Smooth the path to digital care

Sam Hussain, founder and chief executive at Log my Care, explores how change management techniques can be used to help care teams embrace digitalisation.

Local integrated care systems (ICSs) have been tasked with distributing a portion of the £150 million pledged by the government to drive digitalisation among adult social care providers. While giving away money might sound easy, at present 60% of care providers are still using paper-based records and with digital care records not yet mandatory, many of them aren’t ready to change.

While it may be a daunting prospect, digitalisation brings a host of benefits for care providers and the people they support. A shared care record enabling the flow of information between health and social care is on the government’s agenda – allowing for better continuity of care when people inevitably transfer from one to the other. Digitalisation also gives care providers much-needed oversight, allows them to evidence the support they’re providing to inspectors and helps keep family members in the loop. The data collected will pave the way for a future of care that’s predictive, with tailored health and social care services available in each area to meet the population’s needs.

“Digitalisation also gives care providers much-needed oversight, allows them to evidence the support they’re providing to inspectors and helps keep family members in the loop. ”

While digitalisation is on the horizon, our conversations with ICSs highlight the barriers social care still needs to overcome. Care providers are in no rush to take advantage of the funding, because they don’t know if their staff will be happy using digital systems. And during a recruitment crisis in care, that’s understandable. To work with ICSs on overcoming this barrier, we teamed up with change management expert, Guided Innovation. Here are six tips for keeping teams happy and making organisationwide change.

Kübler-Ross change curve

The Kübler Ross change curve model was created by the Swiss-American psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross in 1969. It depicts five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. However, this model can also be used to understand the emotional turmoil a team may undergo when faced with a big change like digitalisation.

Care providers can use the change curve model to understand the feelings their teams may be having and combat them by offering reassurance, listening to their concerns, providing training and celebrating successes when digitalisation is embraced.

Steering groups

Establishing a steering group made up of different people from across an organisation is key to making effective change. This should be made up of the doubters and the digital gurus to give everyone a chance to air their grievances and fears about going digital.

The group gives staff an opportunity to discuss what they don’t like about the current system, what isn’t working well and what could be improved. Once that’s all out in the open, the digital gurus can start painting a picture of how much better and easier things will be with a digital system in place.

Decision-making and accountability

Senior leadership can be a blocker when it comes to people opening up and being honest – the easiest way to fix this is to ensure they don’t sit on a steering group. Instead, give members of the steering group power to make decisions and accountability. Using this, they can suggest ways of improving current processes.

Communication

It’s hard to over-communicate when it comes to a big change like going digital. Team members should be updated regularly, in every way possible. They should know where the organisation is on its digital journey and be given opportunities to get involved.

Culture champions

This is an opportunity for bright stars to shine. These should be people who are interested, positive and want to shout about digitalisation. They should be approachable to all staff and be amenable to questions. Those who take part should be rewarded – with pay or other benefits like enhanced annual leave, flexible working or opportunities for development.

Fun

Change may be difficult but digitalisation doesn’t have to be. This can be a real opportunity for teams to come together and achieve something wonderful. Celebrate the successes – plan quick-win practice sessions for your team, show them how easy the change to digital could be and celebrate those wins as they become a reality.

We talk to directors, owners, senior management and managers, and report across the care sector.

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