The Latest News from Grey Matter Learning...
This year's Christmas Charity...
This year as we done for the last 14 years, we will continue with our tradition of donating a portion of our December revenue (instead of spending it on Christmas Cards) to a local social care service.
We are delighted to announce Priors Court School in West Berkshire is this years chosen charity...
Watch this space for more details...
You said - We did...
Thanks for the feedback from all the amazing organisations we support, we really appreciate your feedback - please keep it coming!
This week sees the release of a number of updates that you requested, including:
- Active / inactive filter on the Training Matrix
- New location for the "Help Centre" icon
- Bulk updates for course due dates
There are other updates on the Roadmap, but if there is something in particular that would really help you, please let us know.
Funding for Infection Prevention and Control
The Government has extended the funding available via the Infection Prevention and Control fund. More info can be found here.
The Infection Control Fund, set up in May, has now been extended until March 2021, with an extra £546 million to help the care sector. Many of our customers have successfully claimed from the fund to support learning in:
- Infection Prevention and Control
- PPE (COVID-19) Essentials
- Coronavirus (COVID-19) Essentials
- Food Safety
- Moving and Handling
- Oral Healthcare
All of which play a vital role in Infection Prevention and Control. If you have not seen our free courses, which include the PPE and Coronavirus courses - just click here.
Training Matrix
We're delighted to release our brand new Training Matrix. Its key features mean that managers can:
- See full colour coding, even when exported to Excel
- Set course due dates for learners
- Get an instant display of compliance %age
- View activity count per course
- Check learners progress and when next course is due, all in one place
- Filter course status reports for individual learners or multiple learners
- Set employment start dates to effectively track induction and refreshers
To find out more and watch the short video, just click here
Workforce Development Fund 2020-21
Great news! You can now apply for funding again to get your leadership and management training back on track.
We have now supported over 2,000 learners to complete Lead to Succeed and Well Led. Since lockdown, we have successfully converted our face-to-face training to webinars - here’s just some of the feedback:
“The most valuable element for me has been the self-reflection about what I have currently been doing and how I can improve my leadership qualities.”
“I have been able to deal with minor conflict within the team more effectively. This has created a better atmosphere for the team members and the people we support”
Check out our current programmes now - places are going like hot cakes!
If your team would benefit from such training, then you can directly commission your own programme - contact us now to get your dates in before March 2021.
Here’s our Introduction to Grey Matter Learning video - feel free to share.
Our response to COVID-19....
Since March, we've been working to support our community during this COVID-19 crisis. We are humbled by the positive response that we received on our free Coronavirus eLearning course. To help the community further during this outbreak, we’re offering:
- Free access to Click, our online learning system with 50+ courses and assessments
- Free Lead to Succeed taster sessions
- Free COVID-19 eLearning which has been used around the world
- Free Stress & Resilience course
- Free Oral Health Care course
- Free Fast Track Induction resources
- Free PPE (COVID-19) Essentials
- Free Supervision Skills for Managers
- Free Epilepsy Awareness
- Free Preparing for an Outstanding CQC Inspection
With the recruitment and retention of care workers already a huge issue, this situation has only brought its additional challenges. However, it’s more important than ever to remember that care providers need good quality care workers at this time so cannot afford to cut corners.
As Kate Terroni, Chief Inspector of Adult Social Care, CQC recently remarked:
“We recognise that at this time providers will be prioritising providing care to people and that this may mean that training will be delayed. However, providers should make every effort to ensure that staff are competent, confident and skilled in providing safe care to the people using their service.”
Find out how thousands of care workers have been assessed as competent on Click.
We hope you and your families stay safe and well. If there’s anything else we can do to support you in the meantime, then do let us know.
May the fourth be with you....
We know it is not quite May 4th just yet, but we are delighted to achieve Skills for Care Centre of Excellence for the fourth year in a row and I wanted to take this opportunity to thank my team for all of their hard work in making this happen.
We have been delivering learning and assessment of competence to the social sector for almost 14 years now. However, reading through some of the feedback from the amazing organisations we support for the re-accreditation process, reminded us of why we do what we do.
Centre of Excellence is Skills for Care’s highest level of endorsement for both our online and face-to-face programmes and we are very proud to have achieved it again this year. The work has already started for next year’s re-accreditation process!
Our response to COVID-19....
We're working to support our community during this COVID-19 crisis. We are humbled by the positive response that we received on our free Coronavirus eLearning course. Since 2006, our mission has been to Improve Lives Through Learning and to help the community further during this outbreak, we’re now offering:
- Free access to Click, our online learning system with 50+ courses and assessments, for new accounts until 1st May 2020.
- Free Lead to Succeed webinars until 29th May 2020.
- Free COVID-19 eLearning which has been used around the world.
- Free Stress & Resilience course
With the recruitment and retention of care workers already a huge issue, this situation has only brought its additional challenges. However, it’s more important than ever to remember that care providers need good quality care workers at this time so cannot afford to cut corners.
As Kate Terroni, Chief Inspector of Adult Social Care, CQC recently remarked:
“We recognise that at this time providers will be prioritising providing care to people and that this may mean that training will be delayed. However, providers should make every effort to ensure that staff are competent, confident and skilled in providing safe care to the people using their service.”
Find out how thousands of care workers have been assessed as competent on Click.
We hope you and your families stay safe and well. If there’s anything else we can do to support you in the meantime, then do let us know.
Keep calm and wash your hands....
Now that the UK government has confirmed that we have moved from the ‘contain’ to the ‘delay’ phase regarding the Coronavirus outbreak, we want all of our valued customers to know that we have reviewed and implemented our Emergency Planning Procedure.
We anticipate that Click will operate as normal and our team will be working safely from home. In terms of our Face-to-Face Learning, we have already postponed some of our modules and we will reschedule any postponed modules. We are also looking at providing opportunities to complete courses using virtual classroom learning via webinar. We continue to monitor the position and will keep everyone informed.
Our Infection Prevention and Control online course covers best practice and the PPE course is a great follow up course. Essentially, the guidance is to follow all standard infection prevention and control processes and keep up to date with announcements from the government alongside NHS guidance.
We have just released two brand new courses - "Oral Health Care" and "Preparing for an Outstanding CQC Inspection". If you want to get started on either of these, contact Support. Otherwise they will be added to Click by managers.
Top Tip: With internet service providers potentially under strain over the coming weeks, you can improve your bandwidth at home by switching off all unnecessary wireless devices in the house in order to maximise bandwidth, particularly if you are needing to attend a webinar online. If video isn’t absolutely essential to any call, then you can always switch to audio to lessen the bandwidth required.
In the meantime, stay safe and well in the great work that you’re doing.
Ready... Click... Go!
Grey Matter Learning is proud to release a fabulous upgrade to its online learning system. Now known as “Click”, you can benefit from a whole host of improvements and new features.
Find out more here: Click or talk to us now for more information.
Grey Matter Learning has been blogging about our experience with delivering the Skills for Care "Lead to Succeed" and "Well-Led" programmes, sharing some of the ideas from managers and senior managers who have completed these courses.
Find out more here: Blog Page
