What does it mean to prepare your communities for the future?
Technology doesn’t replace existing workflows, it makes them more intelligent
Covid offers a rare opportunity to rethink job descriptions and operational processes within senior living. Digital tools help save staff time and become essential as communities work to evolve their wellness models and battle social isolation during the ongoing pandemic and beyond. Below a list of five ways you can make your communities smarter. These productivity tips will help” supercharge your work efficiency in 2021, so you can spend more time devoted to the things that really matter, i.e. your residents.
1.Cut the chaos - Blending technology through all your operations.
The proliferation of software has brought complexity to senior living operators workers' workflows. There's a need for a unifying interface to tie all your information and tools together. A quick peek through your laptop will confirm how many different tools you need to get through a typical working day. Your organization can quickly become entangled in a web of complex software applications, including electronic medical record systems (EMR), accounting and financial consolidation systems, and operations platforms.
The smart way to boost your productivity is by integrating as many of them as possible into a single platform. This can be achieved by breaking down the silos and enabling intelligent connectivity throughout the entire community.
Ideally, you can accomplish most tasks without logging in and out of systems and connecting the disparate data from each yourself, let alone gleaning insight from it. This can be established using API integrations between your platforms. An API integration is a connection between two or more applications that lets those systems exchange data. Not only do they help you save time and sync data, but they also ensure data integrity across your technology stack without having to worry about versioning issues.
2. Put an end to repetitive work with automation
When talking about efficiency in the workplace, it is helpful to start looking at which tasks could be better managed using an automated cloud-based software system. Organizations using automated processes are 1.5 times more likely to reduce organizational complexity and free up these resources for other projects. Productivity superheroes recognize that the intelligent way to cut down on repetitive tasks is through automated capabilities.
A great example of automation within your community is automated census data based on meal orders. Having an overview of all the residents currently seated in your dining area gives you an idea of how many residents still to expect during the service. This way, at the end of the dining service, you'll have an overview of all the residents that did not show up in the dining room and can check upon them. Another example related to your ordering process is the automation of table reservations and food ordering. By allowing both residents and staff to order and book tables via one platform and configure smart notifications related to these requests, you'll eliminate time-related to answering income requests by phone and printing these documents on paper.
You can strengthen your efficiency and overall work quality using these tools to assist you in your daily duties when interacting with residents, family members, and colleagues. By removing low-value adding and administrative work, you can focus on the resident's wellbeing.
3. Rinse and repeat with customized templates
Does that activity calendar you're setting up seem familiar? Does it feel like you're continuously printing the same menus? Are you constantly searching for images and visuals to include in your newsletters? If so, a centralized template library can be the solution. Having a defined structure already built is extremely cost-effective:
Typically, templates let you do something once, save it and then use it again with a few tiny tweaks. They are perfect for informing residents and families, new menu introductions, regular updates – you name it. For instance, having an activity calendar template allows you to stop building things from scratch and reuse your calendar over time. Putting customization possibilities on top even provides you with the opportunity to make it your own and tweak the calendar to the resident's specific needs (e.g. a different calendar for independent living and memory care).
Templates have numerous benefits for senior living communities who elect to use them, including cost and time savings, increased consistency across your communities, ease of use, and the reduction of mistakes.
4. Work from a single source of truth
As with many other business processes, your company's data management approach provides more value and savings when it's well developed. Communities using tools and workflows that draw information from a single source of truth, i.e., a centralized and all-inclusive standard data environment shared by the organization's user base, are ready to capture both time savings and more insights.
Having your resident directory and profile information directly integrated with your EMR system on one platform allows you to retrieve a more comprehensive and accurate picture of your residents' wellbeing and eliminate the need to sift through multiple data sources.
Another example is related to the newsfeed and activity calendar with your community. By having these digitized and centralized, you can collaborate and edit content and automate workflow processes – all from a single platform. Whether you are office-based or remote, all information within the platform can be easily accessed by permissioned users.
Communities using a single source of truth offer a more streamlined approach to drafting, sending, and archiving content. This will help to provide a complete and accurate record of the residents.
5. Put your focus on resident lifestyle and purpose
More and more potential prospects are paying attention to the ways communities gather information about residents and apply that knowledge to anticipate their needs and personalize their experience. That entails stepping away from the mass programming towards a more personalized resident wellbeing approach. Connecting residents with the things that drive them to create a feeling of fulfillment and purpose.
New research shows that having a sense of purpose is associated with more extended living and a decline in cognitive function. Residents who feel that staff members know, understand, and help them connect with their interests, will be happier and healthier. Using the knowledge present within your community and using it in meaningful ways by delivering a whole person-centered experience. Embedded dashboards are a great way to give you an overview of the resident profile, resident engagement, the number of visits they've received, etc. Used correctly, this information can be used to proactively engage residents.
We hope this article was helpful. Please reach out to info@cubigo.com for a free strategic consultation with a Cubigo professional on your IT stack to help prepare your communities for the future of senior living. Cubigo is a fully integrated cloud-based platform, digitizing the non-clinical services in Senior Living to add life to people's years instead of just adding years to their lives. Cubigo helps to replace different specialized, siloed software packages, including tools for maintenance requests, EMRs, Digital signage solutions, POS solutions, etc. Moreover, Cubigo's partnership focus makes it easy to link to the other essential existing software within your community, allowing you to put intelligence on top using smart API connections.