without any help or recognition from us as their employer. That’s when we can lose a good worker who’s having a bad time of it.”

Successful Strategies:

Implement effective attendance policies and practices:
·         Accommodate requests for time off
·         Allow employees to switch days
·         Anticipate needs after stressful times
·         Respect an employee’s reality
·         High absence trigger
·         “No-fault” policy
·         Plan ahead for a 2^nd day’s absence ahead of time

Consider a mix of low/mod/high-cost programs:

·         Grocery-points program – rewarding good attendance
·         Mini loans – low impact for facility / huge impact on the lives of your staff
·         MSW - case workers – offer social supports
·         Avoid micro-inequities – for example, your colleagues call out sick and you are concerned; but, when your staff calls out sick you are annoyed!