Franchising with Right at Home
Franchising with Right at Home is your go-to resource for insights, inspiration, and practical advice on building a successful in-home care franchise. Each episode dives into the world of franchising through engaging conversations with industry experts, seasoned franchisees, and key members of the Right at Home corporate team.
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Franchising with Right at Home
Caregiver Retention and Recruitment with Nikki Holles
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Right at Home's Senior Vice President of Human Resources and People Strategy, Nikki Holles, spoke with Senior Vice President of Franchise Development, Jen Chaney, about caregiver retention and recruitment. Caregiver recruitment is one of the areas of senior care franchising that we get the most questions about. Nikki touched on the resources provided to owners as they launch their business. With best practice guides and a dedicated team, we help you start off right.
Listen to learn more from Nikki. Working in HR for several decades, she has a wealth of experience.
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Hello everyone and welcome to this Tuesday talk. I have my friend Nikki joining me today, and I'll have Nikki introduce herself in just a moment. Without further ado, Nikki, if you would please introduce yourself to our listeners.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, thank you, Jen. I'm really happy to be here with you today. As always, it's so fun to have these conversations. Uh my name is Nikki, Nikki Hollis. Uh I am the senior vice president of People Strategy and Governance here for Right at Home. I've been with Right at Home for uh over six years. Um, but man, Jen, sometimes I feel so old when I say I have like in the industry franchising, I have about 15 years of experience in the home care space. And then in the HR and the people strategy space, oh my gosh, I'm I'm looking at 30 years experience. It's it's crazy. I'm old, old.
SPEAKER_01Okay. So if you would um uh explain to our listeners what your title means. So, what do you do for writing home? What does that long title mean, Nikki?
SPEAKER_00It is, and it's so many fancy words. What does it mean? So great question. So uh the first piece of it is really the area that we're probably gonna focus on today, Jen, uh, but it's that people strategy. So, as a leader in the people strategy space, I not only have the pleasure of leading our internal people strategy functions, and really that's a fancy word for human resources, right? So anything you can think of for HR, recruiting, retaining, engagement, benefits, payroll, all of those pieces internally for our fabulous people like you, Jen, who are supporting our franchisees every single day. And then we have uh our franchise people strategy team that is 100% dedicated to supporting our franchisees and their office staff in all things related to the caregiver journey and experience, all the way from posting that first caregiver job through the entire journey to the end in offboarding employees. So, and then the governance governance, nobody wants to hear about that, Jen. So we're gonna we're gonna forget about that and we'll focus on the people strategy.
SPEAKER_01Okay, thank you for that. So, yes, you're right that um well, not about the governance part. I'm sure there are some people in this world that would love to hear about that for the sake of this Tuesday talk. We're gonna focus really on caregiver recruitment and retention. Um it's something that um because more listeners are people who are contemplating joining the medical content and medical interview. It's a frequently question that we retrieve. How do we recruit caregivers? How do we retain caregivers? So that's really what we're gonna focus on today. So we have a question that came into the question. And there's a few questions within that one question. So it's a mental reading, exactly. How long do caregivers typically stay? Where do you see the biggest drop off early on what you usually causes them to leave? And how do you help owners keep good caregivers longer? So let's start with uh how long do caregivers typically stay?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So I don't know that there is a typical, to be really honest with you. And that's probably a terrible answer because I know it frustrates people, but truly, there we have franchisees in the Right at Home Network that have been franchisees since we started franchising. And they, and that's 25 plus years. And they actually have caregivers that have been with them the entire time. Now, will I tell you that's the norm? No, of course not. That's not the norm. Uh, but it just does go to show that there's a really wide varying degree of how long people stay. A, we do find caregivers as a whole typically are become caregivers a little bit later in life. So a lot of times caregivers will become a caregiver after they've cared for an ailing parent, as an example. Um, and that means that puts that person in that 60 years old kind of time frame before they even become a caregiver with a right-ed home. And then, of course, by then, you know, it might be a little bit limited. And we've actually had some caregivers that have turned into clients. Uh and so, but of course, there's there's the other side of that where you've got uh you've got college students, you've got nursing students who are looking for part-time work, but there's going to be some natural attrition when it's time to go back to school or start their nursing career or doing some of those types of things. So lots of variety and reasons why people may stay or go. Long story short, I would say you generally can look at once a caregiver is kind of committed to staying, we will see three, five, eight plus years of somebody being a caregiver in the right-it-home network, which leads me into the next question, which is how quickly do they usually fall out, right? So how quickly are we gonna see research out there that says, hey, that first 90 days is super critical. I would actually say for caregiving, it's the first 30 to 45 days. It is that first shift, it is the first encounter that they have working a shift alone with a client. Those are going to be the turning points for caregivers. So, generally speaking, if you've got a caregiver that is with you and they last beyond that first shift, they last beyond that first uh alone shift with a client uh for that 30, 45 days, chances are you're gonna have them for as long as you want them in your agency. Um and now I'm gonna forget where the question started to trail off in my mind.
SPEAKER_01No, you've I'm I'm keeping track. You've already covered the first uh couple questions. Next question is Is there something in general that usually causes them to leave? Is there a reason for that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so I just talked about a little bit of some of those variables that you can't control and you just never uh so that those are gonna be reasons. The some of the reasons that are within your control as an agency owner are really gonna come down to, and it sounds really like cheeky chicken soup for the soul kind of stuff, but it's true. It's all about the culture, it's all about how you are treating that caregiver. How are their relationships with the office staff? Do they feel like they can trust the office staff when they're calling in with a schedule change or a request or to report something that maybe happened? Or are they getting met with a little bit of cynicism from an office staff? Are they getting met with, you know, some of those things that are gonna cause them to drop out uh sooner than you would maybe want them to? So culture is a really big piece of it. And that caregiver feeling acknowledged. It I always tell people, yes, pay a fair wage. That's you owe that to your business and to the employees and to the clients. But beyond that, there are so many things that are free that you can do to keep your caregivers. And it is the thank yous. It's the I remembered your birthday, I remembered that your spouse just had surgery and I asked about them. It's the small things that really make a difference for the caregivers. And Jen, I will just say we know that with over 15,000 surveys that we do a year just on our caregivers alone, not to mention industry benchmarking survey.
SPEAKER_01Okay, perfect. Yeah, I believe you covered every every aspect of that question because uh the last two parts are what usually causes them to leave. And then how do you help owners keep these caregivers longer? So you've you've covered um that question completely. Next question has come in, and I'll read it to you. It says Does the corporate office have tools to help franchisees target all the different caregiver demographic pools? It sounds like the caregiver pool is full of people from all different walks of life and areas in a territory.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So, and I love this question too, because it's almost like the I don't know how these folks knew to ask this question. So we've got one of the things that our team did work on, that team that I talked about that's dedicated to helping support, is they have been working on and are constantly evolving what we reference as kind of profiles, different demographics of caregivers. And it's everything from um, you know, the the younger generation, the older generation, the full-time students, the full-time moms who are looking for part-time work, the professional caregiver. It's all of these things. And it really goes through how do you recruit for those folks, the different things that will speak to those different kinds of profile references. Um, you've got uh what's going to keep them engaged, what motivates them uh just all the way through kind of the gamut of all of all of the different kinds of aspects of that employment. But yes, the long, the long answer is uh all of that. The short answer is yes, we've got all the profiles.
SPEAKER_01Okay, got it. All right. So um I want to get back to, thank you for that, Nikki. I want to get back to the caregiver recruitment um part that we were talking about just a moment ago. And really, um, I suppose my question is, and I I teed up some questions in advance. This isn't a question from the audience, this is a gendering question. Because it's caregiver recruitment tends to be forced in challenged in home care in general. So how is right at home specifically to support franchise owners that they're not trying to solve that alone? So what I'm looking for are all of the tools and resources that that we provide to our franchise owners when it comes to caregiver recruitment.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Uh and Jen, before I answer that, and please uh I want to apologize in advance. I'm getting warnings on my computer. So if something happens, um, I have my phone ready to go and I will hop on the Zoom on my phone. I want you to know that. So uh yeah, lots of different resources. Again, we're gonna use industry best practices. So, what um what does the research tell us that caregivers, how are they motivated? What do they want? How do they communicate best? Uh, what are their kind of motivating needs, their drivers? Um, what kind of personalities do they have? What kind of competencies do they have and attributes? And then we've built an entire suite of best practices that will walk franchisees through step by step, again, from posting the positions. So that might mean templates that are available for job postings or vendor contracted negotiated rates for different um technology platforms like applicant tracking systems uh or job boards? It might be templates for how to communicate and set interviews, interview guides, uh onboarding uh templates, onboarding PowerPoints that you can plug and play, videos, uh, and and like I said, just all the way through the entire journey. So then what is that um what does that look like for getting them in their employee file? And what documents do you need? And how do you make sure you've got all the right pieces? What kind of training uh and providing franchisees with the training tools to execute on the training for the caregivers? Those are going to be the types of resources and suites that we create that we are constantly evolving and updating that we make available.
SPEAKER_01Okay, perfect. Thank you. Uh, next question uh has come in. It says, what systems or resources are in place to support non-English speaking caregivers and clients to address language barriers?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, a really great question. And it's it just is every day we see even just a higher need in different languages with this. And it feels like I'm always learning about a new language that we have to have materials in. Yeah. So as a brand, as a write-at-home brand, we have several marketing pieces, both on the client side and on the caregiver side, that are available in multiple languages. Not a hundred plus, like some, you know, some people will kind of say, but definitely the French Creole, the Haitian, Spanish, Chinese, uh, some of those really uh focused languages here in the States. And then, of course, tools and best practices on how to how to um what's the word I'm looking for? Um not transition, but uh get those uh transcribe is the only word I'm thinking of. Translate, translate, yes, uh into uh the preferred language. Um but then even even our technology, applicant tracking systems are you can do applications in different languages and those types of things.
SPEAKER_01Great, great. Okay. So question I uh uh wrote down this question before we joined uh this webinar. So the question that I had about caregiver recruitment is a similar question when it comes to retaining caregivers. And specifically what I'm looking for is how does Red at Home or what does Red at Home do differently to help franchise owners retain caregivers, not just hire them? So trying to think about all the resources and tools and support that we have to our franchise owners when it comes to retaining those caregivers. You've already talked about creating a great culture in your office, but I'm talking about more of the tools and the support that we provide.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So I'm gonna go, you know, a little bit back to the best practices. So all of those that we have for the retention and engagement. So we talk a lot about engagement when we think about culture and really being purposeful with your employees, not just your caregivers, your office staff too, but everybody and what that can look like. Ideas, uh again, templates, guides that you can use to kind of operationalize some of these pieces. And then um technologies, yes, we just partnered, gosh, probably a year, 18 months ago, maybe, with a company uh called Caribou Care. Uh, they're out of Canada, hence the Caribou, but they are a caregiver-first uh company that uses technology to drive engagement with caregivers. So they are definitely focused on the caregiver, but they use that technology and their platforms to um continue to elevate that engagement and reward the behaviors that you're looking for and allow that to synchronize and integrate with your operational software. Uh so maybe that's you know, using it to track uh on-time clock-ins and motivating for that, right? Those things that um that just to help to kind of keep rewarding and incentivizing in addition to the birthdays and the anniversaries and the kudos and all of those pieces. But that's just a couple of examples.
SPEAKER_01Okay, thank you. Um, okay. So um many, if not most, people who join the right-at-home system have no experience in in home care. Um, they've they've never owned a senior care business, they've never um hired a caregiver, they've never um had anything to do with caregiver, they've they don't have any experience doing any of these things that you've talked about. We don't have to have anything experience. That's another journey of anything that we couldn't have anything tools and readers before that you've talked about so far. What I want to focus on in this next question is um for brand new owners right out of the gate. How does Red at Home help those new franchise owners, especially those new to home care? How do we help them build that confidence around recruiting caregivers early on?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Again, really great question. And I and I would say, yes, we have some prescribed ways that we do that. And I just have to give a shout out to our onboarding teams here who are just phenomenal with our new franchisees coming into the network, uh, just in very intense, one-on-one, dedicated time. But that also allows us, we've got the prescribed ways, but that also allows us to navigate based on what that franchisee's background is. So one franchisee might be coming in from a healthcare background, maybe they were a nurse uh for many, many years, and and this is a new opportunity. Maybe they worked on Wall Street uh and they've got some investment dollars that they're looking to have an investment, right? So there's yes, there's prescribed ways, but we also very much individualize those learnings and those approaches, and that can be through web uh us going to the franchisee, the franchisee coming to us. Uh we host guests and do different things of that nature. Um, and we have just an entire suite, our our technology platform, access to hundreds of documents that you are able to operationalize. So a lot of different ways that we that we go about um creating that plan for each franchisee.
SPEAKER_01Okay, perfect. Thank you. Um next Jen Cheney question because I don't I'm watching the QA box and I don't see any questions from the audience. Um, as of right now, I'll see I'll dispose from my list. Next on my list um is how does Right at Home help franchise owners stand to caregivers in this very competitive labor market? So, you know, there's a the the pool of caregivers out there that are looking for employment, they've got lots of options to choose from. So how does how do we help uh franchise owners with you know those those ads for you know looking for a caregiver? And how do we stand out amongst the competition?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And I and I will say part of that too is that that that branding, that you know, being part of a franchise network, right? Because immediately you are coming into a franchise network with a global name, a global reputation, a logo, a colors that are already familiar to people out in the market. So there's there's a lot of value in that. And then part of that is those kind of national marketing assets and campaigns that you are able to leverage as a franchisee. And so again, you're gonna tweak it for your specific office, but they're there, they're available to you. But in addition to that, you know, the different programs that that we have, one is um a satisfaction program that allows your clients and your caregivers to participate in satisfaction management, understand what you're doing well, what is making a difference, what could be improved, what could you do even better, and continuing to hone on that, but then also to communicate and market what you're doing really well to continue to bring those folks in. But we also work with great places to work. We are currently in the middle of our third annual Great Place to Work certification process. First two years we've achieved certification, really proud to say. And there are not uh in many locations, no other franchises or local brands that are able to um market themselves as a certified great place to work. So that alone brings in traffic, both clients and caregivers.
SPEAKER_01Awesome. Okay, all right. So uh next question um from your perspective, yeah. What separates franchise owners who build strong, loyal caregiver teams from those that may struggle a little bit with that?
SPEAKER_00Two, there's two things. And one probably comes off of the other. But the the first one that I'll talk about is purpose. When a franchisee comes into this business, we find that franchisees that are coming into this with a purpose, a something more than you know, I'm just looking for that next job, right? And nobody's looking to buy a franchise because they're looking for a next job. This is a career, this is an asset, this is a business that you are building, a legacy, if you will, and having that strong vision, that strong purpose behind them naturally gravitates and and cascades through your staff. And it is it is in every piece of what you're doing, training your office staff, inviting your caregivers, working with your clients, that word of mouth, the referral network when you're talking to hospitals and different facilities, that is going to shine through. And that's going to make your agency stand out just by having that purpose and that vision for your business. And then the other side of that, which I think this kind of helps with, is engagement with your peers in the network. We are surrounded by 300 plus franchisees just here in the United States, who are ready and willing and so love talking about their own business and what makes them successful. Use that, soak it in, be engaged with your neighbors, be engaged with your franchise or with us, keep up to date on all of the different resources and tools that are made available to you. And really, with that kind of formula or recipe, you would have a hard time not succeeding, would be my answer.
SPEAKER_01Great, great. Okay. Next question. It's a it's a good one. Um they're all they're all good, uh, but I especially like this one because it's a question we get quite often that that people just Don't know the answer to, so I'm looking forward to your answer. It says, What happens operationally when a caregiver calls out and there's no one immediately available to cover the shift?
SPEAKER_00Jen, it is a good question. And my answer is going to be a little bit tough. So in the beginning, that means you, the franchisee, you might be going in and providing the care because you're going to learn every aspect of the business from start to finish. Part of that onboarding, part of what that looks like is knowing what it takes to provide care and taking that role on. Now, once you get established and you've got, you know, a handful of caregivers, and this is part of the training and part of what we will work through with new franchisees, is learning how to create that bench strength so that you're never hiring for just one client, right? It's not your typical job where it's like, I have this shift that I need to fill, and I'm going to hire one caregiver for that shift. You're going to have a bench, you're going to have a bench strength of uh talent that, in the event a caregiver is sick, just in that exact situation. And or you constantly are marketing for new clients. So you never know when those additional shifts are going to come up. So you will learn how to maintain a bench strength of caregivers to be able to pull from to put into those shifts.
SPEAKER_01Yes. And thank you for that. And I do want to add that, um, of course, as Nikki said, we're we're going to teach you every aspect of this business, including how to be a caregiver. And then you're also going to be training the caregivers on how to provide that best in class care. But we want to be clear, we we don't want you to be a full-time caregiver. And I know that's not what you were saying, Nikki.
SPEAKER_00No, thank you for clarifying.
SPEAKER_01As a right-at-home franchisee, you are the owner of this business. So of course, you don't want a shift to go, you know, with without a caregiver and to tell that client, sorry, we can't provide care. And if you don't have any caregivers to fill the shift, then my goodness, if it were my businesses, I'd be like, okay, it looks like I'm going to be a caregiver today. Um, and that's just what you do as a business owner. Um, of course, you know, having that strong bench strength caregivers, you you won't have to deal with that. But initially you may have to fill in from time to time, and that's okay from time to time. Um, but we certainly don't want you uh to do that full time because there's other areas of your business that that are gonna need you.
SPEAKER_00Our goal is always for franchisees to work on the business, not in the business. There you go. Uh that is our mantra.
SPEAKER_01Okay. So next question, and we've just got a few minutes left. I'm gonna squeeze this last one in here. It says as a franchise owner, is it possible to funnel our marketing dollar contributions toward caregiver recruitment versus client recruitment? If we notice it's harder to find caregivers than clients.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. The short answer is yes. And I yes, the short answer is yes.
SPEAKER_01Okay, perfect.
SPEAKER_00I can give you a detail, but I don't know if you have another question. So Yep.
SPEAKER_01No, I I don't have any other questions, Tim, but before we um, if you want to elaborate further on that, you certainly can. But with just a few minutes left, I always ask this question to everybody that I interview. Is there anything that we haven't talked about today that you want to address? Um, that's the first part. And second part is uh uh you and your role, if there's any, if there's a number one tip that you can give to someone uh who is looking to pursue franchise ownership with Right at Home.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so great. Um so the first question, well, I'll answer the second question. What's the number one tip? The number one tip that I have is it it just goes back to engagement, staying engaged with your peers in the network, with other Right at Home franchisees, uh, with your coach here. You'll be assigned a dedicated coach uh at the corporate office who is constantly thinking about you and your business and how you can uh modify things to be even more successful. So that is just engagement, engagement, engagement. That's the biggest key. And Jen, what was the first part of that question? I had the answer on the tip of my tongue.
SPEAKER_01Uh yeah. So if there's anything that you wanted to elaborate further um on that last question, um, and then um any tips um for people who are looking to join the right at home system, anything or anything that we haven't talked about today.
SPEAKER_00I think the biggest thing that that maybe we haven't hit on today is just remembering, maybe is the is the right word, remembering that this is your business. You this is the American dream. I can't tell you how many times I've said to my husband, if I am ever brave enough to go out and start my own business, you can bet your bottom dollar it will be with a franchise network like right at home. And that is because of the support that you are provided and the tools and the resources and the branding and the marketing and all of those things that you get as part of that. But it's your business. It's the American dream. You get this opportunity to have your own business, you're staffing it, you're responsible for your employees and that culture that you want to build and that reputation that you're building in your community is all you. And that's just that's amazing. Yet you have the backing of a brand that will help you along the way.
SPEAKER_01Okay, awesome. All right. Well, thank you so much, Nikki. Time flies when you're having fun. Uh, I am.
SPEAKER_00And I made it without getting to my phone. You did.
SPEAKER_01You did still have a couple minutes to spare, I guess. But thank you for doing this. I always uh enjoy these conversations with you. I appreciate you taking the time to do this. I know you're very busy. So I appreciate you, and I know that our listeners do as well. So thank you.
SPEAKER_00My pleasure. And by the way, happy St. Patrick's Day.
SPEAKER_01Yes. Happy St. Patrick's Day. Have a great rest of your day.
SPEAKER_00Bye.
SPEAKER_01Okay, goodbye.
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