A good leader looks after their staff | Pure Executive

Aged care organisations that do not care for their staff in the same way they care for their residents and clients are at risk of neglecting their responsibilities as a ?caring? organisation and losing the loyalty of employees.

This is the belief of aged care consultant, Deborah McKern, who urged an audience of aged care leaders to value, respect and support the people they employ in the same way they do the older people they serve, at the Alzheimer?s Australia Vic Leadership in Quality Dementia Support Forum this week.

Ms McKern said that currently in the aged care sector, many providers fail to offer strategic services, wellness programs, and support mechanisms for staff working at the coal-face and dealing with life and death issues on a daily basis.

The consequence of this, she added, is a decline in the state of staff health, a greater risk of occupational hazards and an unmotivated, burnt-out workforce with no real reason to continue working for a specific employer.

?If an organisation says the care staff they employ have to care for people [who are ill and dying], then they have to also deal with the care staff?s grief,? said the registered nurse with over 30 years experience, Ms McKern.

?Why? Research says that the self-harm risk for nurses is around 40 per cent higher than that of the general population.

?How does it manifest? Because of the physical demands of the job, long hours and double shifts worked and working through the middle of the night.?

Aged care nurses ?also drink too much, smoke, don?t exercise, don?t eat well, don?t have much time [on their hands], and are not cared for in their workforce which basically, doesn?t nurture them?.

?The shift work goes with the job but the rest is bad.

?And what you will then see at the coalface is a lot of people who are burnt out with no capacity to care,? she said.

According to Safe Work Australia?s national 2008/09 workers compensation figures, the ?hospital and nursing home? industry rates quite high on the number of accepted workers? compensation claims (excluding journey claims) that resulted in a fatality, permanent incapacity or temporary incapacity.

The number of serious claims calculated in that time frame was more than 9,100 compared to only 130 serious claims in the defence industry and 5,545 in construction.

The incident rate of occupational injuries and diseases, per 1,000 employees, for hospitals and aged care facilities was almost 17 per cent while in defence it was almost four per cent; and in construction, 21 per cent.

Finally, the frequency rate of occupational injuries and diseases, per million hours worked by employees, for hospitals and aged care was 11.5; defence was 2.1 and construction was over 10.

Alzheimer?s Australia Vic and the Australian Nursing Federation agreed with the workforce compensation statistics and with the current state of the nursing workforce, as described by Ms McKern.

However, Ms McKern said, encouraging staff wellness could help to create a healthier nursing workforce. It would also allow employees to engage with a resident?s/client?s journey through illness to death, for without that connection, the client?s ?journey will be empty?.

?That?s the negative side.?

?But what you now see are smart organisations which are recognising this issue.

?When I was a director of nursing for an organisation, we had a gym that the staff could use. We fed our staff well with the food that was cooked on-site.

??And we made sure all staff got a text message when someone died.

?The organisation was also planning to buy a time-share for those staff who could never afford to have a holiday. It would be a reward for long service and just to give back to the staff,? said Ms McKern.

Staff wellness programs, on-premises gyms or gym membership discounts and other staff incentives are commonplace in many industries.

But, she said, the concept of promoting staff wellness programs is not big in the nursing field as a whole and is not wide-spread in aged care although it is becoming more common.

?If it happens in other professions, why doesn?t it happen in nursing? If it is not acceptable [for staff to deal with grief and emotional issues without support] in other professions, why is it acceptable in nursing?

?The other thing is that organisations with staff who work in a caring role have a principle obligation to demonstrate that they care for their workforce, as well as their clients.?

Ms McKern said that these type of wellness and support programs not only aim to improve the health and fitness of staff, encourage a work-life balance and promote OH&S principles, but they send a message to employees that they are valued and appreciated.

?I see this time and time again ?the staff feel valued and appreciated if their emotional needs are supported, and they receive a positive reward, positive feedback and support. Staff will then not only work longer and harder but they will stay on with the organisation.

?Yes ? people need a decent wage but, at end of day, if staff are not supported in that workplace, they will go to another workplace for the same money and that organisation will lose the investment they made in that staff member.?

Ms McKern said that given the workforce pressures providers are either experiencing now or are set to experience in the very near future, they must look at what they can do to attract and retrain a quality workforce of caring staff.

?The culture of nursing has never been to nurture staff and there used to be a sense that there will be there will always be staff so organisations never had to try that hard. But now we are facing a tsunami of older people coming into aged care ?..

?So the real focus now is on developing and building a quality workforce. It?s about building sustainability in the workforce. It really just comes down to that.?

The Alzheimer?s Australia Vic Leadership in Quality Dementia Support Forum took place in Melbourne on Tuesday.

Source: www.australianageingagenda.com.au

Source: http://pureexecutive.com.au/a-good-leader-looks-after-their-staff/

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