Team members in long-term care that feel out of alignment with the organization’s core values suffer from miscommunication and dissatisfaction. The end result is exacerbating a staffing crisis that has plagued the industry.
That is why Michele Magner, Founder and CEO of Michele Magner Coaching, works hard to remove barriers for team members to better connect with one another. “Our floor staff are feeling a big disconnect from our corporate, home offices” she said while speaking on the LTC Heroes podcast. “My hope is to inspire people to identify with their personal purpose and values, in order to build a bridge to help them reconnect with their organization’s mission, vision, and organizational values.”
You can listen to the full interview here:
Speaking to Experience Care’s Peter Murphy Lewis at the 2023 LeadingAge Nebraska convention, Magner explained that she hopes to realign caregivers in long-term care settings with their leaders and pave the way for better team relations focusing on six key areas: “our thoughts, intrinsic core values, keeping expectations in check, not taking everything so seriously, intentional awareness of mindfulness and gratitude.” She continued to say that, “Those are the components that allow people to focus on what brings them peace.”
By honing in on these specific areas, Magner hopes to aid communities in retaining their staff so caregivers can focus on what they hold most dear. “[Caregivers] want to serve seniors,” she said. “They want to continue to work with seniors, and they don’t want to leave the industry. But if they feel like the decisions that are being made are confusing or no longer align with their values, they’re gonna move on.”
That is why, in Magner’s expert opinion, leadership needs to understand that organizational and personal values need alignment and also recognize that which bothers their staff. And in the face of opposing values, leaders must figure out how to achieve harmony so the team can collaborate, support, and be open to exploring different perspectives in order to achieve the desired result.
Written by: Cindy Wong
