“We’re all in this together” Supplementary learning paper 1: Recruitment

Recruiting staff has historically been a major challenge for most social care organisations. Surprisingly, during the early stages of the 2020 lockdown period many social care providers reported improvements in their ability to appoint new staff. However at time of writing (November 2020) social care providers are once again experiencing challenges in filling staff vacancies.

This short paper explores the factors that led to improvements in recruitment over the pandemic; the challenges experienced by providers and potential solutions as identified by the provider workforce. We conclude with an offer of recommendations for change to be adopted within:

• Social care provider organisations
• Local authority areas
• National bodies