Caring Times interviews Paul Nery, founder and managing director of Rose Care Group, which now operates 10 care homes

After he found caring for his father in his final months a rewarding experience, management consultant Paul Nery knew he had to make the career pivot into care. Eleven years on, the Rose Care Group (RCG) has 10 care homes across the West Country. And Nery has been doing anything but resting on his laurels, instead designing an in-house artificial intelligence software system for the company. So successful has the technology been, that the programme has gone live and already has its first care home customers across the UK.

How does Rose Care Group set itself apart from the competition?

We are primarily a private, residential care home specialist provider. As a group, our differentiator is our strong focus on innovation and effectiveness. For example, I’m a strong believer in getting results to our residents and staff, so meetings and working groups involve only those who can helpfully contribute. Within those meetings, intelligent, professional critique is encouraged from all, and if we commit to a programme we have to deliver on-time.

Using technology we are able to survey and reach out to residents and staff regularly to gauge their opinions too. Residents and their families regularly praise our friendly, caring, well-trained staff, the accessibility of management and the homely feel of our care homes. While I know how much work and effort has gone in to get there, there is something fantastic about the simplicity of the result – that we make people’s lives better and bring them happiness.

Our staff are proud of the care we deliver, our investment in training and our friendly, supportive culture that gives them many avenues to share their feelings. Management, in particular, appreciates the strong operating model and guidelines we have in place, since they say it makes them feel safe and confident in their roles. I have managed and area-managed homes myself and I know how hard it can be, so providing that robust safety harness around our managers and senior team is critical.

What’s your background and what did you do prior to Rose?

I was a management consultant working in the City for several years, helping to solve complex problems companies faced. I really enjoyed the intellectual challenge, client impact and variability of the work. After several years working in the City, when I was about 27, my dad, who was a lot older than mum, started to fall ill in his last few months and I left my job and helped mum to look after him until he passed away. I’d really enjoyed the difference I’d made to his life, and mum’s, and I decided to move into elderly care.

How did you come to found RCG?

It took a couple of years to find my first home. I wanted to start right and buy a good home, so I could learn good habits early. I bought my first one in 2012 and then another in 2013. I learned a lot from those experiences, and it was around then that I had to step in and manage the sites, handle CQC inspections and so on. It was challenging, but I enjoyed it and so continued to grow the firm. As we’ve grown in size, we’ve had to grow up in approach, becoming better at looking after our staff, looking after residents through effective systems and ensuring a consistent culture throughout. I’m really proud that we have now expanded to the 10, Good-rated homes that make up the group today and we are continuing to grow

What challenges are you finding in the sector? How are you going about tackling them?

I tend to think about care through three lenses: demand, staffing and compliance.

Demand for us remains strong and we are lucky to be a strongly private-leaning care group. However, I hear from many operators that it’s becoming challenging, not least due to strained council budgets. As a result, for operators who rely on a lot of council placements, fee levels are lower than they would like them to be to provide all the services they need to provide, and ensure the compliance checks are in-place that regulators expect.

Staffing, in general, seems pretty decent now, after the post-Covid struggles, but senior staff are hard to come by and I think operators, including us, are refocusing how to upskill internally and create stepping stone roles to grow people into positions. For example, we have created a ‘senior home manager’ role for promising managers to learn to multi-site manage in preparation for area manager roles.

Compliance is good across all RCG services and we are lucky that our internal audit team and operations managers are very diligent in these aspects. However, the recent reductions in CQC oversight do pose a compliance challenge for the wider sector, especially when combined with the fee compression I mentioned earlier. Hopefully, as the CQC restructures, we will see it resume visits, which I have heard is picking up again slightly now.

How do you feel about the Labour government’s handling of social care so far?

It’s very early doors. Wes Streeting has talked positively about the need to recognise social care as an important sector and not just as a secondary element to our primary care system, so I hope he can deliver on that.

How have your dealings with the CQC been recently? Do you think it is genuinely improving in the wake of the Dash report?

I understand why the CQC wanted to change its approach and credit to them for trying a new thing. However, several of the initiatives, when we did our internal review and gap analysis, looked challenging. I think Penny Dash’s interim report’s findings to refocus on operational performance, provide named inspectors and experts, and to review the SAF are particularly welcome. I also think credit is due to the CQC which has reacted positively to the report’s initial findings. I hope the end result is a strong regulatory system that helps us to provide the best care for those we serve.