Childcare, adult social care and education are all facing a balancing act of financial challenges. With rises in the minimum and living wage, and cuts to government funding, settings are being squeezed from every side.
It means providers like yourself are faced with difficult decisions on what costs to cut, while juggling the responsibility of not compromising quality of care. Training is often one of the first things to get the chop and it has a big impact on improving care and retention of staff.
But there are ways to cut cost without removing access to training.
Rewarding without reward
In childcare, government cuts are expected to bite this year as providers look to increase costs, while also cutting corners.
A survey of 1,615 nurseries, pre-schools and childminders found that 63 per cent will increase fees, 40 per cent will add extra charges for services and two fifths plan to scale back training for staff as one of the ways to make crucial savings.
In adult social care the picture is very much the same. For private care settings particularly, around half of care workers don’t have relevant social care qualifications and no access to training half of care workers don’t have relevant social care qualifications and no access to training.
Around four in ten carers in the private sector are leaving every year due to low wages and because there is just no clear career path of progression offered to them.
There is no doubt that working in care and education is rewarding, there aren’t many other careers where you can say that ‘what I did today had a direct impact on the qualify of life someone leads’ – but even re-warding careers need rewards.
Why online learning can benefit your setting
Recruitment and retention have continued to be a major problem for the care sector. In what is a fragmented sector where training standards and levels of training vary so significantly it’s hard to find consistency. Practitioners and healthcare assistants want access to training so they can see care as a career.
For providers it is about finding a cost-effective way to provide access to training. Online learning can help you do just that. With online learning platforms you cut out the induction and onboarding costs that you as-sociate with recruiting and retaining quality staff.
Instead you can replace this with smaller one of costs for courses that give your team the flexibility to learn around their daily responsibilities. It means you don’t have to lose staff for a morning, afternoon or even a whole day when you need to stick to strict ratios. Your staff can control their learning in times that are convenient and most suitable to their lifestyle and commitments.
At Avail Learning Academy, we also believe that learning shouldn’t just be about ticking boxes. Learning has to be engaging, fun and empowering. Our courses have been designed by experienced practitioners and care workers in adult social care and childcare, they know how to deliver outstanding care. Our courses don’t just teach the basics, they can guide your team on what it is to be outstanding.
To learn more about the courses Avail Learning Academy offers, click here.
