Social Scare

G'day listeners.

As you all may well know, I work in the heady field of social care. Not for the faint-hearted I tell you! I have decided, that from time to time, I will write a regular 'column' on my experiences.

Here is the first installment

When is a meat, not a meat?

Getting 'bums on seats' in social care is a hard one. That is, getting people into the job and convincing them to stay! Because of the high turn over of staff, we often rely heavily on agency staff.

Over the years, I have come across agency staff who are good, bad, blatantly rude, incredibly ignorant and just plain stupid. STOOPID!!!!!!!!!!

Why would one turn up to a shift wearing high heels, then, when asked to shower someone, say they cant because they're not dressed for it? Because they're both STOOPID and lazy.

How about this one. I informed an agency worker that she couldn't use her mobile phone whilst on duty. Now I hear all of you gasp at this one, but it's a sad case of give them an inch and they take a mile. You have workers who will talk non-stop on their mobiles for hours, not giving a shit about the time they are NOT giving to the people who need it. The residents whose home these workers are working in!

Anyway. Back to the story. I told her she couldn't use the phone. So the next day, when she was handing over to me details of her shift, she proudly stated that she had not used her mobile. Oh no!!! She had called her boyfriend on the office phone she stated!!!!
Preston stared at her in disbelief. Preston lost it and started laughing. Only briefly. Then Preston pointed out the premise to the non-mobile rule.

This same agency worker, when counting the money on hand over , shifted my ideas on the definition of a moron. Money has to be counted on every shift change to ensure internal financial controls are adhered to....that is....no ones stealing!

So, there was about £70.25 in the petty cash, as well as three tenant personal monies. After she had counted, she filled out the required paper work. Only, after she filled it out, she stated that the money was incorrect. When asked if she had counted £70.25, she replied 'no', she insisted that there was £7,025 in there. Wide eyed, staff pointed out the wonders of the decimal point and how she had left it out. But no! She insisted that she had counted £7,025. This girl had only just finished her A levels. Hmmmmm

How about this one. Another manager told me this story a couple of years back. They had a tenant who, due to the families religious and personal beliefs, did not eat meat. He was in a high care scheme. This means that he needs assistance with most daily living skills therefore cooking and feeding were done by staff. It happened one day, that a staff member fed him meat. She had fed him chicken. The shift leader at the time discovered this and reported it to the manager. The manager and the deputy called for an informal meeting to address several issues in this workers performance. When it came around to discussing the 'Meat Incident', the worker had a very legitimate defense!

Oh yes listeners.....wait for it.... She claimed that chicken is not a meat?????

STOOPID STOOPID STOOPID

I am so disgruntled at the lack of intelligence, creativity and dedication of staff. It pisses me off to the point that if I don't laugh, I would just become bitter.

I am now about to pilot training in certain areas for new starters in the company. Maybe I start with pointing out the 5 food groups to new staff.