[Sample] How one small agency cut caregiver turnover in half

Sample article for testing the newsroom layout. The agencies, people and figures below are fictional.

Metro Companion Care, a fictional agency with 90 caregivers, saw annual caregiver turnover drop from 70 percent to 34 percent over two years. Owner James Okafor says he did not raise base pay during that time. He changed how the agency treats new hires and how it schedules them.

The three changes

1. Guaranteed hours. Every caregiver who wanted 30 hours a week got them, even if that meant fewer new clients for a while.
2. A named supervisor. Each caregiver has one office contact who answers their calls.
3. Paid training time. Training hours are paid at the full rate, not a reduced one.

Why it worked

Caregivers told the agency their biggest frustration was not knowing how much they would earn each week. Stable hours fixed that, and the named supervisor meant problems got solved instead of passed around.

What it cost

Okafor estimates the changes cost about the same as hiring and training 15 replacement caregivers, which the agency no longer has to do each year.

The lesson

Ask caregivers who left why they left. The answers are often cheaper to fix than a pay raise.