Staff retention is a major challenge in the post-acute care industry.
In fact, according to a study published in Health Affairs in 2021, workers in nursing homes turn over at a median rate of 94%. Now that Medicare payments could potentially tie back to staff retention rates, it is more important than ever to find ways to enhance the employee experience.
Positive, consistent, and transparent communication can help with employee satisfaction and Carefeed’s communication tools can help you create and deliver engaging newsletters to your team.
How can you level up your internal newsletters to keep your staff engaged, informed and happy?
Keep it Brief
Before you start your newsletter outline the 3-5 takeaways you want your staff to have from the newsletter. Stick with those and only those topics. Make it skimmable. If there are process changes or longer forms of content your team needs to read and understand, link out to longer how-to documents, or include a video that quickly and simply explains the new piece of information.
In Carefeed’s communication tool, you can easily create tiles of bite-sized information, including images, videos, and PDFs to make it quick and easy to get information into your staff’s hands.
Make it Mobile
Your post-acute care staff is on-the-go and so are you! Make sure that your newsletter is easily consumable on a phone. Even better? Deliver it to their phones via text and email so they can read it however and wherever they can find the time.
Carefeed’s communication tools help you create and deliver mobile-friendly newsletters.
Celebrate Your Staff
Celebrate it all! Use your newsletter to share kudos given by peers and patients. Share big staff milestones (with their permission of course!) – awards, new babies, weddings, buying their first house, promotions, etc.
You can create a kudos form in Carefeed to easily gather great news and shoutouts from your staff to share in the next newsletter, so you don’t miss a celebration. Recognition plays a large role in staff retention in post-acute care, so recognize your team authentically and often.
Include Internal Job Postings to Increase Staff Retention
One of the top five work stress factors is a lack of opportunity for growth & advancement. In fact, research shows that staff who are stagnant with job title and role over time, are more likely to leave a company for a new role elsewhere.
Keep those internal job postings front and center so your loyal staff has first dibs on a role that provides them with growth. This can also prompt your team to refer people they know and trust to apply for those open roles that you need to fill quickly!
Keep it Fun
Yes, there is important information to share, but keeping it light and fun can help your staff connect with each other. Is there a silly staff profile you can share? A section to guess the staff member based off a childhood picture? A recommendations corner where staff can share their favorite books or TV shows? A puzzle, brainteaser, or joke?
A positive and fun environment can have a significant impact on staff retention in post-acute care, so loosen things up and build connections between staff members.
Make it Multimedia
You don’t want to scroll through a wall of solid text to read a newsletter the length of a novel. We don’t either, and that is why Carefeed’s communication tools were designed in a way to easily include images, videos, and links. Upload an infographic about an upcoming process change. Share a video of your administrator announcing the Staff Member of the Month. Add videos of the most recent celebration or fun resident activity so everyone can experience that joy.
Don’t have time to get that fancy? We have hundreds of pre-created templates for you to add to your newsletter and customize.
Share your Post-acute Care Facility’s Mission
Employee connection to your company’s mission is a key factor in satisfaction and retention, so make sure to share stories that drive back to your facility mission or purpose statement in every single newsletter. Share a story about how a staff member’s role ties directly back to your purpose in helping others. Share an uplifting patient story. From nursing to accounting, everyone touches patient and family lives. Telling those stories is powerful.
Make Info Easy to Find
Finish up the newsletter with quick links for employees to find common things that they need. Link to your facility calendar – which you can also create in Carefeed. Link to your employee satisfaction survey. Link to your kudos or shoutout form.
Carefeed’s communication tools allow you to create links to drive your staff where they need to go.
Staff retention in post-acute care can be a significant challenge but try out some of Carefeed’s quick tips above to create a staff newsletter that will keep your team engaged, informed and happy.
Carefeed Can Help Staff Retention in Post-acute Care
Carefeed’s easy-to-use communication feeds are the perfect solution to uplevel your staff newsletter.
Our tools make it easy and FUN to design and write engaging content that will keep your staff informed. With text and email delivery, staff readership will increase, and delivery metrics will help you understand your staff’s engagement with your newsletter.
Are you interested in exploring Carefeed’s communication and operation platform further? Schedule a demo to see how Carefeed be your central place for seamless communication and engagement with residents, families, and staff.
Now go forth and write!
Want to read more about staff retention? Check out our blog about Brightmoor Hospice and their keys to their incredibly impressive staff retention numbers.
Learn more about Carefeed’s solutions or schedule a demo here.