Monday, July 16, 2007
Money vs. Training
I have had a couple of interesting conversations lately with people who think I focus too much on staff training and not enough on staff wages. My answer is always the same - we are state funded. I can't do anything about wages, but I can provide the best training I can for my staff so that they feel comfortable doing their job.
Yes, I'm sure that higher wages would do a lot for staff retention, but how many people do we lose because we don't provide enough training, and so staff get bored (since they don't really know what they are supposed to be doing with clients) or they are afraid to work with clients with assaultive behaviors, so coming to work is not so much fun.
I have always said that if you give people the right training and the right tools, then get out of the way, they will do their job.
I have also been proved wrong on that account a couple of times...
But I still believe it is fundamentally true. How can we expect staff to stick with a difficult job when we don't train them and we don't demand a level of competence from them? Throwing money at the problem is not always the answer. Just look at the government. Are they competent just because they have zillions of our dollars to throw around?
How many of the "bad" agencies across the country provide "bad" service because no one has ever shown them how to operate correctly? I'm talking about day programs who sit around in a building with nothing to do all day (or worse, "teach" clients money skills with plastic coins) or vocational programs who spend much of their time "teaching" clients vocational skills by having them bag the same bunch of metal washers over and over in the same bags. Do you think someone got up one morning and said, "I have it! From now on we'll have clients re-bag metal washers over and over and that will train them to get a job in the community."
Or do you think they do that because that's what their predessors did, and no one taught them any different, so now that they are in charge, they think re-bagging is what you're supposed to do? "It keeps everone busy!" Would paying staff who teach the re-bagging be better staff if they were paid more?
Don't get me wrong... I'm all for paying our staff more money. I'd like to make more money, too. But I can't fix that. I can create training opportunities to make staff more efficient and comfortable in their job. That's why we created the SNAP Curriculum and why we wrote the Behavior Analysis Skills - Introductory Course (BASIC) Training series.
And maybe it's a coincidence, but our turnover rate has slowed.
Yes, I'm sure that higher wages would do a lot for staff retention, but how many people do we lose because we don't provide enough training, and so staff get bored (since they don't really know what they are supposed to be doing with clients) or they are afraid to work with clients with assaultive behaviors, so coming to work is not so much fun.
I have always said that if you give people the right training and the right tools, then get out of the way, they will do their job.
I have also been proved wrong on that account a couple of times...
But I still believe it is fundamentally true. How can we expect staff to stick with a difficult job when we don't train them and we don't demand a level of competence from them? Throwing money at the problem is not always the answer. Just look at the government. Are they competent just because they have zillions of our dollars to throw around?
How many of the "bad" agencies across the country provide "bad" service because no one has ever shown them how to operate correctly? I'm talking about day programs who sit around in a building with nothing to do all day (or worse, "teach" clients money skills with plastic coins) or vocational programs who spend much of their time "teaching" clients vocational skills by having them bag the same bunch of metal washers over and over in the same bags. Do you think someone got up one morning and said, "I have it! From now on we'll have clients re-bag metal washers over and over and that will train them to get a job in the community."
Or do you think they do that because that's what their predessors did, and no one taught them any different, so now that they are in charge, they think re-bagging is what you're supposed to do? "It keeps everone busy!" Would paying staff who teach the re-bagging be better staff if they were paid more?
Don't get me wrong... I'm all for paying our staff more money. I'd like to make more money, too. But I can't fix that. I can create training opportunities to make staff more efficient and comfortable in their job. That's why we created the SNAP Curriculum and why we wrote the Behavior Analysis Skills - Introductory Course (BASIC) Training series.
And maybe it's a coincidence, but our turnover rate has slowed.
