Case Study

City of Greater Dandenong shares how Chisholm training has helped upskill community care workers.

Sally Goedheer has a rewarding job at the City of Greater Dandenong, providing training for her teams so they can deliver essential community services to those Greater Dandenong City Council logowho need it most.

Customer

Sally Goedheer, Coordinator In-Home Support/Integrated Community Support, City of Greater Dandenong

Background

Our association with City of Greater Dandenong spans more than 20 years. The relationship is a broad one and stretches over multiple areas for both organisations – from business master classes and aged care traineeships through to aquatics programs and community services programs.

The City of Greater Dandenong is a local government area in south east Melbourne that provides a wide range of community services including parks and gardens, waste management and pet registration.

The council also provides community care and essential services to older people and people under the age of 65 who have a disability or other social needs. These services include personal care, respite, transport, home care, food services, individual support and more. A team of 135 community care workers deliver in-home services to approximately 3000 clients.

Paul Konig, General Manager of Workforce Solutions at Chisholm, worked with Sally Goedheer, Coordinator of In-Home Support at the council, to plan and deliver training to this group of community care workers.

The challenge

Community care workers need to have specific qualifications for some services that are funded under the Commonwealth Home Support Programme. Council also identified additional training that would help manage risk.

“We wanted to proactively address risk management to avoid an incident occurring,” said Sally. “While this training isn’t mandatory, it’s important because it could help us avoid a safety-related incident.”

When council outsources training, they look for a provider who understands the business and who can customise training according to their specific requirements.

“We wanted to understand exactly how a traineeship would meet our needs and provide an advantage to the community,” Sally added. “We also needed to consider any financial implications.

“We are one of the most diverse councils in Australia. Given the diversity of our workers, we needed a training provider that could cater for a wide range of cultural and language needs.”

The solution

In 2022, the City of Greater Dandenong in partnership with Chisholm ran a successful first group of individual support trainees, with 19 out of 20 participants completing. The demand for workers in individual support remains strong and this success resulted in discussions regarding another intake in 2023.

“We were able to meet our compliance requirements, which is important,” said Sally. “The training provided to our staff was relevant and engaging. It added real value to their work, and that means better outcomes for our clients. It also builds on our reputation for provided a quality service to our community.”

Paul was pleased with the results of this training program as well.

“At Chisholm, we are committed to raising the bar in aged care training, in line with the findings of the 2021 Royal Commission into Aged Care,” he added. “It’s great to see our efforts resulting in positive benefits for our clients and for the local community.

To learn more, contact an Industry Specialist.