Building the Future Care Workforce: an end-to-end solution for recruiting and retaining care staff

Executive Summary

The adult social care sector faces unprecedented challenges in recruiting and retaining qualified professionals, with staggeringly high rates of vacancy (9.9%) and attrition (28.3%). These workforce challenges have a profound impact on the viability of care providing organisations, staff and the people the sector supports, and are exacerbated by demographic change and increasing demand for care services.

The ability of the sector to address key barriers, including low pay and poor perceptions of social care as a career, is limited by a challenging financial environment and low fee rates paid by Local Authorities. In the absence of meaningful Government intervention, it is vital that care providers explore innovative solutions to support their workforce and attract the necessary talent to their organisation.

Care England has partnered with four organisations which, in isolation, have been shown to significantly improve the recruitment and retention of care staff. Each employs a different tried and tested principle to improve staffing, namely Employee Referral Programmes, Values-Based Recruitment, Applicant Tracking Solutions and Employee Assistance Programmes. Together, these four services represent an end-to-end solution to a care provider’s staffing needs. They are:

CareFriends (Employee Referral Programme) – leveraging the power of digital referrals, CareFriends incentivises care workers to refer potential candidates using a points-based system with rewards and recognition mechanisms.

Care Character (Values-Based Recruitment) – an assessment tool designed to evaluate candidates based on crucial ‘Care Qualities’, giving care providers a consistent approach to identifying and cultivating traits that are essential for frontline care and support staff.

Jobtrain (Applicant Tracking Solution) – offers a streamlined approach to sourcing, assessing, interviewing, and onboarding frontline care workers that increases candidate reach and engagement, reduces administrative burdens and expedites the onboarding processes.

Vivup (Employee Assistance Programme) – a holistic employment assistance program that boosts retention through proactive solutions ranging from financial support forums to burnout prevention strategies.

Click here to download the full report.

Read more about the state of the adult social care workforce, in our Sector Pulse Check report, produced jointly with Hft.

Contacts:

CareFriends – neil@carefriends.co.uk

Care Character – Damien.wilkins@carecharacter.co.uk

Jobtrain – giles@jobtrain.co.uk

Vivup – tristan.rigby@vivup.co.uk