Our Care Advantage usage are seeing a significant increase in job applicants due to these extraordinary COVID-19 times. Although many of these people come from non-care sector backgrounds lacking relevant skills or experience, these skills can often be taught on the job as long as the person has the right personality and attitude to work. 

Smart Sort is Smart and Fast!
We have developed the Smart Sort tool to quickly identify which applicants in the pool have a strong job fit (as compared to a benchmark of high-performers in the same role) and have an acceptable behavioural risk profile to work (e.g no hostility or integrity risk). 

Smart Sort takes the pool of applicants and quickly sorts and ranks them based on their assessment results. From here the recruiter can adjust the search parameters or use the proximity search, highlighting people who live within a certain distance to the job. 

The result is a long list of "best-match" applicants to follow up with initially. Saving the recruiters heaps of valuable time, so they can focus on getting the right workforce for these challenging times. 

See for yourself
Contact us if you'd like to see Smart Sort in action via our fast-track demo option (obligation and cost free!). See why such a large number of providers are relying on the information from the Care Advantage assessments to enhance hiring decisions and workforce performance. 

Our view on working in the COVID-19 world
Just like many other businesses, our office staff are all working from from home and are taking all safety precautions as directed by the government. We can no longer offer face-to-face training sessions and meetings, but other than that, we are business "as usual".

The workforce shift
Many of our clients are building an "emergency" or "back-up" workforce for when times get tougher. The creation of new jobs brings opportunities for those huge numbers of people who recently lost theirs. The subsequent recruitment task is just as large and met with novel challenges. For example, group recruitment drives are no longer an option and many clients are thus exploring video interviewing. 

Screen for attitudes, teach the skills
We are seeing an increase in interest in behavioural screening as many applicants now come from non-care sectors. The lack of relevant work experience does not necessarily have to be a problem, as long as the person has the right job fit, values and attitude to work. Although this does not work for all roles, there are certainly roles which can be learned on the job.

We have thereby developed new functionality that helps to quickly screen large applicant pools to find those people with the best job fit and attitude to work. Hopefully this will ease some of the recruitment processing efforts. 

Being able to do our assessments at home, online and thus remote, is another factor that has seen an increase in demand. The free Career Trait Profile report that many candidates automatically receive after completing the assessments is a valuable tool in their search for a job. 

Stay safe!
​These are extraordinary times affecting billions of people around the globe. Let's hope that in the not so distant future we can meet up with a group of friends and think back to the time when the world stood still. In the meantime we will continue to help smooth out the recruitment screening process and wish for people to stay safe and healthy whilst getting used to their new "normal".

​In a consumer driven market with frontline staff being the regular and principal touch point for service users, providers have to manage employee related risk in both traditional and emerging areas of their business.

Misconduct Risk
The commitment to protect service users in the sector is clear and undiminished. The processes to ensure this, however, are often found wanting and scrutiny from the regulator, media and community has never been greater. Reputational damage in a competitive marketplace haunts provider for years, especially in the local community near an incident. Misconduct extends beyond high profile incidents seen in the media to include indifference, neglect, culpable behaviour and dishonesty impacting on clients/residents.

Performance Risk
User Experience is the new battleground in the aged, community and disability sectors. Empowered clients, with choice, and increasing expectations continues to move social care into a consumer driven competitive marketplace. The engagement and relationships built by frontline staff, combined with the quality of the support provided are pivotal for success in today’s care sector. Ensuring employees are suited to roles requiring the delivery of care, support and compassion is fundamental to effective staff performance in social care.

Frontline capability now translates directly into Bottom Line Performance

Some Facts
We took a sample of over 15,000 frontline care applicants screened during the past year. Using the standard Care Advantage assessment for counter-productive work behaviours - Hostility, Integrity and Dependability, we found the following:

Some Quick Wins
Are our applicants ‘right’ for the sector?
Care Advantage screens specifically for job fit in the Social Care sector. It identifies those candidates with the values, empathy and personality necessary for success in a human services environment. It compares your applicants to a benchmark of proven good performers in the same role and identifies those with a strong job fit. Benchmarks exist for around 40 roles in the care sector including personal carers, disability support, home care assistance, Registered Nurses, Clinical Managers.

Can we identify the level of risk with our applicants?
Care Advantage also screens for counter-productive work behaviours, specifically hostility, dependability and integrity. Flagging high-risk profiles allows providers to avoid or increase scrutiny of applicants.

How do we Avoid Missing Good candidates?
Most Care Advantage users screen applicants high in the recruitment funnel, when the candidate first applies. The screening platform has been designed, and priced, to allow employers to review high volumes of frontline applicants in an effective and rapid manner.

Identifying strong job fit and lower risk candidates early in the recruitment process provides significant competitive advantage by reducing misconduct and performance risk whilst improving efficiency and speed of recruitment processing. As the assessments are based on personality, the screening identifies all good job fit, lower risk candidates, regardless of work history, enabling our clients to find the ‘Hidden Gems’.

Governance
With 'Standard 8' of the, now legislated, compliance regime starting next year, there are a number of new requirements. The majority of these involve the ability to demonstrate that the organisation possesses a governance framework that recognises the organisation’s purpose, its legislative, policy and ethical obligations, as well as its workforce and employment responsibilities. Care Advantage allows users to demonstrate an effective framework, as part of a contemporary recruitment process, that identifies candidates able to support service users in a person centred and safe manner.

Contact us to discuss your situation.