Why is staff training important in health and social care?
Training staff is important in health and social care to ensure the safety of people receiving and giving care and to maintain high standards of care quality.
Training care staff helps engrain the necessary behaviours, attitudes, skills and knowledge to deliver high-quality, safe, person centred care. It helps them take the right steps to prevent risk occurring and prepares them to respond correctly should a risk emerge in the course of delivering care. This helps keep everyone safe from harm.
Without the right training there is more chance something (minor or major) could go wrong. This could put people at serious risk of harm. Training staff to understand how to communicate more effectively, to manage people who have behavioural difficulties and how to work towards their personal outcomes are just some examples of how the right training regime boost care quality, for individuals and across care services.
But getting staff training in care right can have knock-on effects in other areas, like regulatory compliance and keeping your care service well staffed, as I'll explain in the sections below:
Why staff training is important in care - regulations
Staff training is also important because as a registered provider it’s a regulatory requirement to ensure all staff have a basic, appropriate level of training and to have undergone a full induction before starting work. In England most care providers will also use The Care Certificate as part of their induction process, and require staff to at the very least complete mandatory training (more details in the section below).
It is also a regulatory requirement to ensure staff have the necessary training to complete specific activities or care for people with certain care needs, for example if a piece of equipment is used as part of a person’s care. Alongside The Care Certificate and mandatory training, regulators also expect all care staff to have a basic set of core skills.
Why staff training is important in care - staffing
Another reason, often overlooked, why staff training is important especially in health and social care, is its role in strengthening retention of staff. As you are no doubt aware, social care is beset by severe challenges in recruiting and then keeping staff.
Alongside offering greater recognition for staff and clear routes for career development, staff training can help retain your best staff. Research from Skills for Care has shown that “87% of employers felt that offering learning and development opportunities improved staff commitment.”
Staff training can also help people feel a level of professionalism that is sometimes unduly lacking in social care. Having the right staff training can also help people feel more confident and well-equipped in a job that can be stressful, complex and challenging. Having this increased confidence and sense of security can help people feel more satisfied and less stressed in their role.
In other research conducted by Skills for Care, care providers reported that staff training can even be important in attracting and recruiting more applicants, as part of a wider investment in staff development and progression. For example when asked how they improve recruitment:
“Demonstrate a commitment to staff training and development and clear career progression routes.” (Risedale Estates Limited, Residential care provider)
“Provide a positive culture and environment that allows people sufficient time to deliver outstanding care to patients [and] provides education and training to support outstanding care delivery and to help staff to maximise their potential.” (Embrace Quality Care, Domiciliary Care provider).
For more help to improve recruitment and retention download Caring for the Future, a free guide featuring expert guidance on care worker training, recruitment and retention.
What is workforce training in health and social care?
Health and social care is complex and varied, as such the workforce training required will vary too. The type and level of training required will vary depending on factors such as the type of care that is being provided, the person’s role and responsibilities (for example are they a registered manager? Or do they need to prepare food?) and the care setting they work in (residential or domiciliary for example). There is some training that would be expected to be mandatory for all care providers though.
Mandatory training are those pieces of training that address statutory requirements like the Health and Safety at Work Act, your regulators requirements (such as the CQC, Care Inspectorate or RQIA) and any requirements set down by the local authority.
Below are the main areas seen as mandatory training (some will not be applicable to all roles/services/settings):
- Health & Safety
- Fire Safety
- Equality, Diversity & Human Rights
- Infection, Prevention and Control
- Manual Handling
- Safeguarding Adults/Safeguarding Children
- Basic life support and first aid
- Food Hygiene
- Managing medicines
- Documentation and record keeping
- Mental capacity and deprivation of liberty (DoLS)
Skills for Care have set out how common mandatory training maps onto CQC Key Lines of Enquiry. What are the CQC Key Lines of Enquiry (KLOE)?
Advantages of staff training in health and social care
As discussed in the previous sections there are lots of advantages of staff training in health and social care. It equips staff to deliver safe, high-quality care, can aid recruitment and retention and keeps you on the right side of laws and regulations.
However, traditional, face-to-face training has a number of drawbacks, it is:
- Expensive
- Time consuming
- Difficult to manage
- Can be disruptive
- Can lack effectiveness
Imagine, your care home employs 60 staff. There are a number of mandatory courses that they have to complete yearly. One course, for example, Moving and Handling, costs £300 for a class of 15 people.
That’s 4 classes of 15, therefore, 4 x £300 = £1,200. Not forgetting that you will also need to include wages for the staff attending, plus the wages of cover staff that you bring in for the day. Therefore, 60 x £7.83 (minimum wage) = £469.80 however, we need to multiply this by 2 to cover the costs of the additional staff, therefore totalling £939.60, just on staff costs!
Now, imagine you have 10 mandatory courses that must be completed annually. You are now looking at £3000 per year, just for the mandatory courses + staff costings too (and this doesn’t include any travel or accommodation costs!). Nevertheless, it’s vital your teams are trained to the highest standard.
Art Kohn, a professor, writer and consultant in corporate training found that within one week of completing a training course, individuals are likely to have forgotten approximately 90% of all information presented.
It's important to remember that staff training in care isn't always easy and it can require a lot of trial and error get things right, so don't feel defeated if you are finding things difficult. If you are struggling, we have created a guide on learning and development for care workers to help you overcome common challenges that care services face, so you can get your staff training on the right track.
eLearning – advantages
eLearning in health and social care is offering a better value, more effective alternative to face-to-face training methods.
Studies have found that eLearning requires 60% less employee time. Courses can be started, resumed, and completed, anytime, anywhere. This minimises the disruption to a care service as training fits around caring and not the other way around. eLearning software can also deploy a greater variety of methods than traditional training, including interactivity and virtual reality, to make training more effective and personalised so it ‘sticks’ and is not quickly forgotten.
On top of all this, eLearning offers far better value, with fees for trainers, workshops, potentially travel and accommodation too, all cut out of your expenditure. With Access Learning for Care, learner licenses can be passed on, so that if one employee leaves you can simply reuse the existing license with a new recruit. Further reducing costs.