Stakeholder Engagement in Aged Care

In an?aged?care?setting, by creating an effective process of?engagement?you are able to foster lasting, mutually beneficial relationships that will improve organisational moral, reputation and business outcomes. In order to effectively?engage?with key?stakeholders, one must understand their needs, wants, interests and motivations.(Ellis Jones)

How can we transform an aged care sector we can proud of in the future if we continue to lose sight of what our consumers, customers, residents, elderly community want and not to mention the high importance we place on hiring and retaining an aged care workforce that needs understanding.

Aged care staff have long felt unheard, but as revealed by the 2019 National Aged Care Survey, they feel more voiceless than ever before. The vast majority of aged care staff, and many in the industry, want to be able to take pride in the work that they do, to be able to provide residents with the best standard of quality, safe care, and to be able to deliver that care in environments that are safe and supportive for themselves.

However, staff are hampered by continued, systemic failure in Australia’s aged care sector and inaction by governments and providers which have resulted in widespread failure to ensure safe, quality care to the residents of aged care facilities beyond the control of the staff themselves.

Aged care staff want to see Australian society take a moral and compassionate approach to our elderly, which would ensure them safe, dignified and respectful care at the end of their lives. This must also extend to the younger residents of aged care facilities.

The survey’s participants believe this will require:

? Ensuring that care is the priority for the entire aged care system;

? Guaranteeing transparency in the use of taxpayer funding, and ensuring it is tied to care provision;

? Ensuring genuine accountability of aged care management and providers as well as government for the quality of the aged care system; and,

? Ensuring the voices of aged care residents and staff are heard

The staff and resident engagement is still slow as the COVID pandemic has taken a grip on the sector and more staff are leaving the sector because they are exhausted, are being blamed for any failure of care and a level of bullying that is psychologically damaging to the people who are paid relatively low for the enormous work being done during challenging times.

To build stakeholder engagement in Aged care or really any other sector we must look towards creating a role of an Independent Collaboration Facilitator (ICF) this will create an independent environment without bias, blame ensuring that there is representatives from Residents, Staff, Families, Management, Suppliers and Service providers and the brief will be how do we make things better and create the pathway to best practice so we can all get a sense that we are all being heard and we are indeed all in this together. An ICF will take all the information via interviews and group meetings to provide a some transparency and recommendations to all stakeholders.

There is nothing new here about stakeholder engagement but it takes effort, time and the want to actively listen, engage without prejudice and be constructive and respectful of people's views and comments because that's where the outcomes of these programs have profound impact and change.

If you are interested in knowing more about the ICF (Independent Collaboration Facilitator) Program and you want to make a difference then please comment and I'll respond back or forward this article to your aged care colleagues.... Let everyone have a voice to improve the Aged care sector we can all be proud of in the future because we all have the ability to change and improve its in everyone's DNA.