On today’s episode of A Drink with “The Hurricane,” Steve talks about the number one complaint from caregivers and the changes you can make in your business to improve retention.
Real quick.
I wanted to let you know that we partnered up with The Institute for Dignity and Grace and there is the first time ever the Caregiver Recruitment and Retention Summit based on the top 10 complaints of caregivers. They’ve identified and addressed how to keep caregivers to increase your retention, and how to attract more caregivers. If you haven’t heard about it, I highly recommend getting to this event, because it will sell out November 6th and 7th. I’ll be speaking there among other leaders in our industry about caregiver recruitment and retention.
The number one complaint of caregivers is discussed in the Home Care Pulse Report that came out earlier this year back in May, the spring edition, they did an entire section, like half the book was about all things caregivers.
And you will see in this graphic below the top 10 complaints of caregivers.
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And when I read this I was not shocked. Because initially, when it comes down to it, like we all think that caregivers want more money, right? We all think it comes down to money. And money would be the number one reason why caregivers complain. And as crazy as it is, that is not the number one reason. Money is number 2.
The number one reason is inconsistent work!
They don’t like working for our industry because they have 40 hours this week, and next week they have 27, and then the week after they have 32, and then the week after they have 16, and then the week after they have 40 again. It’s too inconsistent. Now, this does go back to this, but this is even more important because while a caregiver wants more money, if you’re able to give a caregiver 40 hours of work, and keep them at 40 hours at work every single week, they will stay with you.
Now, I want you to think for a moment the nature of a caregiver. Some of you might have been caregivers yourselves. Most caregivers are paycheck to paycheck. You know, think about what a caregiver makes around the country. Somewhere between $10 to $14 an hour, unless you’re in a city market where it’s a $15 minimum wage, then those caregivers are making $16 to $17 an hour, which, you know, oh wow, you’re making $16 to $17 an hour.
Well if you live in one of those cities, you’re poor at $16, $17 an hour. Seattle, Washington, I want you to try to live in Seattle, Washington making $16 an hour, you can’t, okay? So as it is they want more money, and we know how hard the job is. They’re deserving of more money, but we can’t afford to pay them more, because right now if you’re paying your caregivers $14, you’re probably charging $28, and you need that margin. You need the 50% margin because that is what covers the expenses of running the business.
The compliance, the nursing care that you have to do, the office staff members, the advertising, and marketing, and insurances. Insurance is probably like 15% by itself, it’s ridiculous. So you have to charge that. This gets to a point where a lot of people can’t afford it, and so it’s like, what do I do? How do I meet my caregivers in the middle? All right caregivers, I can’t give you more than $14. I can’t, it’s just not in the numbers, doesn’t work, but I can give you 40 hours of work.
How do you do this? By having a 20 hour a week minimum.
And I’ve been saying this for a decade – a 20 hour minimum. Now, I know there’s already people thinking, “I’m not doing that. “We’ll take any case that comes our way.” Yeah, and what’s your turnover rate like? The industry average is 82%. You can’t keep caregivers because caregivers don’t want to work three hours with this client, four hours with this one, seven hours with this one, to make up a 40 hour schedule. Nobody wants to do that, you don’t want to do that. How can you expect a caregiver to want to do that?
So now you think to yourself, well, what about this person who actually needs this, right? If somebody needs home care, it’s for what purpose? It’s to prevent unnecessary hospitalization from occurring. It is to assist the person with the activities of daily living so that they don’t hurt themself, and or die, right? That’s what we do.
So when you think about the nature of what we’re doing for somebody, we’re putting into the perspective of that if somebody truly genuinely needs less than 20 hours a week, then they don’t really need home care. They need more of like a sitter service, the girl next door who comes over and helps out every once in a while, they can go to care.com for that. 20 hours and greater, that’s for the medically complex client.
The medically complex patients are the ones that if it’s not for us providing not 20 hours, like 20 hours becomes the minimum, because it’s 56 hours, 84 hours, 168 hours a week, live in. If we’re not providing that care for somebody, then they have to sell their house and move into an assisted living, or they have to sell their house and move into a memory care, or they have to sell their house and move into a nursing home. If not for my clients, that’s what those patients would have to do. That’s the medically complex client, and there are plenty of them out there in every market around the world.
When people tell me that they don’t want to do a 20 hour minimum, they don’t know how to market. When people tell me that they don’t want to do a 20 hour minimum, they don’t know how to sell. When people tell me that they don’t want to do a 20 hour minimum, they’re letting the patient dictate to them how they’re gonna provide the care.
Ironically, in the Home Care Pulse Report another graphic that they talked about was people with minimums. And every master, ’cause there’s a new level, they have home care, they have a beginners, intermediate, they have leaders, who are people doing three million and beyond, and then people doing five million plus are called home care masters. Every one of the masters has a minimum. So what does that tell ya?
That people who are the most successful, the people with the best reputations, the people who do the best at managing their patients, have minimum hours per week. Why, because that’s how home care works. And if anybody says to you from a referral source standpoint, “I want you to do this,” or “Why do you charge what you do?” This is something I laughed at.
Would you go to an assisted living and tell them why they charge what they do? No, so don’t tell me how to run my business. That’s not your place. There’s a reason why we charge what we do. There’s a reason why we’re doing the 20 hour minimum. Because when you have a 20 hour minimum, now there’s only gonna be maybe 15 to 20 different possible shifts to fill, and when you have an abundance of referrals coming in, a 20 hour case cancels, you have another one coming in, that caregiver goes from one case to the next case, and they never have to look for work. There’s no lag time in the middle.
Other things that we help our clients do is to set up cancellation periods, etc. But this is why our clients are so successful because we’re helping our people get to this point by bringing in an abundance of referrals of people who have a great need. Where 20 hours is a joke, because really they need 40, 56, and beyond.
When you have a ton of those type of referrals coming in, you service those patients, you go to the 20 hours, and then before you know it, your business is doing three, $4 million a year, and you’re taking care of people, that if it wasn’t for you, they would be in a nursing home or an assisted living.
That’s making a huge impact, it’s making a difference, and it’s also working smarter, not harder, and it helps you retain caregivers, ’cause you give caregivers consistent work. That’s what it’s all about.
And if you want to keep caregivers, if you want to solve the caregiver crisis, you gotta give them consistent work.
You want to do all this stuff. You’re like, “Steve, this is great, how do I do that?” Pick up the phone, give us a call. 848-444-9865.
We’ll help you so that you can do all of this stuff. You’ll dominate your market place, and you’ll BLOW AWAY THE COMPETITION!
If you like this content, then you love my free course, Initiate: Master Your Home Care Business.
