5 HR challenges for the Social Care sector in 2023
HR teams in UK Social Care will face many challenges in this post-pandemic and inflation-ridden year. Here are the 5 biggest HR challenges of 2023.
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| 10 min read
HR teams in UK Social Care will face many challenges in this post-pandemic and inflation-ridden year. Here are the 5 biggest HR challenges of 2023.
| 1 min read
Frontline communications platform Yapster has been acquired by Sona to accelerate the expansion of our revolutionary Frontline Operating System.
| 3 min read
The care sector is facing a serious workforce crisis. Employee recognition programmes offer a simple solution to the challenge of high staff turnover.
PUBLISHED: November 2022
Employee recognition programs are no longer a 'nice-to-have' - they are a must.
Our survey of 500 UK Health & Social Care employees highlights both the pivotal role of recognition in improving retention rates and the urgent need to address a perceived lack of appreciation in the sector.
PUBLISHED: October 2022
58% of care sector employees don't believe work-life balance exists in the care sector.
We surveyed 750 UK care sector employees to understand their attitudes towards flexible working and what these mean for providers looking to increase their ‘flex appeal’.
DownloadPUBLISHED: August 2022
Why are health and social care workers leaving... and where are they going?
1 in every 10 health and social care workers could leave the sector this year. This represents an opportunity for care organisations to rethink how they support, engage and motivate their staff.
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Despite the importance of the sector to society, working in social care can often feel like a thankless task - 92% of staff want more recognition. But providers have the power to turn this around.
3 minute read
Low wages, high burnout, and difficult working conditions are partly to blame. They're the common results of insufficient funding and high staff turnover.
The recent CQC State of Care Report concluded that these factors are highly prevalent across the U.K. Social Care system, with casualties such as staff morale, engagement and retention, and even quality of patient care.
However, a lack of employee appreciation is also a driving force. With just 21% of care workers receiving regular recognition from their employers, it's time to take action.
Not all the solutions are complex. Let's take a look at one in particular: employee recognition programmes.
Employee recognition programmes are a way of helping employees feel valued in the workplace. In the care sector, they drive up employee and patient satisfaction by ensuring hard work does not go unnoticed.
An employee recognition strategy needs to be holistic. There are many ways to identify and create opportunities to show appreciation to care staff, such as:
Rewards do not have to be monetary — a common concern across a sector that needs to keep a close eye on costs. Prizes such as 'Employee of the Month' or 'Highest Attendance Record' or a landmark 'Years of Service' award can mean just as much.
More than 2 in 5 staff working in care have left a job because they didn't feel valued. It's clear that employee recognition programmes are no longer simply 'nice to have'; they're a must for care providers. Let's look at three crucial reasons why.
Once pay is excluded, lack of appreciation is the top reason why care workers leave the sector, creating a vicious cycle.
High staff turnover has significant knock-on effects for care providers, significantly detracting from employee satisfaction and even affecting quality of care.
An employee recognition programme can create a workplace culture that employees are proud to be part of, increasing recruitment and retention: staff churn is 31% lower at companies with a 'recognition culture.'
An employee recognition programme can positively affect performance and productivity.
Feelings of demotivation mean that 49% of staff are less productive, and 39% produce lower-quality work as a result.
Conversely, staff who regularly receive recognition for their work are twice as likely to embrace innovative thinking and generally go above and beyond, which can make a world of difference to the quality of care given.
Implementing an employee recognition programme is a highly effective way of ensuring that a culture of appreciation is present across all areas and levels of your company.
Happier, more motivated staff lower your operating costs. Gallup found that, in the U.S., the total cost of disengaged employees is somewhere between $450 and $550 billion a year. Companies that rank highly for employee experience generate up to 25% more profit than their competitors.
With easy-to-use, company-wide workforce management tools such as Sona, managers can easily show appreciation to their employees.
Using a wide variety of features such as personalised messages of praise, simple feedback loops, reminders for well-being check-ins, and shout-outs on a shared newsfeed, recognition is literally embedded into our software.
The care sector's current workforce crisis needs quick fixes and long-term solutions. Employee recognition programmes can fill this role.
Urgent steps must be taken to ensure all care employees feel appreciated, particularly given the incredible value of their work.
Appreciation truly matters — download our research report on employee recognition to understand why in even more detail.
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2 min read
We’re pleased to announce Richard Upshall has joined us as Head of Product as Sona becomes the most user-friendly workforce app & platform on the market.
1 min read
Every Wednesday at 1pm GMT, this 20-minute session will be your chance to see the platform in action and ask questions you may have for the Sona team.
2 min read
Sona was invited to join an expert panel to discuss why care providers should be focused on employee engagement and wellbeing in 2022. Read more here.