Point of Difference – Through Their Eyes

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Point of Difference – Through Their Eyes

Each of us play the leading role in our story surrounded by people who in the most part support us – family, friends, health professionals, teachers, mentors, colleagues etc. So how do we truly see life through someone’s else’s eyes and understand their needs, wants and aspirations? 

Having a good experience is something we all hope for but when we have our expectations exceeded – that’s when the magic happens!

As the aged care industry in Australia transforms we face new challenges daily that put pressure on all areas of the business..but we do have one thing in common – we are all on a journey working towards providing a better lived experience for our elders and their families. 

Our challenge is to transform our consumers’ experience through; building trusted partnerships with consumers, co-designing a meaningful and purposeful day to day life for all the residents, operationalizing the aged care standards and providing quality care and support and finally ensuring financial viability and sustainability. 

Exceeding expectations and providing a ‘delightful’ consumer experience in the aged care industry is complex as there are several stakeholders to consider; the older person that will be receiving the care and support, the family member/s that require emotional support and of course the people who provide the care and support – the amazing front line team.

To provide great consumer experience all three groups have to be considered in alignment despite all their journeys being so different. So how do we achieve great consumer experiences?

Here are a six tips to get you started:

• Brand and company culture review – often a good place to start is to take a step back and review your brand, your message – look at authenticity, do you deliver on what you promise, do your staff, know, understand and live by the values of the organisation?
• Consumer, family and staff and community consultation – If you use auditing tools, review the last few years resident and staff satisfaction surveys, take the time to speak to a cross-section of your residents, family members and staff. Ask specific questions but also have free flow discussions. Engage with the local community and local health professionals will also provide you with a lens on how you are perceived in the broader community. 
• Mystery Shopping (your services and potentially your competition) – If this is not an activity you deploy – why not? These insights are invaluable and will give you the necessary information on whether your team understands what it is to give a great customer experience. You will also gain a deeper understanding of how your team operationalise the values and philosophy of your service and if they follow the processes in place.

          If a family has taken the time to walk in or call your service to enquire it should be considered a gift. 

• Mapping the process and having the policies and procedures in place – Through the reviews you have completed, the consultation with your stakeholders and your mystery shopping results you will have a good idea of what the path to great customer experience might look like so the next step is to map them out and embed them into your policies and procedures. 

          Its crucial to take your team and your families on the co-design journey. 

• Redesigning functions and role responsibilities around consumer need – all too often staying with the status quo and adjusting a few ‘consumer touchpoints’ is the path of least resistance but, this is also the path to a very fragmented and unsustainable consumer experience. Having a consumer experience vision the complete end to end journey will impact not only your staff behaviour but also consumer behaviour and ultimately your organisation’s financial performance. 
• Committed and empowered leadership – this essential to orchestrate a comprehensive consumer-centric makeover. For some companies, this transformed experience represents a complete step change. For others, the strategy may require only modest tweaks and changes. Either way, the consideration into what your consumer experience strategy is now and should be moving forward will translate into an overall vision and, ultimately, into guiding principles for frontline behaviour.

To find out more about about the AnchorExperience suite of services please reach out by calling (02) 8610 1950 or email info@anchorexcellence.com

Article written by:

Claire Ward
Aged Services, Compliance Remediation
& Consumer Experience Specialist

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