8 WAYS AGENCY-READY WORKFORCE MANAGEMENT HELPS AGENCIES

Transcription

1 8 WAYS AGENCY-READY WORKFORCE MANAGEMENT HELPS AGENCIES FROM A LEADER IN AGENCY WORKFORCE MANAGEMENT SOLUTIONS

2 INTRODUCTION All human service agencies share similar missions: to provide effective services to the vulnerable populations in their care. Agencies strive to help the individuals they serve achieve their goals, expand their horizons and maximize their opportunities. Unfortunately, there are many challenges that can get in way of promoting community involvement, independence, and dignity for children and adults with disabilities. Among the many obstacles holding agencies back are ineffective workforce management systems for time and attendance, documentation, scheduling, HR, billing, and payroll. Other MITC publications explore the ways in which agencyready workforce management can help agencies achieve their financial goals, avoid deficits, and free up time and resources for client services. This publication explores ways an effective workforce management solution helps directly maximize the possibility of an agency accomplishing its mission to better serve those in its care, improve the quality of services, and support independence by improving operations. 1. SCHEDULE PROMPTING 2. REAL-TIME VISIT AND SERVICE VERIFICATION 3. NO-SHOW ALERTS 4. VOICE AND TEXT MESSAGING 5. CHECK AWAKE CALLS 6. ABSENTEEISM 7. CAPTURING BILLING AND DOCUMENTATION 8. SCHEDULING AND TO-DO LISTS Among the many obstacles holding agencies back are ineffective workforce management systems for time and attendance, documentation, scheduling, HR, billing, and payroll. 1

3 1. SCHEDULE PROMPTING Whether services are community or facility-based, they can only be delivered if staff arrive and arrive on time. Schedule prompting allows agencies to exploit the universal use of mobile phones to communicate key work information to employees, such as next shift reminders and work instructions. s or texts remind employees of where their next shift is, what time the shift start and ends, and can include helpful reminders such as John s meds have changed. These automated s or texts not only help reduce absenteeism, but also engage the employee in the day to day activities of the agency and help promote enthusiasm for the shared mission of serving those in need. 2. REAL-TIME VISIT AND SERVICE VERIFICATION Unfortunately, staff will occasionally not show up or contact a supervisor, despite the best practices and policies. In situations such as one-on-one services, it can be vital that a manager know about this as quickly as possible. With real-time visit verification, agencies are not only able to monitor attendance for financial consequences like overtime, ACA compliance, and authorization agencies can better ensure that services are delivered as scheduled to the individuals in their care. MITC Quick Check allows managers to monitor the delivery of services from their smart phone or tablet regardless of where the consumer is being served. Through the Managers Mobile Work Center, managers get instant access to all aspects of their responsibilities at work using mobile devices. Time and attendance, scheduling, personnel, and training information are delivered to Android, iphone, BlackBerry, and ipad tablet or any other smartphone device. Schedule prompting allows agencies to exploit the universal use of mobile phones to communicate key work information to employees. 2

4 3. NO-SHOW ALERTS Once real-time visit verification is established, agencies are able to put into place automated no-show alert procedures which ensure that if an employee fails to clock-in as scheduled, a supervisor is immediately notified automatically. 4. VOICE AND TEXT MESSAGING Agency-Ready Workforce Management also helps with communication among employees. If the employee clocksin using a telephone, voice messaging can deliver individual messages, client, or location specific messages, wish the employee happy birthday, happy anniversary, and even thank them for working on a holiday. or text messaging can also be used to automatically notify employees in advance of expiring certifications, training requirements, upcoming reviews, documentation issues, and more. Together these technologies prompt employees to focus on agency priorities and client care. Agency-Ready Workforce Management also helps with communication among employees. 3

5 5. CHECK AWAKE CALLS At overnight awake locations, agencies are always concerned about staff staying awake, clients leaving the home while staff are asleep, and in extreme circumstances, staff leaving the group home. Using Check Awake Calls requires the staff to check-in every hour or two at a scheduled time by telephone within a 5-10 minute window. If the staff fails to make the check call, a supervisor can be automatically alerted. Records of all check calls are maintained by employee and location. 6. ABSENTEEISM Unplanned absences, late arrivals, and early departures invariably cause disruption, imperil agency effectiveness, decrease morale among co-workers, and can leave positions understaffed or completely unstaffed. Often, absenteeism also results in additional costs in the form of unplanned overtime. The systems at many agencies can inadvertently encourage absenteeism and excessive costs. Agencies that manage their large workforces passively are more likely to suffer from the practices of employees who arrive late, take long lunches, leave early, and abuse paid time off. These poor attendance problems in turn impact service, revenue, and costs. One person s absenteeism can be another employee s overtime. While absenteeism can never be eliminated, it can be measured, controlled, and reduced. Agencies with an effective, real-time, time and attendance system report a lower rate of absenteeism, no shows, late arrivals, and early departures than agencies dependent on paper timesheets or an honor system such as online timesheets. The lack of effective systems for Using Check Awake Calls requires the staff to check-in every hour or two at a scheduled time by telephone within a 5-10 minute window. 4

6 monitoring time and attendance in real time can encourage absenteeism-related problems. Agencies using a real-time, time and attendance solution suffer less from unscheduled absenteeism. This in turn tends to lower payroll costs by reducing overtime for staff forced to provide coverage outside their usual schedule and/or improve levels of customer service. Bottom line: whatever you re emphasizing in your agency, measure it to improve. This is obvious in some ways, but the implications are more far-reaching than a passing glance reveals. Agencies with an effective, real-time, time and attendance system report a lower rate of absenteeism, no shows, late arrivals, and early departures than agencies dependent on paper timesheets or an honor system. want to ensure that you consistently get the behaviors you really want, you have to set processes and procedures in place to inspect them. If you want employees to show up on time and leave on time, just saying you want it would not make a bit of difference unless it is reinforced by concrete action. This is an essential step in getting people to do what you want them to do. Only if your staff know that you are looking will they continue to perform in the manner you expect. In fact, employees showing up late or leaving early disguised by timesheet falsification in a manual system can also result in a financial penalty. This is a further incentive for employees to reduce unauthorized absenteeism. Agency-Ready Workforce Management not only provides agencies with ways to capture time and attendance in real time, it can also automate the reporting of frequent offenders (employees who are more consistently absent, late, or leave early.) Tolerances are set up for each agency and managers are automatically notified in the event an employee acts outside acceptable boundaries. If you measure speed to market, you will get your products there faster. If you measure quality, you will have a better product. If you measure costs, you will have a cheaper product. If you measure time and attendance, you will achieve better attendance. As any business executive knows all too well, when managing employees, you do not automatically get the behaviors you say you want. You may really believe, for instance, in the need for excellent service. But just saying that you value it does not mean that your employees will act in the way you wish they would arriving on time and working their full shift. The best way to let people know that something is important is to measure it and report on it. The only surefire way to ensure that your people do what you want them to do is to inspect what they are doing and how that impacts the results. If you 5

7 7. CAPTURING BILLING AND DOCUMENTATION For better or worse, all agencies have to comply with state regulations to be reimbursed. This often means capturing not only staff attendance, but also client attendance and documentation. Making this process easy for staff to do will free up more time for staff to work with clients while highlighting any discrepancies, such as missing documentation. Using Agency-Ready Workforce Management, payroll, billing, and documentation can be easily and inexpensively captured by telephone or any low-cost internet-enabled device, such as a tablet. Agencies managing SourceAmerica or similar state contracts have additional compliance and reporting requirements to manage. 8. SCHEDULING AND EMPLOYEE TO-DO LISTS A growing body of research shows that employee workforce characteristics have a considerable impact on client outcomes. An optimal skill mix and greater experience have been linked to fewer adverse events and lower costs. Ensuring that clients are tended to by appropriate staff with the proper skills is essential to providing quality care. Agencies need creative and flexible staffing models that support a safe and healthy work environment and equitable staffing. Automating scheduling and staffing processes can help fulfill these criteria for any agency focused on retaining satisfied employees. With advanced scheduling, employees can access a work schedule online, view open shifts, request time off, and provide scheduling preferences and availability. Employees who participate in the scheduling process report higher job satisfaction and are more likely to remain on the job. Managers are happier when they do not have to deal with numerous verbal and written requests from employees who need to adjust their schedules. Scheduling can become a daunting task requiring several days of work by managers. With a manual or ineffective system, the more time managers spend on scheduling, the less time they spend on more value added tasks, such as working directly with clients. Advanced scheduling solutions also allows agencies to create to-do lists for individual employees that break down a shift into time spent working with particular clients or taking responsibility for a task, such as distribution of medications. Staff can be required to check off tasks on their to-do list. Managers can then review the completed to-do lists, where missing tasks are automatically highlighted. 6

8 ABOUT MITC MITC provides modular workforce management solutions and services to support all the needs of agencies time and attendance, advanced employee scheduling, service documentation, payroll rules and reporting engine, workforce analytics, payroll and billing integration, and more. For 25 years, MITC has grown to serve over 1,500 organizations (with anywhere form 5 to 10,000 employees) in the USA, the UK, Africa, Australia, Canada, Ireland and New Zealand. They have selected MITC to help control costs, save time, improve productivity and ensure compliance. Visit to learn more. 7