Why is it so Hard to Maintain Consistency in a Residential Children’s Home?
In the last article in this series, we looked at the problem of overwhelm. In this one we are going to tackle consistency and the problem that it poses for care home managers, not just now in the post-COVID-19 world we live in, but even before the pandemic overtook our lives.
Why is consistency such a difficult thing to achieve when you are running a residential children’s home? That’s what we are going to look at in this post.
First, though, let’s outline what consistency is.
What is Consistency?
Consistency is defined as the quality of performing and behaving in the same way, always or consistency is the quality or condition of being consistent.
Why is Consistency in Residential Children's Homes Hard to Achieve?
Many people who have not been in the position of maintaining and managing a residential children’s home may think that consistency would be an easy thing to achieve. People who have been in that position, as you may be reading this, know different. With good intentions, you want everything to run like clockwork.
You want the same tasks to be completed when they need to be completed and within the desired timescale. However, due to the ever-changing environment that children’s homes are, it’s not always possible.
Jim Rohn
-ENTREPRENEUR-
Success is neither magical nor mysterious. Success is the natural consequence of consistently applying basic fundamentals
The Issue of New Challenges Always Arising
One of the reasons why it is so hard to maintain consistency within a children’s home is because there are always problems, incidents and occurrences that arise in the day to day running of the home. With new residents, there are new challenges, as every child that stays in a children’s home comes from different backgrounds and has unique needs.
So, even when you try to keep a firm plan and schedule in mind, something will always come along to throw it into disarray.
Illnesses can also have the same effect. You may have your children’s home organised to run like a well-oiled machine, right up until one of the staff suffers from an illness. Whether it’s something minor like a cold or something a little more serious, like Covid-19, for instance, it can really disrupt the routine you are trying to stick to in the children’s home environment.
That’s why it’s essential to work on consistency. If things are always done the same way, at the same time, at the same regularity, then even when those things happen that you can’t plan for, because you have a schedule that you consistently stick to, it is less likely to derail the smooth running of the home.
Whether you have been struggling to maintain consistency in your approach to running the children’s home you manage for some time, or it has just arisen as a problem over the last few months since the outbreak of Covid-19, there are things you can do to make it easier. One of them is by utilising the Children’s Home Care Manager’s Annual Planner devised by Rezume. In the next article in this series, we are going to look at this effective solution in greater detail.
10 Minute Care Management Tasks
During times of overwhelm the act of 'lessening the task' can make climbing the mountain of jobs amidst the chaos seem less challenging. We have put together a resource of 10 minute tasks to pick and choose from and use to get things done, when the going gets tough. Download below.
