Feedback might not be high on the agenda when you’re running a small care home on a tight budget. But there are good reasons for making feedback central to how you work.
Businesses with a healthy feedback culture often enjoy higher morale, better collaboration and career development, and lower turnover – all things the care sector could use more of.
But what is a feedback culture, and how can you create one?
In this article, we explain:
- What is meant by ‘feedback culture’
- The benefits of a feedback culture in the care home sector
- How you can create a feedback culture at your care home
- Giving actionable feedback: top tips for care managers
Let’s jump straight in.
What is a feedback culture?
A feedback culture is a work environment where colleagues are encouraged to share honest assessments of each other’s performance – as well as that of the wider organisation.
In a strong feedback culture, staff feel safe when giving or receiving feedback regardless of where the other person sits within the organisation’s hierarchy.
Workplaces with strong feedback cultures typically have all or some of the following:
- Open and two-way approach to communication
- Methods for employees to feed back anonymously
- Training and learning culture deeply embedded
- Reward and recognition mechanisms adopted
- Processes for measuring the impact of feedback.
So, what are the benefits of a feedback culture to your care home?
Why a feedback culture is important in a care home
Since feedback can be both positive and constructive, the big benefit of having a strong feedback culture is the ability to recognise and improve performance.
In a 2022 survey of social care workers, 41% said they’d left a job because of a lack of appreciation. What’s more, 81% want recognition from their employer – but just 21% get it.
Positive feedback and praise can increase employee engagement, leading to higher quality work and fewer sick days – crucial for a small care home with limited resources.
On the flip side, constructive feedback helps you see where additional training is needed – so you can provide regular opportunities for learning and career development.
So, how can you create a feedback culture in your small care home?
Creating a feedback culture: 4 Tips for care home leaders
The good news is you don’t have to spend money to get a feedback culture going. Effort and routine are far more important than fancy software or expensive employee rewards.
Here are four things you can do to start creating a feedback culture now.
1. Make your 1-2-1s sacred
If you want your team to feel motivated and valued, 1-2-1s are vital. Don’t get into the habit of skipping them, they’re one of the most important feedback channels you have.
Amongst your general conversation regarding recent positives, challenges, blockers and so on, include a recurring set of feedback-focused questions. For example:
- Is there anything I could be doing differently to support you?
- How has your interaction with your teammates been lately?
- Is there anything about the home you’d like to know more about?
2. Mix things up in team meetings
Team meetings, even quick huddles, are a great place for sharing appreciation and constructive feedback. But it can be tricky to get everyone together in a shift environment.
One solution could lie in shift rotations. Could you coordinate team meetings with changes in shift patterns, to mix up the attendees and create a new team dynamic each time?
And if your people can’t all be in one place, at least your information can. A noticeboard or newsletter can be a central hub for sharing minutes and updates with the entire team.
3. Gather 360° feedback from colleagues
With 360° feedback, each person asks a few colleagues, from varying levels of the organisation, to give an honest appraisal of their experience working together.
This is usually done with a short (often anonymous) questionnaire, which typically includes:
- Closed questions: the question is a statement and the respondent can ‘agree’ or ‘disagree’ on a sliding scale, to help you collect data you can compare year on year.
- Open questions: the question starts with words like ‘what’, ‘how’ or ‘share’ to encourage thoughtful, anecdotal responses that add colour to quantitative data.
- Varied topics: questions cover role-specific issues, but also things like digital skills, soft skills such as empathy or communication, and alignment with company values.
4. Open up a suggestion box
In a shift setting like a care home, a suggestion box can act as an ongoing brainstorming session. It’s also great for getting ideas from people who find it difficult to speak in a group.
But before you put a suggestion box and forms in your break room, consider this:
- What information will you collect? Will people identify themselves, or stay anonymous? Will you separate ‘new ideas’ from ‘solutions to existing problems’?
- When will you review and act on suggestions? If people think their feedback is being ignored, your suggestion box will do more harm than good.
- How can you encourage people to be constructive? This should be a box of ideas for a better future, not just complaints about a frustrating present.
And this brings us to an important point:
Be specific with your feedback
For feedback to be valuable, it must give the recipient a clear idea of which behaviours they should continue, change or stop in the future. In short, feedback should be ‘actionable’.
How to give actionable feedback
Actionable feedback is praise or criticism that tells you why you’re receiving it, and what you should do next. It helps embed good behaviours, and improve poor practices.
Actionable feedback example
Let’s say one of your care home’s values is ‘Take ownership’. This could cover a person’s responsibility to hand over incomplete tasks and important information at the end of a shift.
If you receive feedback that an employee is consistently failing to do this, your ‘unactionable’ way of passing that on might sound like this:
“You’re not living up to the home’s ‘Take ownership’ value.”
Aside from the fact this person might not understand the value’s meaning, your feedback gives them no indication of how they’re falling short – and what they can do to improve.
So, the actionable version of this feedback would sound something like this:
“At the end of each shift, you must properly brief the person taking over from you before you leave. This ensures unfinished tasks get completed and residents get the care they need. Respecting this responsibility is a key part of our ‘Take ownership’ value.”
Act on your feedback with FuturU’s online learning
Sharing ideas isn’t the point of a feedback culture, it’s what you do with them that counts. Acting on people’s feedback is how you gain their trust and improve their performance.
A culture of continuous learning helps you do exactly that. When feedback reveals room for improvement, investing in training and development shows you’ve listened – and acted.
With FuturU’s online learning platform, you can assign CPD-accredited courses, set deadlines and track progress with ease – all at a small monthly cost to your organisation.
Book a FuturU demo today to see how it could work for you.
