#SocialWorkCaseManagementSoftware SocialWorkpracticemanagementsoftware ClientCaseManagementSoftware Billingsoftwareforsocialworkers clienttra

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We recently had an interview with the CEO of one of the largest Support Coordination Agencies located in NJ, about the current COVID-19 pandemic and the impact it is having on their business, employees and the families they serve. The CEO & his partner, who is also a managing member of one of the largest Support Coordination Agencies, are continuing to serve families during this difficult time.

In recent weeks Coronavirus has triggered the nation’s largest work-from-home experiment. Companies and employees are learning to adapt to working conditions where people all over the world are being forced to socially isolate. For Social Services Agencies and their Support Coordinators, whose work revolves around home visits and building strong relationships with their patients, this is proving to be a challenging time. Upon interviewing the CEO we found that a combination of early planning, strong state support, and the use of appropriate technology can largely overcome the difficulties of running a “relationship-based business” during a time of social isolation and it helps us take a better look at how technology is enabling them to work from home.

FieldWorker: Hi, Thanks for taking the time to discuss the current situation and how the COVID-19 pandemic is currently impacting your business, Support Coordinators and the families that you serve. First, how are you doing personally?

CEO: We’re doing well, thanks. I’m working from home on the first floor of my house and my wife is working on the third floor.

FieldWorker:  Glad to hear that you’re doing well. We were thinking of you guys and how things must be a little crazy right now. Will your partner be joining us as well?

CEO: I don’t think so, she’s been on emergency calls and if I get bombarded with calls, I might need to drop off as well.

FieldWorker: That’s perfectly fine, and we understand. We’ll try to keep this short so you can get back to helping families!

FieldWorker: How are you doing as a company? Both Management & Support Coordinators in the field?

CEO: We are doing well. We got out ahead of this, we were concerned about the safety of our employees and asked our Support Coordinators to start working from home in early March to keep our staff out of harms way. It’s been pretty hectic trying to keep up with all of the calls and emails, but we’ve been using technology to stay connected.

Fieldworker: How are the families you serve managing and coping in the current environment?

CEO: it’s a difficult time for the Parents since they closed all of the day programs, parents have to stay home to look after the children but the state is doing a good job and allowing Parents to become Self-Directed employees to ease the financial burden.

FieldWorker: If & how has the State of NJ or the federal govt. changed/adapted to work with Support Coordinator and service provider agencies to make sure that the needs of the families are met?

CEO: The state has done a good job, they have deferred face to face and home visits and allowed us to use technology to do video calls for now.

FieldWorker: What are you as a business finding difficult at this time?

CEO: Ours is a relationship-based business, we want to meet people face to face and that is not possible, we are making do as best as we can.

FieldWorker: Is there something that you wish you could do differently that would have been able to make things better?

CEO: I wish that there was a pandemic protocol and plan in place already, instead we have had to scramble and rush and do things to continue to provide the level of service we like to provide.

FieldWorker: How are the Service Provider Agencies that you work with adapting to this new environment?

CEO: The service provider agencies that we work with are excellent and have very committed people. They have had to adapt even more since a lot of the day facilities that are operated by Service Providers are now closed, and they have had to go in the field to provide these services. They are doing a very good job as well.

FieldWorker: What message do you have for the State?

CEO:  Governor Phil Murphy, and the state are doing a very good job, they have adapted, the DDD and DHHS have been sending emails, webinars, materials and keeping us, Service Providers and families informed of the changes.

Despite the difficulties they had been facing, the CEO was calm and hopeful. He spoke about how they hoped this pandemic would create a sense of urgency across all industries to create “pandemic protocols and plans”. They also kept emphasizing how theirs was a relationship-based business, and when it came to resources and technology, video calling was only the tip of the iceberg. They are often overwhelmed with paperwork and taking notes for all of their meetings, where technology can step in in the form of dictation tools. Moreover, there is a huge requirement for online data banks and document archives in order to appropriately store and retrieve important information for patients.

As a result of distressed families and parents, the CEO and his partner are also taking more calls and checking in with their patients more often, sometimes even responding to emergencies. This reality makes all of us at Fieldworker think about how we can adapt our Field Service Management Technology to serve the new demands of support coordinators. In the current situation, we all find ourselves asking each other, how can we make our businesses and jobs pandemic proof by using technology? One thing we know for sure is that such technology must enable support coordinators to spend the most amount of their time taking care of their patients, and the least amount of time worrying about paperwork, document archiving and note-taking.

Upon asking the CEO and his partner what advice they would give other Social Services Agencies they said:

Look out for your staff, and the families you serve, provide the staff with the resources they need and the materials so that they can do their job well and access the information they need at all times.

This answer reaffirmed our mission to create easy-to-use software that ensures daily heroes, like the CEO and his partner, can continue to do their job well.

We would love to have you join our no cost pilot program – Let’s schedule a 15 minute window to talk – Schedule a call here

If you have any questions, please get in touch at info@fieldworker.ai or visit our website https://fieldworker.ai

Best Regards,

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Ayo, I’m (not) tired of using technology – Wake up agency owners, it’s time to embrace technology

Social Workers, along with agency personnel have to deal with a great deal of documentation on each client they serve. This process can be time consuming and frustrating for everyone involved. Despite this career being an extremely rewarding one, it can also be equally problematic due to the high level of paperwork requirements from the state. Usually, this is to satisfy governmental and insurance funding sources.

The paperwork requirements can even be overwhelming for clients. Particularly in the case of intake forms, while this is important in establishing a bond with the client, it is a lengthy and tedious process. Thus, leading to minimal genuine interaction as more time is dedicated to completing these state requirements. In turn, resulting in social worker burnout within the profession, providing a disadvantage to agencies as employee morale is significantly low.

While each agency is different, it’s hard to escape the reality of the paperwork mandates and how this negatively impacts time spent with clients out on the field. Where client-social worker relationships are the foundation of a successful agency, if this paperwork is posing a threat to the health of this relationship it’s important to consider alternatives, such as technology solutions.

Technology solutions will help in organizing paperwork in the correct fashion. Through automation techniques information will be correctly filed, reviewed and processed on one database accessed within an organization. This allows for timely data collection, more one-on-one time with clients and higher employee satisfaction within an agency. Adopting technology acts as a benefit on a small and large scale from the social worker to the executive level owner.

FieldWorker promises a seamless transition and adoption process where we offer FREE app demos for agency owners as well as the team. We believe in complete integration and will be there every step of the way to ensure an easy transition onto our application.

Schedule a free demo today.

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(REAL)ly, it’s TIME To Start Adopting REAL-TIME Tracking Methods

What does it take to run a successful business? Lots of perseverance, responsibility, and time, right? Well, of course! However, let’s not downplay the importance of utilizing analytic technologies! Using the right analytic technology allows any business owner to make the necessary improvements to their products and/or services.  Several business owners are already starting to adopt new technologies to evaluate their company, so if your company hasn’t been doing so, I’d highly encourage it, especially if you want to remain competitive in the market.  support coordinator agency owners, ask yourselves this: Are you equipped with the right knowledge and technology to monitor your business?

As support coordinator agency owners grapple with the effects of the pandemic and adjust to the “new normal,” it is absolutely essential that they are on top of all business operations, especially those related to their social workers. Real-Time tracking is there to help with that!  Not to mention, it also provides a plethora of other advantages! Let’s delve into some of the advantages of this ground-breaking technology:

Access to consolidated information: What defines an “effective” analytics tool? Well, in short, a tool that provides business owners with accurate and valuable insights on their company. There is a copious amount of data that can be both gathered and analyzed in a typical support coordinator business. For a psychology clinic with home-based therapy providers, it is typically the amount of time a therapist will spend on each case and with each client, and the distribution of cases and clients across the neighborhoods the clinic serves. For an adult day care center, it could be the ages of the clients, the disability and/or diseases they suffer from, their overall satisfaction with the care center and care workers, and so on and so forth. Real-Time tracking provides detailed, relevant, and easy-to-access analytics on all those insights, which in turn can inform better decision making.

Transparent KPIs and critical information: As all support coordinator agency owners know, tracking the location of their employees is crucial when it comes to directing essential equipment and ensuring safety. Many owners spend grueling hours pondering over how to implement tracking tools that are reasonably priced, effective, and easy to use. Real-Time tracking provides an easy-to-use and highly intelligent tracking tool that will allow agency owners to see where exactly their employees are and quickly respond to highly demanding and/or potentially dangerous situations.

Ability to track inefficiencies: Cost, productivity, and profit! These three words will surely resonate with any business owner! Every business owner knows the end goal is to maximize profit, meaning it is important to minimize costs as much as possible while maintaining stellar productivity and services. The productivity of the employees, social workers, directly impacts the costs incurred and the operational capacity. An effective tracking tool is one that contains one-touch systems, which are used for interactions throughout various stages in the delivery cycle. When it comes to evaluating cost and productivity, Real-Time operational data plays a crucial role. Real-Time tracking makes collecting and analyzing data user-friendly too!  I mean let’s be real, who wants to deal with some tracking method that is super confusing?

Now, these are simply a few of the many reasons why support coordinator agency owners should invest in Real-Time tracking. Real-time tracking ensures that any process will function smoothly and provides ample opportunity for both short term and long term improvements.  Agency owners, think about your company and employees! Learn about tracking technology!

One of our top priorities at FieldWorker is staying up to date with technology and sharing information . Our app allows agency owners to monitor their agency by providing awesome tracking solutions!

Click here to schedule a free demo!  Go explore our tracking features!

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COVID-19 blazing through Nursing Homes

Did you know that 1 in 5 deaths from COVID-19 occurred in nursing homes? 1 in 5! That’s 20% of the deaths! All in nursing homes? That’s insane!

As you may already know, the nursing home population is typically 65 years old and older or people who suffer from chronic medical conditions, such as diabetes or heart disease, or even both.  They are our most vulnerable citizens when it comes to contracting COVID-19.  Wouldn’t it make sense if their safety was a top priority amidst this public health crisis? Well, obviously. However, that’s not how it played out in the USA. Let’s delve into the reasons behind all of this.

Well, to start, we’ve already established that the elderly population, especially those with underlying conditions, is the most negatively affected by contracting the virus, meaning they are significantly more likely to be hospitalized.  Needless to say, that is out of our control. The problem here is how the state governments handled the situation.  Many Governors initially allowed all of the people who were recovering from COVID-19 back into the nursing homes. Both California and New Jersey required, yes I mean forced, nursing homes to accept COVID-19 patients.  It goes without saying that these policies spiked the infection and death rate amongst the elderly and employees in the nursing homes.  How can you as a leader and a state allow this to happen?

Furthermore, it is important to consider the lack of COVID-19 testing and essential supplies, such as masks, gloves, etc, present in nursing homes all over the country. Yes, for a while we didn’t have enough testing in facilities where the most vulnerable lived.  This obviously led to an increased contraction of COVID-19 and death amongst residents. It is crucial that we as a nation disperse essential supplies to neighborhoods and places that were hit the hardest.  A nursing home is an example of one!

One “positive” that came out of all this was that leaders are starting to take initiative and ensure that safety in nursing homes is a top priority.  Nursing homes across our country are now screening residents for COVID-19 on a daily basis; communal dining rooms and group activities are suspended; and federal and state governments are providing nursing homes ample supplies, such as COVID-19 testing kits, masks for staff, etc.  The situation is far from perfect, but we should and will continue to push for a better future for nursing homes.

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Do Your Mandatory Client Visits Make You Feel Unsafe Sometimes?

When we think of a dangerous profession, we think law enforcement, firefighting, serving in the military and during COVID-19, a front-line caregiver.

What about social work? As an organization that offers case management software for social workers, we recognize that social workers often put themselves in harm’s way while on the job.

These employees are constantly putting themselves in risky situations to help a client and perform their job to the best of their best ability. Social Workers are at risk, when making home visits alone and in unfamiliar surroundings, serving people with serious conditions i.e. mental illnesses and potentially getting involved in dangerous family dynamics. Workplace safety is becoming an increasing concern to organizations.

Our FieldWorker Application is integrated with an easy to use one touch button interface. Enabling social workers to let the home office know where they are at any given point. In addition, a simple Check-In/Check-out interface enables Electronic Verification of Visit (E.V.V) compliance as per the Cures Act, capturing essential data including location, duration and other required information. In turn, making the social worker feel safe and secure with the help of FieldWorker.

It’s important Social Workers take precautions to create safe environments for themselves and their clients. There is a plethora of resources available online to help with self-defense as well as other methods that create a safe work environment. “In every single work setting, in every neighborhood and socioeconomic group, violence can occur,” says Eva Skolnik-Acker, LICSW, consultant to a workplace safety training program operated by the Massachusetts chapter of NASW. “Every social worker and human service worker can be a victim of aggression at some time during their career.” Given this very real situation, we make safety our number one priority as most organizations are beginning to do so as well.

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3 Questions Social Services Agency Owners Need to Ask Themselves

Owning a company, no matter what industry you serve is challenging and incredibly stressful to say the least! It’s pretty incredible to think of the risks that entrepreneurs take in order to start, maintain and drive a successful business!

Owning a social service agency comes with just as much responsibility as owning any other company, arguably more, considering the fact that your employees are often responding to emergencies and unpredictable situations. We know that you have your clients and your employees on the forefront of your concerns, but let’s face it, as a business you’re also concerned about the bottom line. Monitoring your agency’s performance and analyzing the “stats” associated with your business is absolutely essential when looking for ways in which you can generate more profits. And in order to increase profits, you must be able to understand where your organization is losing out, which can be achieved by observing and analyzing detailed “stats” regarding your company and employees.

At FieldWorker, we have created an app for social service agencies that helps keep track of all the important business data through comprehensible and visual “Business Intelligence” dashboards.

With our Business Intelligence dashboards, we help owners and managers answer the following essential questions:

1. How many new cases has my agency onboarded?

Case management is the utmost priority when running a social service agency. It is vital that you as an owner know how many cases you’ve onboarded or lost when identifying areas for growth and improvement. Our Business Intelligence dashboards will provide you with that necessary information. All in one place and on one app! The information on the Business Intelligence dashboards can help evaluate and investigate your social workers’ performance. Hey, our dashboards may even help you fill out that dusty “Employee of the Month” board sitting in your office! Ever wondered if your current employees are at their capacity? Ever wondered whether or not you should invest in hiring more social workers? Well, our dashboards can help with that too!

The onboarding number that you will see will give you an idea of your agency’s overall performance and can indicate how well each and every one of your social workers is performing.

2. How much time are my caseworkers spending on their cases?

Our Business Intelligence dashboards assist you when it comes to keeping track of your social workers’ performance by allowing you to observe whether they’re making their appointments and meeting their deadlines on time. Here’s a good rule of thumb when evaluating your agency’s productivity: If several of your social workers are unable to attend to more than one or two appointments a day because they’re spending too much time on a particular case, your agency needs to improve its productivity. It is important to ensure that your social workers find a happy medium between spending time with clients and attending to as many clients as possible.

You, as social service agency owners, should ensure the utmost productivity of your agencies, especially since we are amidst a public health crisis and your services are in demand.

3. How are cases distributed across counties?

This onboard number is becoming increasingly important, especially if your agency serves a large metropolitan area or an entire state. It goes without fail that certain communities and counties that your agency serves will have more cases than others. If a particular county your agency is serving has an extensive amount of cases, you might want to consider the possible factors. For example, ask yourself the following questions: Is there less infrastructure and health services in those counties? Is there a higher poverty and/or unemployment rate? Considering these questions can help you gain more insight into the areas your agency is serving and can even assist government agencies in solving pressing issues surrounding social welfare.

Overall, our Business Intelligence dashboards will provide social service agency owners and managers with a consolidated view of critical measures that will help them operate efficiently. A lot of people assume that social service organizations don’t require much analytics and data. That is furthest from the truth! In this day and age, case management software is optimized with dashboards so social service agencies can stay on top of their agency’s progress.

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Introduction to FIeldWorker, Watch full video here.

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How to become the best in field service provider for social worker case management organizations

Those who work in social services will know that managing FieldWorker operations can be challenging. Not only do your field worker teams need to develop strong relationships with their clients, but they also need to stay on top of their administrative responsibilities. On an average day, one support coordinator on your field worker team has to keep track of their daily tasks, appointments, route maps, file paperwork and coordinate with your head-office, making sure their client feels well attended to.  When all these factors are uncoordinated and unstreamlined, your support coordinators are likely to feel overwhelmed.

In “relationship-professions” an overwhelmed support coordinator directly affects the client experience. In today’s day, it’s no longer enough to just acquire clients, organizations must also prioritize retention and client satisfaction. Luckily, innovative technologies can help health and human services organizations better manage their Field operational activities, so that their field worker teams can always focus on what matters most: the client.

Manage time better

Social Worker Case Management Software helps teams in the field manage their time more effectively by streamlining operations. Automated scheduling tools provide daily updates of tasks and important reminders, all in one place. These tools eliminate human error and the possibility of overloading schedules. Route maps ensure field worker teams don’t get lost on the way and make it to their appointments on time. Instead of carrying paperwork to each appointment, now there’s a mobile app that has cloud-based technology, which allows remote access to all updated client files while in the field. These software also allow remote document capture, which saves a lot of time that would otherwise would be wasted on retrieving, organizing and filling out paperwork. The result is an optimized workflow and a happier field worker operations.

Improve communication and collaboration

Another huge challenge faced by your field worker operations teams is efficient communication between them and your home-office. Oftentimes there are no legitimate channels for communication and real-time communication is hindered. Real-time communication is not only important in the case of emergencies but also on a daily basis as a way of supporting your field teams in case they forget important information and need assistance. Your clients depend on you to provide quick and quality service, and when there aren’t any legitimate tools set in place for your employees to communicate remotely, your clients lose out.

Eliminate the possibility of fraud

An increasingly important feature of health and human services management software is the Electronic Visit Verification or EVV, which allows patients and authorized service providers to verify visits through electronic signatures. EVV, which is now a federal government mandate, was put in place to ensure that people get the care they are promised. It does so by documenting the exact time and duration of a visit but so to protect your clients against the possibility of fraudulent care claims.

Have a better oversight of your organization

Intelligent business dashboards that allow you to track all of your employee’s progress in one place are increasingly valuable for service providers. By tracking each of your employee’s progress through easy-to-understand visual dashboards, you can determine whether some employees may require more support because they may be losing clients. You can also determine employees who are doing their job well and may be able to take up more clients in their weekly schedules. All of this data will help you make more informed decisions when it comes to  allocating your field team/support coordinators effectively.

We, at Fieldworker, have built a software to tackle the challenges faced by health and human services organizations who have significant field teams. Schedule a demo with us to learn more.

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6 Main Benefits of Going Paperless in your Office

Don’t underestimate the power of going paperless

Reducing the amount of paper your organization uses doesn’t just save trees, it also saves your employees valuable time.There are huge benefits of going paperless today. If your health and human services organization is considering a paperless system, there’s no better time to do so. Huge leaps in technology have made it incredibly easy and cost-effective to convert paper into digital files. Cloud-based software is enabling teams to communicate remotely and in real-time, optimizing collaboration and workflows in new ways. If you’re still on the fence about going paperless, we’ve highlighted 4 benefits that we think are relevant to HHS organizations.

Important Information all in one place

We often find ourselves looking for ways to stay organized and on top of things. The best way to do that  is to have your information all in one place, making it easier to organize documents. How do you ensure this information is all in one place? Through automation. Where you can convert your loose papers into online archives for efficient filing and create a paperless work environment.

In the case of SWCM organizations easy document archiving and retrieving of information is especially important. As workers are on the field constantly communicating and sharing data with their base office, the only way to remain productive is through going paperless and creating a paperless office.

Cut down on time spent filling paperwork

Time is money. The best way to optimize time is to allocate your time smartly. One way to achieve this is by going paperless. This is beneficial for processes such as uploading documents for clients to access on the go, from wherever they may be.

Easy information sharing

Going paperless allows you to collaborate with your colleagues remotely. With all your documents being digitized and accessible by all, it opens channels of communication among your team members. Additionally, you are able to communicate in real-time without experiencing any lags that would further delay work. Through information sharing, communication becomes more seamless and reliable.

Accessibility

Accessibility plays an important role in ensuring effective paperless communication. Let’s face it, dealing with paper and files makes the whole process of transferring from one team to the next quite complicated. Whereas, this information online means it is accessible to everyone in an organization.

Go paperless to ease your loadout in the field

With all that said, going paperless will not only improve the quality of your processes by saving precious time and the environment, it will also keep everyone in the organization connected as communication gaps are filled by this timely sharing of information and resources.

Start your free trial with Fieldworker, the Best Social Worker Case Management Software and unlock the benefits of going paperless today!

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3 Myths Debunked about Social Worker Case Management Software

While many social workers are making the switch to automated software systems, some are still apprehensive to adopt new technologies.

What is a Social Worker Case Management Software, and does it apply to me?

Social Worker Case management software provides solutions for social agencies to help serve their clients better. Enabling you to optimize the process of service delivery and the effectiveness of your organization including the field team through technology.

Meet Janet, a Support Coordinator for an agency in New Jersey. Janet has a lot on her plate, and has to juggle multiple client visits along with completing reports and keep her head-office up-to-date on her progress. Social Worker Case Management Software, like Fieldworker, can help Janet save time by automating processes such as scheduling and task management. Through an array of tools such as geo-tracking, document retrieving, uploading, and archiving it also enables Janet to seamlessly collaborate with her supervisor while on the move.

SWCM software is a huge win for your organization’s productivity. We, at Fieldworker, want to debunk the myths that surround this new and innovative technology, so you and your team can unleash the power of automation.

Myth Debunked #1: Social Worker Case Management software is too expensive.

In reality, SWCM software is actually relatively cheap. It is subscription-based and only entails monthly fees based on the size and requirements of your organization.

In the case of Fieldworker, there are no set up costs and for first-time users the monthly subscription is currently being waived, making it entirely free of charge. This software also comes in mobile application form, meaning that employees can use their own mobile devices to access their schedules, route maps, and other app features. With little to no investment in new technology infrastructure, training, or set up costs, Health and human services management software promises organizations increased efficiency at a low cost.

Myth Debunked #2: Social Worker Case management software takes too much time to set up.

Another misconception is that a lot of time will have to be spent on setting up new technology infrastructure and training employees. SWCM software is easy to use, intuitive, and quick to set up. Moreover, cloud-based technologies require no new hardware which means your employees can start using these apps immediately on their pre-existing devices. Software, like Fieldworker, also applies to organizations of any size, or even individuals who would benefit from its technology solutions, meaning you don’t need a full-fledged IT team to get things running. It’s literally as simple as scheduling a demo, and getting started.

Myth Debunked #3: My organization has been doing just fine without it, I don’t need a Social Worker Case management software now.

In today’s climate, automated tools are paving the way for organizations to conduct their operations more efficiently. Not only does automation promise productivity outcomes and profitability in the long run but it also enables organizations to optimize service delivery for their clients. By automating time-consuming tasks such as document management and organization, automating case notes, and other activities, we make caseworkers very efficient. And, by giving you key business insights via dashboards and metrics, help you to leverage your resources and operations more efficiently. It’s a simple rule of the thumb that we follow here at Fieldworker: automation yields efficiency. Learn more about Health & Human services management software like ours.