The Home Instead network is the world's leading provider of personalized in-home care services. With over 120 healthcare workers, the Home Instead Rhode Island offices offer a wide range of in-home senior care services — including companionship for Alzheimer's patients and hospice support — to nearly 100 clients.

Retaining caregivers starts by showing appreciation — a tough task for dispersed teams

In-home care has no shortage of demand. In fact, the Census Department projects that by 2035, seniors will outnumber children for the first time in the US's history. Meanwhile, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics expects job openings for home health aides to grow 22% from 2022 to 2032 as the population ages. 

For healthcare leaders — like Cris Dersidan, owner of Home Instead's two Rhode Island offices — this fast-growing demand makes retaining talent mission critical. "We could be doing more business if we had more staff. But this is a challenging environment to hire in," Cris explains. 

So, Chris decided Home Instead Rhode Island needed a different approach. Rather than focusing on hiring alone, he'd work with his engagement manager, Lauren George, to make his business a top workplace in the area. That way, he could retain his talent longer. 

The challenge was that caregivers work with clients in their homes and rarely interact with the larger team, leaving the job feeling siloed. This dispersion also made rewarding and celebrating individual team members extremely difficult. 

To foster a stronger team environment, leadership held raffles and distributed gift cards to reward targeted behaviors, such as showing up on time and not missing shifts.

But, this system required the office staff to manually identify which caregivers earned rewards. The delayed incentives also didn't reinforce the targeted behavior. Worst of all, the system only recognized top and bottom performers while overlooking the most consistent and reliable caregivers.

“We’re cultivating a culture of inclusion and support. We want our caregivers to get the recognition they deserve — not just the exceptional performers, but steady people who show up day in and day out.”

Reducing caregiver churn risk with Perry Points and Pulse Surveys

Since partnering with Perry, it's easy for the Rhode Island offices to show every employee the appreciation they deserve. Chris and Lauren assign Perry Missions, which gamify everyday tasks and reinforce targeted behaviors. For example, after a drop in on-time visits, the duo assigned a mission that instantly rewarded caregivers for clocking in and out on time.

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Using the app, employees could track how many Perry Points they've earned and for what in real-time. With enough points, the caregiver could then redeem their rewards as gift cards to over 50 retailers, including Walmart and Amazon. 

Meanwhile, leadership could see which employees engaged with these missions and garner insights into how the reward system impacted employee happiness with: 

• Pulse Surveys. Caregivers get prompted to fill out these short questionnaires weekly, encouraging timely feedback about their work, the company, and Perry. The business can then use these insights to improve company culture and morale. 
• Sentiment Scores. This metric quantifies each caregiver's sentiment toward the company out of 10, gauging the individuals' well-being and churn risk. If an employee scores lower, leadership knows to proactively re-engage the individual to prevent churn. 

For instance, Lauren explains that "if someone's not at a 9 or 10, we know we need to reach out." This proactiveness on leadership's part has prompted Home Instead Rhode Island's most reliable caregivers to share that they now feel more noticed and appreciated. 

“We’ve gotten so much feedback from caregivers about how nice it is to feel recognized for the everyday tasks. They love how Perry Missions give them something to strive towards, too.”

Bolstering caregiver engagement and retention rates with 400+ missions completed

With Perry, Home Instead Rhode Island reports happier caregivers, better engagement rates, and higher retention rates, leading to better quality of care for their patients: 

• 500+ missions completed in a quarter
• 90% on-time visits
• 88% caregiver adoption rate 

“Our caregivers have had a wonderful experience. They love getting extra perks without waiting for their paycheck and knowing they can check in through surveys.”