business | opinion
Recruitment crisis three-point plan UK country manager, Grzegorz Wrzosek, of live-in services provider Promedica24 outlines three steps the government must take to ease the recruitment crisis
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ew figures released in October by Skills for Care have revealed the growing scale of labour shortages in social care, with as many as 165,000 unfilled vacancies in the sector. This comes at a time when demand for care is equally growing – maybe in 2023 we can answer the question: how can we solve social care’s recruitment problem? As UK country manager of Europe’s largest provider of live-in care services, Promedica24, I have overseen a successful recruitment process, which has allowed us to more than double our number of carers, and here are the three most important things that the industry and the government should consider in order to solve the issue. First of all, while remuneration is not always an incentive for people to work in care, poor pay can certainly act as a demotivator and drive people away from the job. Thus, if care providers want to deliver a high-quality service to vulnerable people, they should not be afraid to price salaries appropriately. This will make a career in care more attractive for people with a vocation for it, but who might have otherwise chosen a less emotionally demanding job for better pay. This might seem simple, but increasing overheads obviously poses a barrier. To this end, the government must step up and offer financial support to the local authorities which have responsibility for funding care. This will make sure that care
services remain accessible and affordable for our ageing population, especially in the context of the cost of living crisis. Secondly, following Brexit, the UK should establish a visa and immigration system to make it easier for people to come to Britain to work in care. Just as there are special visa schemes for temporary workers, carers should benefit from a simplified process to allow them to come to our country to deliver this vital service, especially given the scale of shortages. The recruitment process in care is already lengthy and robust, to ensure that people who want to go into it have a fitting personality, but the new visa requirements introduced by Brexit have raised additional barriers for getting qualified carers in post. Currently, providers pay significant sums of money to sponsor their workers, so facilitating this process would also lower the cost of care, which would further benefit users and keep prices down. Finally, providers should realise the importance of investing in recruitment and have dedicated recruiters whose full-time job is focused on hiring new care workers. Too often, recruitment falls within the remit of care managers who are too busy with other aspects of their role to devote enough time and resources to recruitment. This is another area where the government could support the industry, by setting up a central government recruitment agency to give
Grzegorz Wrzosek
smaller providers easy access to a pool of available talent and workers who can be quickly employed. Once recruited, retention is also key, which employers can maximise by helping their workers, acknowledging their achievements and providing accessible support networks. While there are many industries affected by labour shortages, solving this issue in the adult social care sector is extremely crucial to the wellbeing of our population. A career in care can be highly rewarding, but the industry and the government need to step up to promote it and make it easier for people to enter this path.
Change in the adult social care vacancy rate (independent sector only)
Source: Skills for Care
24 | DECEMBER 2022/JANUARY 2023
CARING-TIMES.CO.UK
