Check out the following promising practices from other LeadingAge members around the country. We hope they will inspire you as you focus on workforce issues.
Mentor Program for New Employees
Challenge: Six years ago, managers at Christian Living Communities began noticing that turnover among its 600 employees was beginning to rise. A root cause analysis revealed that workers were leaving the organization because they didn’t know what was expected of them, and didn’t have a friend at work who could answer their questions.
Solution: Today, nurses, nursing assistants, and personal care attendants at Christian Living Communities are assigned a mentor who works side-by-side with that employee during his/her first 3 shifts, and makes sure the employee achieves a defined set of competences within the first 30 days on the job. Mentors and new employees continue to meet monthly for the first year of employment. The program was “home grown”—it started as a nurse and nursing assistant program—and Christian Living Communities believes it is easily transferable to other organizations. Learn more.
Orientation for Training and Retention
Challenge: Well•Spring has high standards for resident care, their mission is simply to exceed the needs of a diverse and evolving population of older adults. Residents expect and deserve the best at this life plan community. To equip staff to meet these high standards, they needed to establish a process for training and retention.
Solution: Well•Spring’s orientation process for new hires is extensive and incorporates peer teaching throughout. They use a mentor program to train new staff. In addition, all staff are trained in the skilled nursing setting before they may rotate to any other care area. Learn more.
WeCare Connect Program
Challenge: Not being aware of how new employees are acclimating to your organization in terms of onboarding, training, supervisor relationship, job fit, expectations, environment, and plans to stay leading to high and preventable turnover.
Solution: WeCare ConnectTM is a program that connects to your new and existing employees via phone, email or mobile app, and instantly sends the appropriate people in your organization email notifications of any issues that may lead to a resignation. This allows you to immediately intervene with an individual employee and prevent turnover before it happens. Built-in issue tracking and resolution ensure all notifications are addressed appropriately and in a timely manner. WeCare ConnectTM also connects with resigned and terminated employees gathering valuable data that drives organization-wide changes. Learn more.
