Incentives, gifts keep CMs happy at work
Liberty Mutual Group in Boston recently reorganized, creating 35 new nurse managers with little or no management experience. Liber ty’s training efforts for its newest nurse managers included tips for remembering to reward their employees in an ongoing effort to keep them happy on the job.
"It’s very expensive to replace case managers. I set up budgets every year, and I know that turnover hurts the bottom line," says Julie K. Johnson, RN, CCM, assistant vice president of medical and disability management for Liberty Mutual’s Dover, NH, office. "We lose revenue every time we lose a nurse case manager and have to advertise for, hire, and train a replacement. Reducing turnover is an important goal."
Keeping your case managers happy doesn’t take a large budget, just a little creativity, notes Johnson. Here are some suggestions she and her nurse managers say have been field-tested and approved by their own staffs:
• Thank case managers for jobs well done. When you notice that a case manager has done a particularly good job on a case, recognize his or her efforts, says Johnson. "I have one manager who returns from conferences with a bag of vendor giveaways such as pens and novelty gifts. Every time one of her staff members does a particularly great job, she rewards them with one of those small offerings. It doesn’t cost her a thing, but her staff seems to appreciate the gesture."
• Send a card to mark important anniversaries. It’s not uncommon to send an employee a birthday card signed by his or her colleagues. However, Johnson also suggests you consider sending your case managers a card to mark their employment anniversary.
• Offer incentives. Incentives are a tried and true method for motivating staff, she says. "We once offered a trip to a conference as an incentive for finding a name for our new case management system. The staff member who won the trip had never been able to go to a nursing conference before."
Liberty Mutual also hands out small, inexpensive items to reward departments for effective teamwork. Past offerings have included T-shirts, sweatshirts, and baseball caps with the company logo on them.
Of course, money is a wonderful motivator, Johnson notes. "We have reward and recognition programs that award employees a percentage of their salaries for superior performance during a given quarter. The reward is higher for employees who sustain superior performance for an entire year."
• Reward staff from other departments. Don’t limit your efforts to rewarding and motivating your own staff, she adds. "We often recognize the efforts of employees in other departments. For example, maybe we were working on a difficult case with a member of the claims staff, and he or she did a great job. We make an effort to recognize that claims staff member with a note or small gift. It really helps promote cooperation and create better working relationships between departments."
• Invite field staff to the home office. If you have case managers who work in the field, inviting them to come to the home office for a week to work on a special project can be an effective reward for their hard work. "We forget that case managers in the field often feel isolated. It’s a wonderful feeling for them to be asked to the home office to work on a project. It makes them feel important. It also provides you with important input from the field you might not other-wise receive," Johnson says.
Conduct exit interviews
Even the best managers occasionally lose valued employees, she notes. "The important thing to do is not to let a case manager leave without an exit interview. Make sure you know the case manager’s reasons for leaving. Most often, we find that employees don’t leave over salary issues. They leave because of some other job dissatisfaction issue. Exit interviews give us valuable information that we use to be more effective managers."
Don’t wait until an important member of your staff leaves to find out if your case managers are happy, Johnson cautions. "We survey our case managers on a regular basis to find out what’s working, as well as what’s not. We really seek input about what our case managers are feeling and thinking. Liberty surveys every employee in the entire company every couple of years. If employee concerns turn up, we try to resolve them."
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