Tech as a healthcare industry gamechanger: Improve Staff Retention

Improve staff retention

Staff retention is critical in long-term care and senior living facilities to bring stability and regularity to quality of patient care. At the same time, healthcare professionals are highly susceptible to stress and fatigue due to healthcare's unique demands – such as dealing closely with illness, families and being in stressful, highly emotional situations. Long-term care facilities need to fill staff demands 24/7 and shift-work compounds the situation, leading to high rates of employee burnout and turnover. If employees are faced with administrative disorganization on top of all these other challenges, it's common for staff to become disengaged. The engagement and retention statistics are discouraging. According to recent surveys, only 57% of healthcare workers report feeling engaged on the job and 69% of healthcare staff say they plan to leave their current position within five years – and 37% within just two.

Thankfully, new technology is proving to be one of the best strategies for easing scheduling stress, re-engaging employees and increasing staff retention in long-term care. Workplace management tools, such as BookJane J360, reduce the administrative burden on staff and employees alike by managing scheduling through all-in-one platforms.

Scheduling software frees staff and management from the pressure of daily phone calls, and gives employees the convenience of building their work schedules on their own mobile devices, according to the work-life balance that suits them best. When staff members are empowered through choice, they're motivated to sign up for shifts through a sense of professional commitment and desire, not out of a sense of obligation. Employees check in with the platform regularly and voluntarily, and shift fulfillment rates increase while managers find that they have far less need to incentivize.

The technology is versatile and gives leaders the option of letting internal staff view and sign up for shift opportunities first. These are employees who are most familiar with a facility’s mission, vision, and values, so prioritizing them for shift fulfillment has positive and long-lasting impacts on employee engagement and on patient care. Most importantly, when schedules are consistent, predictable and well managed, staff feel satisfied, engaged, and valued, which increases staff retention alongside quality of care.

The advantages are clear for Jessica Bailey, who works at Amica Senior Lifestyles Peel Village as a personal support worker. "Using the BookJane app has improved my life." Jessica used to spend time worrying about whether there would be work available, but the ability to check in with BookJane J360 outside of her scheduled work time gives her peace of mind – and gives her purpose. Like many employees, Jessica finds the scheduling tool empowering and motivating and it gives her the freedom to focus back on the reason she chose patient care work in the first place: to make life better for residents and to grow as a person.

Choice is powerful and staff appreciate having the scheduling control and freedom over their work-life balance. Not only does workplace management software increase staff retention in long-term care and senior living facilities, it reduces agency fees and overtime, increases staff engagement, eases administrative burdens and saves everyone time.

For an in-depth look at how BookJane will improve your workplace environment, click here to set up a time to speak to one of their experts.

Learn how BookJane helps health care facilities improve shift fulfillment by 40%, dramatically decrease their time to fill shifts, and significantly reduce burdensome scheduling and administration time.