Working as a Care Coordinator alongside Emily, Adam is responsible for scheduling around 7500 hours of care per month, ensuring the wellbeing of our clients.
Having started working in care fresh out of college at the age of 18, Adam is now five years on, working as a Care Coordinator alongside Emily, at Home Instead Exeter and East Devon. Together, they are responsible for scheduling around 7500 hours of care per month, which is growing steadily.
Before starting with us 15 months ago, Adam worked as a support worker for people living with learning disabilities, providing direct care to them, much like our Care Professionals do. He then moved onto the more managerial role of team leader.
He began scheduling around 500 hours of supported living care per week which gave him a lot of experience. He familiarised himself with the scheduling software and sought advice from experienced schedulers in the organisation, learning from their insights and best practices. During this period he worked on-call and learnt auditing experience.
When Adam was ready to move onto pastures new, the job of Care Coordinator at Home Instead came up and it sounded perfect for him. He had heard positive reviews about the company and the way they look after their staff so didn’t hesitate to apply.
The schedulers have to deal with a lot of last-minute changes and emergencies in their roles so have to be able to keep calm under pressure. Adam described a time when a Care Professional got into some car trouble on the way to visit a client.
‘The Care Professional broke down on the motorway and phoned Emily very distressed. Before Emily was off the phone supporting her, I called the client to let her know the news and that I was sending a replacement Care Professional to cover her visit in her place. We made sure the Care Professional had a recovery service going out to her and the whole situation was dealt with in less than an hour’.
At Home Instead, we always introduce our Care Professionals and clients so that they know who is going into each visit. The clients usually have two or three Care Professionals that visit them frequently, so we often have cover in case of an emergency. We match our Care Professionals and their clients based on interests and personality. It’s important to us that the client is introduced to the Care Professional and that they don’t have new people that they don’t know, going into their house each visit.
In the Care industry, everything is always changing. Clients’ needs and wants change all the time and so do their care plans. Adam says ‘Customer service comes into it a lot as you have to be quick to react when the phone rings and do your best to accommodate last minute changes to keep the clients and Care Professionals happy’.
When clients ask for an increase in hours, Adam has to find the Care Professional to accommodate those hours. He may have to offer the client different time slots if he can’t always fit in a visit at such short notice.
‘If a client wants a lunchtime visit at 12pm the following day I check the rotas of their care professionals and see if I can accommodate this. Sometimes I may not be able to find someone to cover a 12pm visit, but could offer them a 1pm visit instead’.
At Home Instead we use a number of different software packages to track, and manage our clients schedules, manage holidays, care plans, invoices, payroll etc. Any increases or decreases have to be documented and dealt with quickly to ensure no one is left without care. Care Professional sickness, client sickness and sudden hospital stays can all happen very last minute and everyone needs to be kept up to date with these changes.
We asked Adam how Home Instead was different to the other care providers that he has worked for and what the future looks like for him.
‘With Home Instead you know you’ve got that support and nurturing environment where you can grow in a safe way and not just learn through mistakes. Although I already had some experience with scheduling and coordinating, I received comprehensive training from Home Instead and learnt so much’.
Home Instead Exeter and East Devon have received the five star Work Buzz award rating eight years in a row, reiterating their excellent reputation as an employer of choice.
If you are interested in working for our ‘Outstanding’ in all areas CQC rated homecare company, call 01395 200600 to speak to our Recruitment Coordinator or email [email protected]