Every working mom desires to have a nanny who can stay long-term with the family. In addition, it brings in a consistency level to childcare that your kids need for better growth and development.
It adds to the reliability and convenience of childcare because it is very tiring to hire a new nanny every now and then. A nanny who stays with you for a longer period will help you cut down on time, and the troubles of searching, hiring, and orienting a new nanny after a few weeks or mothers.
You do not need to keeping hiring a new nanny every month or so. In a year, aim to never hire more than twice. You should be able to keep a nanny at least for an year and a half in the minimum.
But how do you retain your nanny commitment for the long term? How do you avoid the reasons the nannies quit work too soon? You can offer guaranteed hours, a long term contract, attractive benefits, vacation days, enhancements & activities to secure their commitment and they will stay with your family for longer.
Secrets & Tips on How to Retain a Nanny Longer
1. Offer Guaranteed Hours
Nothing shows your commitment to your nanny like offering them guaranteed hours of work. The surety of this eliminates the element of surprise and unpredictability about her earnings and earns you her commitment in the process. When she knows she will be working for certain hours per week for you, she can easily commit to you for a longer period.
But when these hours are not guaranteed and keep fluctuating, your nanny is more prone to look for work elsewhere where the hours are consistent and guaranteed. Therefore engage your nanny on guaranteed hour’s of about 35-40 hours per week. You may retain your nanny for years by doing this.
2. Offer A Long Term Contract
A full time contract is crucial when you are engaging your nanny and intend her to stay with you for a long time. It details in writing her scope of work, terms of engagement, work hours, terms of payment, and most importantly the duration for which her services are needed.
Your contract can be part time or full time depending on the hours you want her service. When your contract does not commit to engaging the nanny on a full time basis she is most likely to start looking for work elsewhere where she can be engaged on a full-time and long term basis.
While a probation offer is crucial when you start off with a nanny, you need to communicate your intention to engage her full time after her probation period is over. If the probation period is over and you have shown no interest or intention to have a full-time engagement with your nanny, she will probably leave sooner than later.
Therefore if you want you nanny to work for you for a long time, you need to offer a full time engagement work plan. This is probably about 40 hours or more per week. A nanny may stay with you even for five years when given a long term contract.
Read: Reasons your Nannies are Quitting too soon
3. Offer Attractive Benefits
One of the reasons why your nanny may decide to stay and work for you for a long time is receiving extra benefits. Nannies love their jobs yes but will naturally go where the money is. If you want your nanny to offer her childcare services to you for long, you need to pay her well compared to others in the area. It is mainly what will set you apart from other offers she is getting and aid in her decision to stick with you for the long term.
Aim to not only pay the minimum legal pay for your area but beyond. What you are offering your nanny must be worthy of her work and then some. Depending on your location, and her job description you need to offer a competitive hourly rate if you can afford it.
In addition, you need to offer other benefits such as a Christmas bonus. Many nannies evaluate how much you value them by the amount of the Christmas bonus that you give them at the end of the year. Many expect that you need to show your appreciation for your nanny services with this bonus.
Other benefits that can help secure long-term commitment from your nanny includes health insurance, ALL paid federal holidays, etc. You will realize your nannies are willing to stay with you even for three years minimum.
Therefore you need to budget on benefits and bonuses if you intend to secure the commitment of your nanny. Further, have a budget for annual raises. When a nanny has been with you for a reasonable time, it is expected that you give them a raise. It motivates them to keep working for you as they know their work and commitment are seen and appreciated by you.
Read: Christmas Gift Ideas for your Nanny
4. Offer Rest and Vacation Days
Ensure you offer your nanny some paid time off work for rest. Also give your nanny specified paid holidays, vacation days, sick leave days, etc and all this will play a big part in deciding to stay working with you for long. A reasonable offer may include one-two week’s sick leave, a paid day off once per 6-8 weeks, 2 weeks paid vacation, 10 days PTO/year.
You need to understand that time off work is as crucial for your nanny as they are for you. We all need some time off work to recharge and reboot. Therefore you must allocate off days and vacation days for your nanny for resting and re-energizing.
They are very important for her health and subsequently the care she offers your kids. You do not want a burnt out irritable nanny caring for your child. Let your nanny know they have the right to take care of their health. Also let them they can take a break during the day. However, let her know her downtime is when the baby is napping
Read: How to Set a Professional Work Relationship with your Nanny
5. Offer Enhancements and Activities
The main role of the nanny you have hired is to care for and nurture your child. While she may clean after the baby and do other light housekeeping her main job is to ensure that your child is growing and hitting the development milestones at the right time.
To do so however your nanny needs many indoor and outdoor play and activities to stimulate and engage your child. What you can do in this area to keep your nanny interested in the work she does for you is to support her with as many enhancements as possible. When you offer these work enhancements, your nanny will be willing to work for you for longer.
The supports include all the necessary passes to outdoor activities. Depending on your location, your city may have some children’s parks and learning centers whose entrance is free. However, a majority are paid for so you need to pay for passes for your nanny to outdoor activities destinations such as zoos, parks, local botanical gardens.
In addition to this, you need to give your nanny the flexibility and freedom to create activities for the kids as she sees fit. She has to know it is okay and expected of her to take the kids outdoors. Many nannies have quit their jobs after being “locked” and limited in the house for the whole day.
The support ensures your nanny and the kids have a variety of options during the day. They will motivate her and by loving her job, she will more likely stay with you for the long term.
Read: How to Build Trust with your New Nanny
6. Have Reasonable Nanny Expectations
If you want to keep your nanny for long, you need to understand that your nanny job is as professional as your job. Unreasonable job expectations tend to overburden and hasten the nanny’s decision to quit. You need to be professional and have boundaries, especially on her job description. Therefore develop the most effective and reasonable job description for your nanny that sticks to this role.
Her job expectation strictly need to be caring and nurturing your child. Only include baby feeding, playing, learning, bathing, and other grown and development engagements. In addition, it is reasonable to have the nanny clean after herself and the baby such as washing their meals dishes, laundry for baby clothes, folding baby clothes, cleaning the mess created from the activities mess, etc.
Do not add to her role anything else that is not related to her nanny role, unless she is okay with it and also compensated for it. Many nannies detest this and immediately quit for work elsewhere when their employers try to have the nanny do general housekeeping, pet care, garden work among others.
Let your nanny job’ s be peaceful. No unnecessary demands and disagreements and this will help in securing their commitment in work for long. Don’t ask questions about their plans for their time off as respecting boundaries is also crucial in helping retain your nanny.
Read: How to Create a Reasonable Nanny Description
7. Have Open and Honest Communication
You cannot underestimate the role of communication in any relationship. You as the employer and your nanny as your employee must have open and honest communication. It helps your nanny job to know what’s up.
Your nanny needs to be empowered and in control by having relevant and unnecessary information. Nanny tends to stay and work longer for families that constantly communicate their expectations, corrections, and updates among others.
Also, be open and transparent in your communication with your nanny. It is a key ingredient to a trustworthy nanny relationship. Aim to tell your nanny what is going on rather than speaking to your partner through her.
Treat your nanny with kindness and show them that you value and appreciate them. Never allow the kids to disrespect the nanny.
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