Category: Key things to help you everyday

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Key things to help you everyday Latest industry developments

Village Hubs Grants Fund moves to next stage and shows why villages are the ideal location

Independent Living Assessment (ILA) is seeking expressions of interest from Australian communities and organisations interested in setting up a Village Hub.

The initiative, designed as part of the Australian Government’s Seniors Connected Program aims to relieve loneliness and social isolations among older Australians by creating these new social and community hubs. 

The Government wants to trial 10 village hubs, with grants to support them and they’re expected to run from 2021 to 2024.

The Village Hubs will provide a diverse range of member-led social activities which could include any of the following:

  • Physical: walking groups, excursions and fitness classes 
  • Social: trivia, fundraising events, teas, lunches and dinners
  • Learning: guest speaker programs, digital skills mentoring
  • Arts and cultural: art classes, book club, choir

The Village Hubs Activity involves working with communities to fund the establishment of at least 10 Village Hub projects across Australia to provide pathways for residents to improve mental health through increased social connections.

Could a Village Hub be an advantage in your village?

For more information or to express your interest, click here.

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Key things to help you everyday

Are you ready? It’s time to start planning your village budget

It’s that time of the year again when many village professionals will be commencing their planning for annual village budgets.  

You many be responsible for developing or providing input in budgets for:

  • Village operations – funded mostly by resident contributions.
  • Long term maintenance – funded via the operating budget, as a contribution upon exit or as a surplus of operation funds.
  • Capital expenditure – the funding of this can vary from being funded as a contribution via contract terms typically upon exit, funded by the operator or a combination of both.

In my experience, much of the discontentment or complaints that come around budget time are down to a lack of communication, poor processes, or operators not fully understanding the legislative and contractual requirements of village financial management.

Therefore, it’s imperative that your budget process:

  • Starts early ideally around February or March
  • Takes into account whether multiple meetings are required
  • Caters for time needed for stakeholder feedback, approvals and sign off
  • Understands legislative and contractual requirements
  • Has a sound communication strategy

I’ve always found the following points helpful in budget planning:

  • Develop a budget worksheet (organisation is key, so make sure you keep tabs for line items and assumption details for full transparency)
  • Be proactive in checking increases from utilities, service contracts
  • Consider contract expiry plans/renewal costs
  • Consult the continuous improvement program
  • Consider cash flow management
  • See if larger service contracts can be smoothed over a year
  • Have a policy for recovering and/or apportioning deficits/surpluses
  • Make sure you’re following legislative steps
  • Understand contractual/policy obligations
  • Make allowances for legislation changes (not just the RV Act)
  • Keep up with market trends and consumer expectations
  • Have a firm checking process in place

The key thing to remember as a village professional is most residents are on fixed incomes, regardless of whether they are pensioners or self-funded retirees.

This means their capacity to increase income or assets, match inflation or large village budget increase is diminished.

Planning and good processes are the best way to minimise nasty surprises.

DCMI Institute has developed a Budget Planning Guide to help village professionals manage their budgets.

You can download your guide here.

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Key things to help you everyday

Understanding the peak bodies that represent the sector

Three major peak bodies play an important role in our sector.

They are:

Leading Aged Services Australia (LASA)

A national association for aged services providers across residential care, home care and retirement living.

Aged and Community Services Australia (ACSA)

A leading national peak body supporting Not For Profit church, charitable and for purpose providers of retirement living, community, home and residential care.

The Retirement Living Council (RLC)

A dedicated national division of the Property Council of Australia, focused on retirement villages and senior housing.

Through their collective membership, they represent more than 50 per cent of retirement communities across the private and Not For Profit sectors.

So what do they do?

While LASA, ACSA and the RLC represent different sector groups and operators, they each provide a valuable service to their members and the retirement living sector as a whole.

This includes:

Representation and advocacy to Government for their members and the sector, to influence policy and legislation.

Member services, which do differ for each body but include advice on specific elements of the sector, reports and briefings, events, and operational service support.

Industry promotion through media campaigns and public facing initiatives like the A Wise Move website currently hosted by the RLC.

Research and partnerships to support innovation, best practice and insight into all aspects of our sector, and the services we provide.

Collaboration, coalition and alliance to drive better outcomes. Collaboration between the bodies is strong, as evidenced by the Retirement Living Code of Conduct and more recently the Australian Aged Care Collaboration.

These organisations can add real value to our villages, teams and residents, so it’s worth checking each peak body out and seeing how they might be able to suit your needs.

For more information on these peaks, contact the DCM Institute here.

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Key things to help you everyday Things to watch

Helping our residents stay connected and fighting loneliness in a village setting

When it comes to mental wellness and wellbeing, connecting and engaging with others is one of the most important things we can do.

As we get older, our social connections change.

We may lose friends and life partners, or be less physically able to attend activities in person.

The result?

Some individuals choose to remove themselves from situations where they engage with others.

There are many reasons someone might do this – it could be as simple not wanting to feel like a burden.

But the problem is it’s not healthy.

Retirement villages are normally great locations to facilitate the kind of social engagement we as individuals need to drive positive health and wellness outcomes.

But what about our residents who have become isolated and less connected?

What can we do, in our roles as village professionals?

It’s an important thing to be mindful of, especially amid the onset of COVID-19 which has increased the risk of older people feeling more isolated and less connected.

Facilitating positive change in your village

This is why we want to draw your attention to Connected AU, recommended by Gerard Mansour, Commissioner for Senior Victorians, in a recent LinkedIn article.

Connected AU has two key offerings, that can be great for residents:

  • The Letterbox Project – handwritten letters are sent from volunteers around the country to people experiencing isolation and loneliness.
  • Virtual Hobby Groups – Providing connection and engagement to people anywhere.

It’s relatively easy to set up, but it can drive serious positive outcomes in your village.

Just think of a resident who could benefit and then check out the Connected AU website here.

The easy of helping your resident will just fall into place.

A little bit of effort goes a long, long way

In our experience, when a resident is feeling lonely it’s the little things that count.

Something as simple as stopping to say hello when you see them in the village can really make their day. We’ve also seen great success with Facebook pages and messenger groups set up to engage residents on the tech-savvy side of things.

Here are a few extra ideas you might want to look into:

  • Be Connected – offers simple guides for older people to learn about technology and online safety. Learn more here. 
  • Community Visitor Scheme – residents may be eligible to access the CVS who arrange volunteer visits to older people. 
  • Local Government – contact them for information about clubs, activities and community events in your region.
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Key things to help you everyday Latest industry developments

The Retirement Living ‘Code of Conduct’ turns one, plus a useful tool to help your village stay compliant in 2021

The Retirement Living Code of Conduct celebrated its first birthday last week. 

The new code for retirement villages was developed by the Property Council and LASA to give customers confidence in village management and operations.

Ben Myers from the Property Council said they’ve been thrilled to see almost 50 per cent of retirement villages participate and sign on.

This is despite obvious external pressure from COVID.

You’ve got to say it’s a real win for the sector.

“This year we will be increasing awareness of the Code to grow the number of subscribers,” Ben says.

“We have set an ambitious target of 75 per cent take up in the industry. This would seriously demonstrate the industry’s commitment to residents and to robust self-regulation.”

We here at the DCM Institute strongly support the Code of Conduct industry framework, and believe it supports best practice village operation, staff retention and resident satisfaction.

This is why we’ve provided plenty of info in our village manager professional development program to supply knowledge, guidance and resources to fast-track compliance with the code.

Keep an eye out for a new tool to be released in our 2021 program.

The Code of Conduct Gap Analysis tool can be used in conjunction with the Code Implementation plan. These resources help operators progress in their compliance of the code in2021.

You can find out more about our professional development program, and how it will help keep your village compliant here.

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Key things to help you everyday Things to watch

Get ready – changes to NSW retirement village regulation are just around the corner

More regulation changes are on the cards, this time for retirement village operators in NSW.

On the 23 December 2020 the NSW Department for Fair Trading notified retirement living operators that there would be a raft of new compliance requirements to fulfill in 2021. 

One of the biggest changes comes in regards to asset management.

From 1 July 2021, operators are expected to maintain an Asset Management Plan (AMP) for the village’s main capital items.

This plan must be available to current and prospective residents, and include:

  • Costs associated with maintaining and replacing items of capital.
  • Reasons for decreases or increases in costs.
  • How often costs are incurred and the expected lifespans of items.
  • Maintenance and replacement requirements of items of capital.

Back in December the Department said, “To allow time for operators to prepare the asset management plans and fully comply with this requirement, penalty provisions for non-compliance will not commence until the second half of 2021”.

This week our colleagues over at Thomson Greer shared updated information, which says from 1 September 2021, village operators in NSW are expected to:

  • Prepare in consultation with the residents, an AMP including prescribed content every 10 years in relation to each village they manage;
  • Include into the AMP an asset register being a list of the major items of capital and their prescribed information (Asset Register);
  • If capital maintenance is included into the proposed annual village budget, include into the proposed budget a 3-year report relating to capital maintenance for major items of capital that is extracted from the AMP current for the corresponding period;
  • Update the AMP within 28 days of the annual budget being approved, if the 3-year report included into the approved annual budget differs from the AMP;
  • Update the AMP within 7 days of the purchase of a major item of capital.

This is important. If a major item of capital is not in the asset register, funding for its capital maintenance from the capital works fund or recurrent charges are not authorised.

Concurrently with the New Regulations, the Department of Customer Services has issued Secretary’s Guidelines for Retirement Villages AMPs, including a recommended template to follow when developing an AMP.

I managed to track down the gazette information which showcased the likely template sample and guidelines for the AMP’s in Appendix 1 & 2, pages 19-21. You can view the information here. 

For those operators keen to commence planning for this activity it may be a great resource to start helping you plan for developing your AMP.

Alternatively, engaging the services of a Quantity Surveyor would also be an option to consider for time poor village professionals.

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Key things to help you everyday Latest industry developments Things to watch

Join us at the LEADERS SUMMIT in your city – March 18 – 19

You’re cordially invited to join the DCM Institute at the LEADERS SUMMIT. Hosted by our sister company DCM Group, the LEADERS SUMMIT brings together 40 leading CEOs across five cities, live.

The key is to understand the recommendations from the Royal Commission into Aged Care, and the next steps for your business.

The impact for retirement living operators will be big, as the Commissioners are expected to promote a new model of living based on the current village setup.

In a COVID-safe setting, experience premium networking with your colleagues including our famous hatted restaurant dinners, full sit-down lunches and barista coffee breaks live in every city.

We’re going to be there, and we hope to see you there too.

The future of retirement living and aged care. It’s important.

Remember spots are strictly limited, so click this link to register now.

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Key things to help you everyday Things to watch

Five Good Friends offers great new service – regular home support guidance sessions in your village – supporting you and sales

Last week I was lucky enough to spend some time with Sam Carson, the Commercial Manager of Five Good Friends, a peer-to-peer home support service that has spread across the country.

The great thing about Five Good Friends is that it was co founded about five years ago by Tim Russell, who created RetireAustralia and is a real leader in the village sector. They understand our ‘business’.

I was excited to learn about the new offering they have for retirement village operators who want a care service solution for residents, without the burden of being the Care Provider. And they want a sales aid to show potential customers that there is a care path.

The new service is called the Village Concierge.

Essentially, this service offers operators a regular visit by a skilled guide to the home care world who can have confidential discussions on your residents needs and guide them to the best solutions.

The service means the same person comes back to the village each week and can monitor progress and advise adjustments as required.

Some villages have chosen to frame it as a Village Nurse Concierge or refer to it as a Village Wellness Coordinator.

The key thing is it takes the burden of care off you as a manager or operator, while still providing support to residents that need it. 

It works great in a retirement village setting, and the operator decides how long the concierge is present in the village and the kind of services they put forward. 

It’s a great investment in your future planning too, offering support and guidance through simple preventative health measures and assisting in the access of appropriate home support. 

The outcome – residents with a happier, fulfilling life. 

The role of the Concierge weaves naturally into the fabric of the village as a trusted care advisor to residents. And often, what you’ll see is this relationship grows with time.

Personally I think it’s money well spent supporting residents, expanding your service offering and supporting sales.

If you are interested in learning more about the kind of services Five Good Friends can provide in village settings, I strongly encourage you to contact Sam Carson on 0409 384 990. 

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Key things to help you everyday

Eight steps to good, fair decision-making

The role of a Village Professional can at times feel like walking a tightrope.

In the broadest terms, the basic role of a village manager is to deliver, or facilitate the services promised under the operator’s contract to residents living within their community. Gosh, if only it was that easy!

In reality, every day Village Professionals are balancing residents needs and expectations against legislative and contractual agreements, sometimes in the absence of clear parameters.

And as a result, Village Professionals often find themselves in positions where they have to make decisions – and big ones. 

In my experience, the Village Professionals who make the best decisions generally follow eight steps, which you can use as a guide. 

Here are eight questions to ask yourself before your next big decision.

  1. Is the answer in the legislation?
  2. Is the answer in the contract/residence agreement?
  3. Is there an organisational policy/position guideline around this matter?
  4. What will be the impact on the operations/budget?
  5. What will be the impact on the resident or other residents?
  6. Does this decision require further consultation with others?
  7. Common sense – does it pass the ‘pub test’?
  8. Does it fit in with the values of the organisation?
    (Be careful not to bias with your personal values here.)

When these steps aren’t bearing fruit, you may also consider:

  • Whether you may need to gather some further information; and/or,
  • Are there alternative positions/solutions?

One of the most important lessons in my career, after working on and in more than 200 villages, has been to make sure that my decisions are thoughtful.

I’m constantly asking whether I’ve followed due process, considered all angles, being transparent and can explain the why of my decision.

As a side note, I have also learnt sometimes my decisions may need to be reviewed or amended. Having the ability to revisit a decision (even if it eventually comes out the same) shows respect, and your residents will certainly appreciate it.

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Key things to help you everyday Latest industry developments

Have you heard about COTA’s Aged Care System Navigator?​

COTA Australia provides advocacy, information and services to all older Australia to promote, improve and protect the wellbeing of older people in our country.​

https://www.cota.org.au/

One of its recent initiatives is the Aged Care Navigator Service Trial.

This includes:

  • Assistance to contact My Aged Care
  • Help to fill out forms
  • Community workshops and information sessions 

Led by COTA Australia, the trial is designed to test different services and activities that may help people learn more about Australian Government-funded aged care services and how to best access them.

COTA has partnered with 30 organisations as part of the pilot and is evaluating 64 different Navigator trials across the country.

It’s a valuable resource for Village Professionals and your residents, and it’s available to older people, their families, friends and anyone else who wants to link with aged care supports.

For more information on the program and to share with your residents, click here.