As Michigan's largest nonprofit provider of senior services, Holland Home offers a full continuum of care. Based in Grand Rapids, the organization has two residential campuses and a hospice facility, and offers home care and therapy services.
Challenges
Holland Home had been using a mix of automated and manual scheduling, timekeeping, attendance, and payroll systems, which was both inefficient and costly to maintain. The company wanted a workforce management solution that gives managers daily access to employee time data to help them avoid unnecessary overtime. With no real-time visibility into employees' accrued time, managers granted time off that employees hadn't accrued, requiring payroll staff to make corrections.
Solutions
"We wanted one automated system that works together smoothly and provides savings," said Doug Himmelein, Vice President of Human Resources. "We also wanted a company that could take us into the future, one that invests in research and understands our industry. We looked at all options and chose UKG."
Holland Home is using the UKG for Healthcare suite to centralize time and attendance, optimize scheduling, and better manage labor costs.
“UKG has saved us money and increased staff satisfaction. If you're keeping staff happy, residents are extremely happy too.”
Doug Himmelein
Vice President of Human Resources
Results
Holland Home has centralized scheduling with its UKG® solution. The centralized scheduling department creates schedules for clinical staff for skilled nursing, assisted living, and hospice by using a staffing model that indicates the number of RNs, LPNs, and nurse aides needed for each unit and shift, which is built into UKG scheduling solution.
If a staff person calls in, any central scheduler can send an open-shift request to a replacement with the appropriate skills or certifications. The integrated solution's HR module, which tracks employees' skills and certifications, indicates who has the right skills to fill an open shift, supporting compliance. The system also notifies employees — and their managers — if a certification or license is about to expire.
"Because the UKG solution tells us how many people we need on a particular unit and shift, any scheduler can step in," said Himmelein. "It's an enhancement for staff and our budget. An all-inclusive system like UKG makes us much more efficient."
All employees use the timekeeping solution to clock in and out, and they can use self-service tools at a time clock or on a mobile device to check their schedules, timecards, earnings, and accrual balances. Employee satisfaction surveys indicate that employees like having access to their information, helping to retain staff.
"The mobile piece supports employee satisfaction and helps us financially too," said Himmelein. "If employees aren't in our buildings, they can punch in or out remotely, creating savings with someone on site not having to key in an off-site employee's time."
With skilled nursing facilities needing to electronically submit direct-care staffing and census information — Payroll-Based Journal (PBJ) reporting — to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Holland Home's UKG solution enables the organization to easily meet this Affordable Care Act reporting requirement.
The CMS Five-Star Quality Rating is an important distinction in the industry, with a higher number of RNs increasing the star rating in the staffing portion. "UKG is a valuable tool because it helps us monitor and balance that piece of the outcome," said Himmelein.
The UKG attendance module has provided additional compliance benefits. With the prior paper-based system, not all attendance occurrences were accurately marked and monitored, creating consistency concerns. Now, every occurrence is automatically tracked.
Real-time visibility into labor data is increasing productivity and helping control labor costs. Before, supervisors weren't aware of employees' accrual balances. If employees were granted time but had no accrued time left, payroll staff had to make corrections. Now, supervisors can see up-to-date accrual information before granting time off.
Managers receive daily overtime reports, enabling them to make staffing adjustments to avoid overtime while responding to resident needs. Before, financial reports were produced monthly. "Now we can see overtime by person and look at the schedule census to determine if overtime was needed," said Himmelein.
These efficiencies also have enabled the reduction of payroll and scheduling staff, saving $100,000 annually in wages alone. Holland Home saw a two-year return on investment with its UKG solution.
"UKG has saved us money and increased staff satisfaction," said Himmelein. "If you're keeping staff happy, residents are extremely happy too."
