Improving recruitment, retention and progression in social care: steps for employers

Engaging and retaining talented staff is especially challenging in sectors like social care, where demand is high and job pressures intense. By proactively improving recruitment strategies, supporting progression and bolstering retention, employers can create stable, confident teams that deliver better care.

In this article, we’re taking a closer look at practical steps employers can take to strengthen their workforce in social care.

Overcoming recruitment challenges

Host career fairs

In-person career fairs are a valuable way to meet potential candidates, but virtual fairs also offer unique advantages. By hosting events online, you can connect with candidates beyond your local area and build relationships across multiple locations – a big plus for care providers hiring in different regions.

You can consider including “myth-busting” style content in your career fair, particularly if you are aiming to build your pool of entry level talent. Alongside this, host one-on-one sessions with candidates so they can find out more about the roles available and what it’s like to work for your company.

Tip: Target people from other industries with the relevant transferable skills that can serve them well in the care sector.

Offer work experience

Care providers have an opportunity to connect with schools and colleges in their local area to form long-lasting partnerships. This might be volunteering schemes or work experience, which will broaden the perspectives of what younger people expect from a career in care.

Highlight the variety of jobs on offer in social care

Care is most often spoken about in the context of the elderly, which means that often it is residential care homes for this demographic that many people typically picture when thinking about the industry.

Highlighting that care expands far beyond this – into supporting young people experiencing mental health issues, one-on-one support within people’s homes or coordinating events to build a sense of community for clients – is key to help tackle assumptions. For example, care providers can consider the kind of imagery they use on job adverts, on their company website, or in the press – are you only showing care for elderly people, when you are actually supporting a broader range of people?

At Totaljobs, we’ve worked alongside care providers to build case studies from existing staff and tell the stories of their career journeys to a wide audience, which again helps to reach people who may have the right values for care, but assume the career path is much narrower than the reality. We’ve also worked with the Department of Health and Social Care to create a series of case study videos with the aim of educating the public on the opportunities within care.

Overcoming retention challenges

Actively engage and communicate with employees

If the workforce is spread across multiple locations, creating an aligned internal communications strategy may be a challenge for care providers. Building a sense of togetherness with staff who may be out and about throughout their working day, without the need of a laptop, is important for morale.

Head of Resourcing at Care UK, Victoria Cole, previously shared some of her top tips on communicating with staff following with us:

• Weekly e-newsletter bulletin to communicate priority messages to colleagues
• Monthly e-newsletter featuring people news, values and messages to all colleagues
• SmS messaging used by Home Managers to communicate local priority messaging
• An intranet for all colleagues to share company updates and employee spotlights
• Engagement during onboarding and induction using videos, messages and surveys via text to all colleagues
• Regular virtual or in-person meetings held by the CEO/management to share company updates and a chance for colleagues to ask questions

Understand why staff stay or leave the business

While many HR teams may employ exit interviews when a member of staff hands in their notice, much fewer investigate the reasons that people stay with the company. Developing an employee engagement survey, or one-on-one interviews that ask staff to outline the factors that have led them to continue their career in care will help employer to refine their people strategies and improve retention rates.

Look to other sectors that have strong retention rates – what can you learn from them? Is there a common thread within certain businesses or industries that can be developed and adapted for your own?

If one-on-one engagement is not achievable, hosting virtual staff forums that act as Q&A sessions with senior management can also help to strengthen relationships between staff “on the ground” and management, while making it easier to group together particular topics or area through anonymous live surveys.

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Overcoming progression challenges

Offer apprenticeships

Care has long been perceived as ‘low skilled’ in comparison to healthcare, which may mean some candidates do not consider the sector even if they would be a good fit for it. Some care providers are utilising the Government’s Apprenticeship Levy and have created Higher Level Apprenticeships to shift this perception, reiterating that social care is a professional career path that gives people access to qualifications and on-the-job learning.

Did you know? Apprenticeships also offer staff a clear, tiered path to progression where their development is easily mapped and rewarded with each qualification.

Prioritise the right training

The knowledge or confidence gaps of staff will be different for every department and location. However, our survey to care workers highlighted some common training needs, including:

Training in specific soft skills

• Communicating with clients, particularly people with Dementia and Alzheimer’s
• Dealing with challenging behaviour from clients
• Practical and safe manual handling
• Training tailored to the day-to-day role

Regularly asking staff about the skills they want to brush up on will ensure that all training is relevant, timely and properly engaged with. Many of the areas care workers flagged in our survey were focused around maintaining a positive relationship with their client and feeling prepared for challenging situations that may arise. The more training is embedded, the more confident staff will feel in stressful situations – and ultimately clients will receive better care as a result.