Navigating Turnover in Assisted Living: A Personal Insight
Dec 07, 2024
Running an assisted living facility has its ups and downs, and one of the biggest challenges is keeping a steady, happy staff. Turnover among caregivers and administrators doesn’t just cause extra work and expenses; it also impacts the care residents receive and the bonds they form. High turnover can lead to burnout for remaining staff and can disrupt the connection between residents and their caregivers, which can be tough for everyone involved.
In this blog, I’ll share my own experience with turnover and offer practical ways to tackle it in your facility. By understanding why turnover happens and learning to manage it, we can create a better, more supportive environment for staff and residents alike.
Check out the video too:
The Turnover Challenge in Assisted Living
Turnover is a known issue in the assisted living business. For administrators, there’s the challenge of managing both daily operations and staff morale while balancing all the demands of running the facility. Caregivers face similar pressures, often developing deep connections with residents, making their work rewarding but emotionally taxing. I recently faced this challenge myself when one of my administrators sent in her two weeks’ notice.
It was a reminder of how stressful this work can be. She’d become burned out and overwhelmed, struggling to see any progress despite all her hard work. This conversation really brought the issue of turnover and burnout to the forefront for me, showing just how important it is to support our staff every step of the way.
Understanding the Emotional Toll
In assisted living, the emotional investment is high for everyone involved. Caregivers and administrators juggle a lot—from building resident relationships to dealing with unexpected situations. For my administrator, it wasn’t just the workload; it was the weight of the responsibility, day in and day out, that wore her down. She felt like she was constantly putting out fires, which ultimately led her to the difficult decision to leave.
How to Mitigate Turnover: Practical Tips
Here are some of the strategies I’ve found helpful in managing turnover and supporting my staff:
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Open Communication
Make sure employees feel heard. Regular, open conversations can help them feel supported and give you a chance to address any issues before they escalate. -
Offer Support Systems
Providing a support system—whether that’s regular check-ins or a space for sharing concerns—goes a long way. This lets employees know that it’s okay to ask for help when they need it. -
Encourage Work-Life Balance
Stress is high in this industry, so encourage your staff to take breaks and prioritize their mental well-being. A little time off can make a big difference in preventing burnout. -
Show Appreciation
Don’t underestimate the power of “thank you.” Recognizing hard work and celebrating small wins can make staff feel valued and keep morale up. -
Provide Professional Development
Offering training and growth opportunities can keep your team engaged and motivated. This is a way to invest in them, and it helps reduce turnover in the long run.
Moving Forward
Dealing with turnover in assisted living is challenging, but a proactive approach can make all the difference. By supporting our staff, addressing burnout, and creating a positive environment, we can build a more stable, thriving facility where both employees and residents can feel at home.
Final Thought
At Assisted Living Investing, we know firsthand how important it is to have a strong team. If you’re interested in learning more about managing turnover and creating a positive workplace culture, explore our resources and coaching programs. We’re here to help you build the knowledge and skills to run a successful assisted-living facility.
For those looking to delve deeper into the business of assisted living, our Business Plan Checklist is an invaluable resource. It provides a comprehensive guide to creating a successful business plan, helping you lay a solid foundation for your facility. Download it here to get started on your journey.
Need help figuring out where to start? Join the next Roadmap Challenge and build your launch plan with me.
Show full transcript 👇
Transcript
00:00:01
hey everybody welcome back to the channel it's Brandon Gustafson with Assisted Living investing today I wanted to get into get into a topic with you uh that we've actually talked about a little bit before and quitting a facility and desires to do that and why it is so hard to be in assisted living facility we're going to get into the turnover problem in assisted living and how is a big problem and how you can try to start navigating a little bit [Music] thank you [Music] hey everybody welcome back to the
00:00:42
channel excited to be with you today on Assisted Living investing I have a bit of a hard topic to talk with you about we actually talked about this previously when my administrator quit so make sure you watch the video over here and I'll link it up above and uh you can kind of get a feel for what happened in that scenario I had another very similar one happened to me actually this week this is May of 2023 I got a text from my administrator at one of my facilities and she said I'm giving my two weeks
00:01:13
notice I can't I can't do this anymore and I immediately called her and left her a voicemail um she didn't she didn't answer I left her a voicemail and kind of explained to her some of the situation that I'm going through in my personal life not not to get pity from her but just to explain like I'm going through a lot if you really need to quit it's okay can give me some extra time she didn't answer she texted back a little bit later and said I just need some time to breathe let me I haven't
00:01:45
listened to your voicemail yet I need some time to breathe let's talk tomorrow and uh so I was like that's fine I'm kind of worried about the rest of the the evening and then as I um as as it got it later into the evening I work late I'm very much a night person so as I was working late at night I got this text from from her and she said I just listened to your voicemail are you okay um she's much more worried about me and my situation and uh you know what I was going through right now if you haven't
00:02:17
watched the video watch it here with Novus and what why I was away from the channel for a little bit so make sure you watch that video but uh kind of she just asked are you doing okay and she's like call me I'm up all night I'm working at the facility I'm here all night I'm up just give me a call so I ended up having a conversation with her uh it was probably a 10 minute conversation just really good and kind of deep personal about the different things that we're each going through as
00:02:47
as we're kind of dealing with businesses and the stress of life and and what it's like and um just hold her like she was feeling overwhelmed because of a conversation she had with the Ombudsman and some deficiencies that kept coming up that she was having that conversation and it just made her feel overwhelmed and that she couldn't make any progress and it was just really stressing her out so we had a conversation about that I just reminded her that we absolutely love uh working with her that we're not
00:03:21
disciplined in anything that she does and just affirmed um that she that we were happy with her and I had no issues or concerns with her and her ability to do her job as the administrator and I just expressed how much we love her because we really do she's just incredible um so we um we had that conversation I got to the point where she's like okay well you know I'm not going to leave you hanging um I still need some time to think about this uh and try to get through it and figure out what I need to
00:03:52
do for me and my family and my health and I was like you take the time that you need um and she's like let's let's touch base later on this week we haven't actually had that conversation yet that follow-up conversation that will be um later on this week but um it was really good to have that conversation now what I wanted to really address here in uh in this video is uh the idea of burnout in assisted living it is a hard job caregivers get it uh administrators get it everybody that
00:04:21
works in this space they feel the burnout you're dealing with people uh in Colorado we do mental health and it is a completely different burden from those that we have in Idaho that are elderly care but is very mentally taxing to get in there and have these conversations with people and to help them through the the difficulties that they're dealing with and just their mood swings and it can be very taxing from perspective as you're dealing with those people uh in the elderly care space it can same thing
00:04:52
they're very needy you're having to help them it's a little maybe a little more physically demanding um on you as well but just a few things there that you just want to be aware of like your caregivers your staff your administrators they do so much for these people they love them so much and that's what they're there for that's why they are working in this industry that's what they're they're trying to do and it's great um but it doesn't make it any easier um
00:05:20
on them just you can only do something that you love for so long and you need to to take time to breathe and take time to step back and so that's something that we're trying to figure out as as owners and operators of our assisted living facilities how to kind of implement that uh work-life balance it is difficult for us to find um staff it's difficult to retain staff those are all really hard things and it makes it really hard on the um the administrator because they are the ones that have to to pick up the slack when
00:05:54
it comes to people all the turnover issues that they're dealing with from a staffing perspective they're the ones that get the brunt of that and have to deal with it and it doesn't make it easy it's actually really difficult and very mentally taxing on them as I can attest to from just the conversations and experiences that I've had in the the two years that we've owned our facilities it's it's hard it's difficult but you can make it through it I've talked about this before um mental
00:06:24
health and what the impact of that is I'll try to link that video up above as well but I got into mental health and taking the breaks that you need and making sure that you're in a good spot so that you can help um people especially if you're in that caregiving type of a position this industry is fun it's rewarding you get to develop incredible relationships people but it's hard it is time consuming it's taxing it's exhausting and if you're not willing to put in the
00:06:55
work for that and you want this to just be a completely passive thing and you don't have you don't really care about it it's probably not the the position for you uh honest you should be committed to it and care about the people that you're trying to work with and when you do that you're going to have a lot more success as you try to bring people through um and and help them and make an impact on their lives and so I just wanted to put that out there that assisted living is hard as difficult there's a lot of
00:07:28
challenges in operating it doesn't mean that it's the wrong asset class it doesn't mean that you can't do it it doesn't mean you can't be successful with it and be profitable and all those things you can you can be successful you can have uh yeah you can you have the opportunity to just impact the lives of so many people and develop relationships with some incredible people and it is extremely rewarding still hard though so I just want to be real with you have that conversation
00:07:58
probably do another video that is a follow-up to this and how things have shaken out for us in that location whether or not our administrator is staying if we have to find a new administrator if we're going to find ways that can help relieve some of the administrative burden for her we've been doing some brainstorming on that and how we can do it and how we can help people out um I think we've got some good ideas I'm excited for what we're trying to do there and the impact that we're going to
00:08:24
have in our facilities moving forward is we've tried to to make them continue making them profitable and expand our portfolio so I'm really excited for all of those things that are coming down if you are interested in learning more about investing in Assisted Living make sure you check me out on assisted livinginvesting.net we'll link that down below um I have a lot of free resources there on the website and we're putting together a coaching course for you there's a virtual option you can do on
00:08:52
your own time it's a 12-week course can bring you through the entire process from I don't know anything the Assisted Living to I'm ready to start my own facility in 12 weeks there's a group of coaching options and for those of you that really are serious about it have an option to do one-on-one coaching and really help you out through the process so make sure you check out assisted livinginvesting.net check us out on the site there and just remember it doesn't take a lot it's a just a little bit just
00:09:20
incremental Steps step by step by step if you are consistent I promise you you're going to be successful you're going to reach your goals and it's going to be awesome thanks for watching and have a great day foreign [Music] foreign
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