Maintaining relationships with your caregiving staff is critical to the success of your business. Some business owners view staff almost as a commodity. Particularly with non-medical home care, where many caregivers have little education beyond high school, we see business owners making the mistake of associating high turnover simply as an aspect that every competitor encounters.

Imagine for a moment that rather than providing home care, you are in the business of manufacturing widgets. If you wanted to become a global leader in widget manufacturing, you certainly would employ an entire R&D department. You would have a team of people dedicated to improving quality. Another team would be focused on acquiring raw materials for future widget manufacturing.

Research and development in our industry becomes "recruitment and retention". Your caregivers are your inventory, they are your product, and they are your single best marketing tool. If you become masters of recruiting quality people and keeping them happy forever, we will not only win in the marketplace, but we will become a dominant force changing home care for the better in our community.

I'm passionate about people, and here are five recruitment and retention techniques I've personally used and seen work effectively in private duty home care.

Money is a de-motivator. If you give raises every year to show your caregivers you value them, eventually, your best caregivers will become unprofitable. If after one year you give a 10% raise, and they do the same quality work, they expect an additional 10% next year. From a business perspective, if an employee is worth $11/hour last year, and does the same quality of work, shouldn’t they be worth $11/hour this year?

Some people need and deserve raises. Make merit raises infrequent, but significant. If someone is making you money, share the wealth. Make certain they understand that the merit raise is unusual, and is a reward not a motivator.

Make sure merit raises are accompanied by verbal or written recognition. Be specific about the reasons for their raise. For example, “You’ve worked a year, over 2000 hours, without missing a day.”

There are two keys to making this work. First, you must maintain cost-of-living raises. Your employees need to know that they won't be working for you next year for less money. Second, you must start them at a competitive salary. I'd rather recruit using competitive salary than attempt to retain an employee with money.

Didn't I just say, “be frugal”. No, I said “be frugal with raises” but be generous to your employees overall. Buy them gifts and spend money on them both individually and as a group.

One of my clients from years ago purchased automobile club memberships for every employee working in the field. This gift had two effects. First, it showed that the company cared for its people. Second, it reduced the occurrence of "car trouble" as a reason for canceling or coming in late. Purchased in quantity, the memberships cost the company about $15 per employee at that time. Their average employee worked 1500 hrs, and therefore the cost per employee was about $0.01 per hour worked.

Our firm was paid to conduct an employee satisfaction survey. Approximately 15% of employees mentioned the auto club membership as one of the reasons for not leaving the company. If this perk helps retain only two employees each year, the memberships actually save money in reduced recruitment expense.

Throw a company picnic, buy donuts for the office, send a get well basket or birthday balloons. These little gifts show employees that you value them as people. You'll find that you spend much less in the long run on recruitment and salaries.

As a manager of people, I pride myself on being compassionate. I listen. I help if I can. I try to accommodate without becoming an enabler. That's where it stops. My caregivers realize that I care for them, and consequently I care about their personal lives. Yet, they also know that they have responsibilities working for me, and when personal lives interfere their responsibilities don't vanish.

I explain to them that I understand life is difficult, then explain that life is difficult by design. It shows my caregivers respect, and again demonstrates their value to me. By being compassionate, I develop friendships. These friendships actually help by holding people more accountable.

One of my employees lost an infant grandchild, a pain I can't even fathom. This was such an extreme case, my first reaction was to give her unlimited time off. Two days after the funeral, she returned to work. I told her she was welcome to take more time, but she simply said "I want to be here, I feel needed, and among friends."

About a month later, I bumped into her sister in the grocery store. I offered my condolences on the loss of her great-niece. After a few minutes she told me "my sister must really enjoy her work with you." She told me how the employee had lost two previous jobs for unexcused absenteeism.

First you need a DNA sample... just kidding. Everyone can identify your best employees. Here's how to clone them. Ask yourself these questions, and let the answers help you find more quality people.

• How were they recruited? Where were they recruited?
• What encourages them to stay?
• How old are they?
• What is their level of education?
• What characteristics of their personal life affect their job performance?
• What are their hobbies or personal interests?
• Do they worship regularly?
• Were they great when they first arrived, or did they develop greatness?

Create a profile of your best employees. You may even want to interview them to learn more. Once you have this profile, skew your recruiting techniques to help find similar people.

I realize some of these questions could be perceived as prejudicial. Don't use these questions to evaluate applicants, but you may use these questions to hone your recruiting methods. If you find your best employees worship regularly, begin recruiting in places of worship, but don't decline to hire a qualified candidate if they aren't religious.

The first few tips were terrific in small companies with relaxed atmospheres. Over the years I've learned to develop personal relationships with caregivers and other employees and that's made me very effective.

Larger companies may find these techniques difficult to master. I still believe the techniques are important, however, medium and large organizations need to develop more formal recruiting and retention programs.

I encourage companies of all sizes to create programs, because even small companies with a handful of employees can use formal recruitment and retention plans to encourage growth. It's much easier to create programs in a small company, and have it grow with the organization, than it is to create a companywide program for hundreds of employees.

Here are three quick examples:

• Employee referral programs. Create a financial incentive-based program to recruit other employees. Make sure the incentive covers both applicants and long-term success
• Profit sharing programs. Make sure every employee realizes that the work they do affects the bottom line. Design a program where a portion of profits are distributed to employees in the form of bonuses.
• Reward and recognition programs. Reward education. Reward longevity. Reward consistency. Recognize dependability. Reward ingenuity. We have a saying "what gets measured gets managed, what gets rewarded gets repeated."

For more help developing formal recruitment and retention programming, contact our newest associate Kathy Clater, our staffing programs specialist. She may be reached in our Louisville office, 1-866-209-5101.

By Kathy Clater

The U.S. Department of Labor estimates that it costs a company one-third of a new hire’s annual salary to replace an employee. Using a wage rate of only $6 per hour, it costs a company $3,600 for each departing employee.

Leading Home Care will soon be offering a new selection process for home care caregivers. The process includes cutting edge technology pre- employment assessments, behavioral interview questions based on assessment results, and core performance indicators already benchmarked for successful caregivers in the home care industry.

Well designed and properly implemented, pre- employment assessments have been proven to:

1. Reduce turnover
2. Reduce cost per hire
3. Reduce worker’s compensation costs
4. Reduce liability for negligent hiring
5. Increase productivity due to better job fit
6. Increase customer satisfaction
7. Improve employee morale
8. Increase effectiveness and efficiency of staffing process

We’ve heard from many of you, that recruiting and retention of caregivers is one of your biggest challenges. In a recent telephone survey conducted by Leading Home Care of 18 Private Duty companies, we confirmed that companies are asking for help in selecting reliable caregivers.

There is a high degree of interest in pre-employment assessments, but the process of developing or finding a tool that is valid and reliable and a good fit for our industry is confusing and complicated. It can often include a time consuming and expensive benchmarking process.

The good news is - all of that work is done. We’ll even provide you with training materials and assistance in getting started!

What do you do after the first sales call? How do you approach a physician or a hospital discharge planner for that next sales call? What do you say to get back in the door?

These are the questions we hear all the time from new AND experienced sales people in home care. Now, we have the answers for you.

I've teamed up with Michael Giudicissi, former Vice President of Business Development for a major home care company, to bring you the latest ideas and information on how to make more effective sales calls in home care. Based on a new book by the same title, Making the Approach: Advanced Sales Training for Home Care Professionals is a three-part audio learning program for your entire sales team.

Session #1 – The First Call – Thursday, October 12, 2006 The first program in the series will focus on what you need to do before you make the first sales call, and how you can turn that first call into more business and more follow up calls. Michael and I will dissect the first 15 seconds of a sales call and give you all you need to know about pre-call planning. Then we will help you design and plan that first call on a new “A” prospect.

You’ll learn about pre-call planning, what to bring – and what not to bring – on your initial sales call, and how to craft your “30 Second Elevator Speech.” Then you’ll get the scoop on how to “set up for the follow up,” and how to close the first call and leave them wanting more.

Session #2 – The Second Call – Thursday, November 9, 2006

Now that you’ve made that first call, what are you going to say or do to get back in the door? In this session, Michael and I will guide you through planning and making the next call. You’ll get great ideas to answer the question, “Why are you calling again?”

You’ll get powerful information on how to build trust, position your company, and handle issues or objections. Then, you’ll hear powerful tips on asking for the sale.

For many new sales reps, making that follow up call is the biggest challenge in home care sales. This teleseminar will give you what you need to know to overcome that hurdle and make the approach you need to get the business.

Session #3 – The Third Call and Beyond – December 14, 2006

In this session, you’ll get ideas and insights on how to feed your referral sources and prospect information . . . NOT with donuts! Too many sales reps in home care fall into the pharmaceutical trap of only being able to get in the door by bringing lunch. Krispy Kremes® are not the key to a doctor’s heart. There are better ways to get your message across and build customer loyalty.

In this session, Michael and Stephen will give you the tools to build “The Respect Factor – the unbreakable relationship,” and describe how to aim for customer delight. You’ll find out how to make your customers your sales force, and how to “Lock Up Your Territory.”

To participate in this advanced sales training teleseminar series, contact your state home care association, or register directly online at www.leadinghomecare.com.

Private Duty Today! is published every other Wednesday by Leading Home Care . . . a Tweed Jeffries company. We invite you to pass this newsletter along to your friends and colleagues in Private Duty Home Care by clicking on the link below.

• Publisher - Stephen Tweed, CSP
• Circulation Manager - Diane West
• Editor - Jason Tweed

Permission to Reproduce: Permission is granted to home care companies, home care associations, and home care related publications to reproduce articles from this newsletter as long as appropriate credit is given as follows: "Printed with permission from Private Duty Today! Copyright 2005 Leading Home Care ... To sign up for your FREE Subscription, log on to www.leadinghomecare.com."

You may also sign up for your FREE Subscription to Stephen Tweed's Leading Home Care Report. This bi-weekly electronic newsletter is written for home care company CEOs and senior executives who want to grow their businesses and multiply their performance.

email: jason@leadinghomecare.com

phone: 1-888-668-9333

web: http://www.privatedutytoday.com