While the top priority in every child care organization is the quality care provided to a child, this priority would be hard to achieve without effective management of staff. Great leadership among a team is never a straight line, but there are some good starting points to consider when looking to improve your staff management strategy.
Here are 6 excellent tips for managing and motivating child care staff as a result of years in the child care sector.
Things You Should Offer To Attract And Keep High-Quality Staff
Employee financial compensation isn’t the only consideration to make when it comes to managing staff from a human resources perspective. Some other benefits that employees are typically offered include paid vacation and sick time, free meals, the opportunity for growth within the organization, and flexible working schedules.
Of course, offering all these workplace benefits means that you have to effectively keep track of the benefits offered and redeemed by each employee. Alliance CORE is a dedicated child care management system that brings organization and time savings to the workplace, leaving you with more opportunities to provide excellent leadership.
Features of Alliance CORE related to employee records and staff management include tracking:
- Paid vacation time
- Paid sick time
- Free childcare
- Good healthcare
- Performance-based bonuses
- Promotion
- Free meals
- Paid Planning time
- Paid 15-minute breaks
- Flexible hours and schedules
Even if you can’t offer all of these benefits to your staff, considering adding some benefits in addition to salary can be highly effective in boosting morale and creating a positive work environment, which also translates to exceptional care for children.
Put The Needs Of Your Staff On Par With The Needs Of The Children
Yes, providing quality care for your organizations enrolled children is why you created your organization, staff needs should also be high on your priority list. In fact, maintaining high staff motivation is child care is essential to providing high-quality care for children.
If you aren’t sure where to start when evaluating your staff needs, start with improving your ability to listen to your staff, appreciate their contributions, and provide opportunities for professional development.
Open, Honest, And Often Two-Way Communication
Among the many tips for managing child care staff, this is one of the most important. When you think about child care organization communication, you likely think about all the ways that you remain in contact with your parents and families. However, there is a whole other side to your organization that requires effective communication: your internal team.
Working on your internal communication methods can lead to a more engaged team. Some tips for managing your child care staff communication include:
- Choose communication channels that are easy and effective for your team to use
- Encourage feedback and open dialogue
- Actively listen to feedback and create action plans to improve operations where needed
Two-way communication fosters a greater sense of teamwork, improves trust between child care staff members and management, and builds loyalty among your team. Most importantly, two-way communication translates to better care for children as a result of higher job satisfaction, increased productivity, and innovation.
Give Honest Praise Frequently
Words of encouragement go a long way in the workplace, and this goes to you and your staff. Staff motivation in childcare can mean different types of leadership and management styles for different employees, but a good place to start is by showing appreciation and giving praise for quality contributions from your staff.
Giving honest, effective praise is the most effective when management focuses on relationship-building among the team and beginning to pay attention to work styles, sources of motivation for each individual staff member and staff strengths and interests.
Providing effective feedback can become a major part of your child care organization, especially when it is incorporated into your child care management system. Aspects that a child care management system can assist with when it comes to managing child care staff include:
- Giving your staff detailed praise to make their message relevant and meaningful
- Creating opportunities for your teachers to engage parents and listen to their feedback
These areas of staff management can all occur and be recorded within the Alliance CORE system.
Watch For Signs That Staff May Be Getting Overworked
Keeping your staff motivated and highly engaged with the children means that child care management should remain attentive to the time and effort that the staff is putting in. Managing staff means identifying when staff might be overworked and finding solutions to reducing hours and work commitment to an acceptable level.
If overworked employees remain as such, many negative effects can begin to unfold including:
- A reduction in overall workplace efficiency
- Burnout and resulting health issues
- Hazards caused by fatigue, oversight or overwhelm
- Low employee morale and ineffective management
Ensure Your Staff Proper Training, Certification, And Licensing
As you know, becoming a certified child care provider can mean a significant amount of time and effort into education about proper child care methods. Every state maintains its own rules and regulations when it comes to training and certification standards, along with of course licensing requirements.
Ensuring that your staff has received the proper training, certification, and licensing necessary to legally provide quality child care is the first step and is a valuable aspect of managing your child care staff. In the end, each staff member will benefit from having the proper training and knowledge to deliver care that your organization’s children need. Further, having a strong, certified staff will strengthen your team and make it an enjoyable workplace environment.
Set Your Team And Yourself Up For Success
When looking for tips for managing child care staff, don’t forget that organization and proper documentation of your management strategy is an important part. Alliance CORE is specifically designed to bring create clarity and efficiency in every aspect of your child care management strategy, with a number of features dedicated to employee records and staff management.
Are you looking for more child care management information? Check out our Ultimate Guide to Child Care Management.
Our child care management system makes running your child care program simple and efficient. Get back to what's most important. You shouldn't have to spend more time on the administrative tasks than you do with children and staff.
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Do you run an early childhood association made up of child care providers? If so, check out our Ultimate Guide to Shared Service Alliance.
Header image courtesy of JumpStory.
