Which kind of institution should I work for as a Home Manager?

There are a number of variables to reflect upon, which may help you to make up your own mind. Ultimately, it's which set up works best for you!

What are the differences between working for a charity / private sector / corporate sector / small group/independent?

I guess the best way to start this one is to consider which set-up is best for YOU to work at.

There are a number of variables to reflect upon, which may help you to make up your own mind;

If you’ve worked in the NHS a great deal, you may find the culture in a charity to be closer – less focused on customers and more focused on the values without a profit motive and striving towards ideals of service with an ethical basis and sense of equality.

If you try a private company with a focus on business performance, you may find it hard to navigate and their obsession with performance and results.

If you’ve worked for a mid to large-size private company, you may be used to making things happen, execution and a focus on results and the customer, with that in mind, a charity may be a difficult transition.

In contrast to this is the small independent home, i.e. one owner with 1 or two homes.

This brings a culture quite different from the two extremes above for very specific reasons;In my experience, there is a range of cultures ranging from amateur operators where the home is an extension of the family, very personal and comfortable but unclear boundaries regarding roles and responsibilities.

For some, this can be comfortable, for some the opposite.

On the other side of the spectrum, you have small operators with a high level of knowledge and competence who want the highest standards and will relinquish a degree of control and welcome the skills of the professional manager to help develop the service and all degrees in between.

Read more

• Peripatetic / Operations / Regional Managers and Operations Director - what's the difference?

• Should I work for an employer or through an agency as a Home Manager?

• What is the difference between a residential home and a nursing home?

Only you can determine the best fit for you, you will feel it.

My only word of caution overall is if you are drawn to work for an operator closer to the first description, what can be difficult is where the provider expects you to do miracles, pays you well and complains when you are not able to bring significant change.

This is an impossible bind as they may not understand their part in limiting how far the service can be developed.

There is no right and wrong here but clarifying expectations at the beginning and having a degree of awareness helps!

The home manager cannot raise standards without being able to access some funds be it for staff training or partial refurbishment or getting better calibre staff, electronic care systems etc or adequate staffing - this needs to be clear at the outset.