A strategic way forward for Aged Care

Kosta Nicolaou
October 13, 2020

-An agile way out of survival mode and into a state of stability-

On the back of a Royal commission, bush fires and Covid 19 things are becoming increasingly challenging in the world of aged care. Many leaders find themselves feeling the pinch as they work through the everyday and strategic challenges of maintaining wellbeing and care standards, complex funding models, the very real prospect of more compliance, increased competition and community expectations. Armed with limited funding and resources the pressures build to continuously deliver more with less.

Benetas CEO Sandra Hills told the Australian Aging Agenda that COVID-19 has had a huge impact across the organisation. Resulting in intensified efforts and new measures to protect the health and safety of residents, clients and indeed our employees.

Sandra went on to say that the evolving COVID-19 situation has accelerated the need for agile management. Benetas is also working to reduce hierarchy and increase accountability at different levels of management. Within the space of a few months, Benetas has also significantly strengthened its digital capacity and consumer engagement.

At a high level, aged care as an operation is made up of dedicated people and useful technology fueled by a very practical profit formula. As today’s challenges drive more leaders toward the agile management required to navigate tempestuous waters we may find ourselves having to question long held belief systems as we shift and adapt. In some cases entire organisations may find themselves under review as they forge a strategic way forward out of survival mode and into a state of stability.

Key Benifits of Agile Management

Agile management adopts characteristics that enable organisations to move quickly, tolerate, overcome and be strengthened by adverse events and experiences. Agility is driven by an adaptive strategic plan which factors in people performance, technology and a strong financial framework.

Financial strategy and management

IRT Group CEO Patrick Reid told Australian Aging Agenda that while IRT has achieved a lot in a short time, the impacts of the fires, storms and COVID-19 have put a lot of pressure on finances. Working under an adapted strategy plan IRT will focus on four main areas in 2020-21. “The first is to find new ways to generate revenue.” “The second is to ensure our organisation is best aligned to support the important work of our frontline employees.” “ Third is cost containment and stripping out non-essential costs, diverting all available resources to the frontline.” “The final item is to make sure that our aged care centre and retirement village sites and home care regions align with customer demand and needs.”

By introducing a strong financial strategy aged care organisations can gain a very clear picture of where they currently sit. This presents opportunity to explore and experiment with company direction and strategic aims while still mapping out a financial structure. Financial structure can get leaders where they need to be to drive their new strategic direction. With a bold strategy supported by strong financial modeling leaders can inspire corporate shifts. A financial strategist with the right tools within your organisation can empower facility managers, department heads and home care workers to have their eyes on financial and operational objectives. By teaching, mentoring and coaching frontline employees on what the numbers mean and how they can effectively use their resources a financial strategist can drive positive outcomes. These outcomes will not only contribute to the execution of strategy but provide a level of corporate resilience and fortification.

Strategic agility can be well supported by a strong operational and financial framework. A well established framework should consist of detailed three-year forecasts of future financial position adjusted quarterly, Automated systems for routine daily tasks, systematic budgeting and planning tools, detailed financial cost/volume/profit models and Executive Performance Dashboards. Once your strategic framework is in place it can provide opportunity to seek new income sources and drive continual experimentation and improvement.

Using Technology to build and deliver on stratergy

Technology and data play a crucial role in building a strategy that is agile, resilient, and dynamic. By sourcing and integrating an aged care strategic plan into an organisation you are not only building a strategy that is adaptive but also working your strategy into the day to day operation and care through the various layers of organisational structure down to the frontline employee. People at various levels can build reports that can be viewed through an automated system giving true transparency and real time agility.

With strong strategic leadership, financial agility and an automated and a web based aged care strategic plan software solution like Skefto leaders in aged care will find that people and technology will be the tools that rebalance the profitability equation. Finding this balance will drive future successes in wellbeing and care standards, ensure compliance and build governance. Using technology to connect people with objectives and managers with integrated kpi dashboards should not only lead you to a competitive advantage but also arm your organisation with the ability to quickly adapt to ever changing environments and community expectations.

Find out more about how you can give your strategy a SPARC with skefto aged care strategic plan software today.