Good Afternoon Keri
I hope you're well and had a nice weekend. Recently, I have heard quite a
bit of conversation around client retention and considerations on why
clients may not always feel connected to the office team. Client retention
was always at the forefront of my mind as an HCA owner and as you know, I
am a huge advocate for client appreciation and loyalty programs. I have
some thoughts here on Chen's burning question "why do clients love their
caregivers but basically just put up with the office team?
First, I am thrilled that attention has turned back to client retention
rather than solely focussing on client starts but it's interesting to me
that Client Success Managers have been basically stripped of all our tools
to see this through.
The new Operating Model sees that CSM's manage at least 13,000 hours with a
stretch goal of 16,000 hours which has diminished our valuable face time
with clients. From an historical point of view, as franchisees, we
typically worked on a model of approximately 35 clients and 10,000 hours
per CSM. As such that difference in hours managed per CSM simply doesn't
allow for high-quality relationship development any longer which drives
retention.
We no longer have a budget for small tokens of appreciation, milestone
gifts or loyalty rewards. Client Success Managers don't currently have any
real "offerings" for our clients. Being proactive in this area is critical
to adding value to relationships. We have to find ways to connect with our
clients regularly and in positive ways and not only when things go wrong
and we're in recovery mode. This doesn't have to only come in the form of
paid gifts necessarily but time for regular communication and face-to-face
conversations would go a long way. It would be nice to occasionally have
more to offer our clients than just a weekly update. We are still dealing
with an older population, both our actual clients, and their families in
general who continue to view “old-fashioned” relationships as valuable.
We have excellent tools for recovery and to try and regain lost business
with win-back programs and yet, we don't have any tools for reaching out
just to thank them. I guess I feel like we have great focus on the business
we don't have, rather than appreciating the business we do have. We can and
should do both.
Second, clients love our caregivers for the most part. They feel loyalty to
them and start to see the office as unnecessary because they don't see all
the background work, all the effort that goes into making a case run; all
the coaching and scheduling and crisis management. We are the bad guys,
just here to make money. As much as we like to think that the "business" of
a case is confidential between caregiver and client, the reality is that
most care relationships are far more intimate in terms of information
sharing. As such clients tend to know roughly how much caregivers make and
they certainly know how much we charge. When rate increases are proposed
and caregivers don't get raises or benefits that commensurate with those
increases, the clients resent the "middleman" more and more. We need to
align things such as client increases with real commitment to caregiver
work enhancements, including benefits or other meaningful programs for them
(such as certification/ paid training and career opportunity). When our
caregivers love their employer, feel pride where they work and loyalty to a
company who treats them so well, the client feels less resentful. The more
we commit to our team the less “middleman” we are, and we become a trusted
partner to both the clients and caregivers.
Fundamentally, when clients ask their caregiver about their employer, I
want them to be singing our praises to such an extent that they can't
imagine working for anyone else.
Lastly, why are we not asking the clients directly? Engaging clients in
this process improves their perception of us and impacts loyalty
positively. We need to add to the quantitative data that Medalia provides
by probing and asking questions such as... How can we improve this
experience for you? What would be helpful? What would you like to see?
Just my thoughts,
Cheryl--
*Cheryl Cartwright*
*Regional, Client Success, Canada *
Home Care Assistance
Office: 416-488-8777 <4164888777>
Toronto, ON (EST)
torontohomecareassistance.ca <https://www.torontohomecareassistance.ca/>
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