The Benchmark Email

...benchmarks, strategies and ideas for improving your agency
A service of Fazzi Associates, Inc.

October 12, 2006

Staff Satisfaction Surveys:
Increase Retention / Save Money / Protect Quality

Question:
Turnover has been going up in our agency. Because of nursing and therapist shortages in our area, we are also having trouble recruiting new staff. What is the most cost-effective way to ensure we have enough quality staff and how do we get started?

Answer:
The answer is simple: Given staffing shortages throughout the country, you must do everything you can to retain good staff. The best way to begin addressing your turnover problems is through a segmented, Home Care Staff Satisfaction Survey.

Before considering doing a survey, consider this: Turnover drives up your costs. You have the cost of overtime and per diems as you try to cover services. You also have advertising costs, interview costs, training costs, preceptor costs, orientation costs and a myriad of other costs associated with hiring, training and getting a new staff person up to productivity levels.

Fifteen years of nursing turnover studies report that the cost of turnover in health systems range from a low of 1.3 times salary and benefits to a high of 2.6 times salary and benefits. Using a conservative 1.5 times salary and benefit ratio, if an average nurse costs you $60,000 for salary and another $20,000 for benefits (taxes, health coverage, disability cost, retirement, etc.), the cost of replacing that nurse would be 1.5 x $80,000 or $120,000. That’s an additional $40,000.

Want to see what it is costing you? Simply click here or on the image and follow the link to Fazzi's Home Care Staff Turnover Calculator page. Put in your numbers and you will know in seconds what your annual cost of turnover is.

But, the problem doesn't stop here. Turnover means more pressure on remaining staff. Supervisors must refocus their efforts from service delivery to hiring. Patient relationships are broken as new workers are called in. Relationships with referral source personnel begin changing. Quality of services are threatened as per diems and possibly less experienced nurses take over.

What can you do? Consider using a Staff Satisfaction Survey as the first step. They are inexpensive. They are effective. And like Fazzi's Home Care Staff Satisfaction Survey, they will not only provide you with overall results, they will provide you with segmented analyses by department, team, discipline - any way you like. (Fazzi's survey also provides benchmark insights comparing your results to other home care and hospice agencies throughout the country.) And, as with any survey, you should expect to receive clear recommendations for improvement.

Once you know what staff like, don't like, and what you can do to increase their levels of satisfaction and retention, you can initiate highly focused quality of worklife efforts to address issues and reduce turnover. Best of all, by keeping one staff person and not having to go through the cost of recruiting, your savings will more than cover the cost of the survey AND all of your improvement efforts. You can't be more cost-effective than that.