Page 8 - Unfair-To-Care-22-23-Flipbook

SECTION 2: THE RESEARCH
WHAT’S IN A SUPPORT WORKER ROLE? KORN FERRY’S FINDINGS
Through focus groups and analysis of role responsibilities, Korn Ferry reviewed Support Workers in Supported Living settings within Community Integrated Care, looking at the:
Level of knowledge and skill needed for acceptable performance in the role.
Depth of thinking required in the form of: analysing, reasoning, evaluating, creating, using judgement, forming hypotheses, drawing inferences, and arriving at conclusions.
Extent to which the role is answerable for actions and their consequences. This assessed the autonomy and accountability of the role.
Physical, environmental, and emotional elements of the role and their effects on the individual (rated on a scale from minimal to extreme).
The analysis clearly distilled the general experiences and expectations of this role:
Know-how: “Role requires some specialist, practical skills in management of specific healthcare needs. Post holders need at least three months to understand emotional triggers and behaviour specific to each individual in order to respond appropriately to
their needs, as well as a high degree of empathy, which goes beyond common courtesy, to provide the appropriate level of care required.”
Problem solving: “The role works according to routine procedures. However, there is a requirement to adapt to ‘in the moment’ situational change and to the unique needs of the individual being supported.”
Accountability: “The role is constrained by clearly defined operating procedures and regulations. Most of the work will be undertaken without close supervision and whilst routine in nature, there will be freedom to decide when and if to change routines in accordance with circumstance. Impact is measured to reflect the delivery of care which is tailored to the needs of the individual without the immediate support of others.”
Physical effort / endurance: “Carers will be working for long periods of time and will be required to exert physical effort in activities such as bathing and showering. Many will be sleeping on site which is typically and routinely disrupted.”
Environmental: “Carers are with the client constantly and regularly exposed to unpleasant conditions such as bodily fluids, streams in noise e.g. TV / shouting, and temperature. There is little opportunity to change the working environment.”
Emotional: “Carers are likely to experience verbal and/or physical aggression with potential risk of personal injury.”
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