Maintaining
a Vibrant Care Sector
Ash
House Management has developed a series of programmes to
support Social Services Departments and the Care Home Sector
through the current period of change following the Care
Standards Act.
Programme
1: Ensuring Supply
A review of businesses in the sector is undertaken, using
a structured interview which examines the issues affecting
the sector locally and its ability to respond to wider service
needs. This includes the implications of the National Minimum
Standards, business planning, occupancy levels, contracting
issues, cross border activity, marketing and communication.
Benchmark information is provided to participating homes.
Programme
2: Identifying Strategic Demand
The concept is to work with the Social Services Department
to identify long term goals, and to provide a framework
for achieving supported living at home, analysing demand
and suggesting methodologies for achieving positive outcome
objectives. This would also provide a strategy document
to enable the private Care Sector to consider what restructuring
was necessary to support the strategic direction.
Programme
3: Engaging Older People in a Contract of Care
'Better Government for Older People' and the Department
of Health call for older people to be represented in the
development of services and strategies.
This
programme seeks the views both of older people who have
recently moved into residential / nursing homes, and of
those who are in receipt of community care services in their
own homes. This programme engages with older people to solicit
their input into the strategic planning process.
Although
these programmes can be stand alone, they are intended to
be integrated to create a composite analysis of supply and
demand which can provide the basis of a common strategic
plan for Social Services and the Care Sector.
A
Review of the Care Sector
summary
of a recently completed project for a local authority
For
the majority of care homes which are not large corporate
units with the business skills to utilise market change
to advantage, coming to terms with the new National Minimum
Standards can be seen as the final straw.
Legislation
is an issue for the Care Sector as a whole, but for a small
independent home operating in isolation it is doubly so.
The overhead cost of complying with the National Minimum
Standards is proportionally greater for a small care home,
and the cost per bed of achieving and maintaining the Standards
is felt hardest by the smaller units.
As part
of a support initiative for the sector, one county council
used the Small Business Service Business Review to assist
the care homes within its boundaries. The Reviews were funded
by the Regional Development Agency as part of the government's
initiative to support small businesses. The exercise was
carried out at no cost to the care homes.
The
Business Reviews are an assessment of individual homes against
the Business Excellence Model, in order to identify operational
issues and areas for development. The Business Review is
not a panacea for all the problems of the sector but it
does allow businesses to put their issues into context.
The
care homes that were reviewed welcomed the opportunity to
discuss confidentially all aspects of their business from
personnel to balance sheet, and receive meaningful feedback.
They acknowledged the benefit of re-appraising marketing,
quality, staff turnover, recruitment and profit and loss
at a time when real-term income was falling. Several homes
acted upon the final report by developing business plans,
structuring quality systems, reviewing marketing, tracking
costs and planning for the future.
The
County also commissioned a confidential sector-wide survey
which covered all the issues currently affecting the sector,
including controversial questions centred around closure,
owner retirement, clients supplemented by third party payments,
the effect of the minimum wage, the cost of meeting the
National Minimum Standards and details from the latest Profit
& Loss Account and Balance Sheet. The latter information
was developed into a number of benchmark statistics based
on income and individual costs per bed.
The
benchmark information was collated confidentially in terms
of Residential / Dual / and Nursing & EMI homes, as
this provided the most consistent mix of issues and cost
gradients, and returned to those homes who took part, with
a key to identify their own business, so that they could
compare their performance with others in the sector.
The
universal shortage of business skills within the sector
was identified as a major factor in the difficulty of the
small care homes in meeting major organisational change,
such as envisaged in the Care Standards Act.
The
effect of the exercise for those who took part was overwhelmingly
positive. The care homes benefited from an overview of their
business against an objective assessment and from this were
able to determine their long term needs. These small homes
are now able to see the future of their business through
the structured framework of a Business Review. Business
Plans, Staff Reviews and Marketing can all be seen to combine
into the good practice defined in the National Minimum Standards.
The
project did not by any means solve all the issues for the
sector, but it did allow owners of small homes to view their
businesses in perspective and to prepare them for the challenge
of meeting the requirements of the Care Standards Act and
the National Minimum Standards.
For
further information telephone 01352 750300 or
complete the contact
page.
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