Sue Dubeau – barely a month into her new position and leading an entirely new management staff – says the challenge in the coming year will be to increase awareness of the home to attract both future residents and future staff.

“We can do this in a number of ways,” Sue says. “For instance, the Lion’s Club. We want to offer a donation to them of all our surplus wheelchairs, walkers and geriatric chairs. They likely have better knowledge of where to put these in the community where they’ll get used,” she says.

Sue, who was most recently environmental services manager for the home, but also an RPN, says the home has also taken out an ad in the local police calendar. “We wanted to advertise the home in a book that has wide community reach,” she explains.

The administrator says there is absolutely no doubt that recruitment and retention is the number one priority for the home. “We have the bare minimum of registered staff right now. They’re stretched to the limit,” Sue says.

One idea the home has for the long-term recruitment picture is to seek some co-op students. “We can maybe get to some students early and get them directly into nursing,” says Sue.

Sue says it is a challenge right now to see the big picture because there are so many new people at Willows. “Every manager is brand new here. We’re settling in but we still need some time to find our stride,” she says.

The Tena disposable incontinence program will begin in June and the multidose system will begin in the fall. These are projects which will take up a great deal of time in implementation, says Sue.

She points out that a recent recycling program was also implemented at Willows, which is reducing the number of trips to the dump necessary and saving money, as well as being good for the environment. “We used to just recycle cardboard. Now we do cans, plastic, paper and glass,” she says.

Sue says the coming year will mean everyone has to buckle down and be competitive in a market that has a great deal of competition. “We have a lot to do in the next little while,” she says.