Evaluation of the Home Care Workforce Support Program
Purpose
The Department of Health and Aged Care (DoHAC) commissioned HealthConsult to evaluate the $91 million Home Care Workforce Support Program (HCWSP). The HCWSP aimed to attract, train, and retain an additional 13,000 personal care workers (PCWs) to address increasing demand for home-care services. The evaluation sought to determine program effectiveness, assess outcomes and sustained impacts, and generate actionable insights to refine ongoing program delivery and inform future aged-care workforce strategies.
Approach
HealthConsult employed a structured, comprehensive evaluation approach:
- Evaluation Framework: We developed a robust, theory-based evaluation framework comprising a bespoke logic model and evaluation matrix structured around four key evaluation questions: implementation fidelity, outcome achievement, sustained impacts, and forward-looking policy options.
- Mixed-Methods Analysis: We conducted extensive mixed-method data collection and analysis, including surveys (675 PCWs and 609 providers), sector interviews, case studies, focus groups, and analysis of quarterly performance data covering nearly 48,000 candidate registrations.
- Stakeholder Engagement: We facilitated national engagement through co-design workshops, virtual case-study visits, stakeholder interviews, thematic focus groups, and quarterly feedback presentations to ensure transparency and immediate applicability of insights.
- Real-time Visibility: We implemented real-time monitoring dashboards ensuring transparency throughout the evaluation.
- Continuous Improvement: We systematically documented lessons learned, integrating these insights into interim findings and evidence-based recommendations to optimise HCWSP outcomes.
Outcome
The evaluation delivered clear, actionable outcomes to support ongoing improvement and strategic planning:
- Reusable evaluation framework: A comprehensive, Department-endorsed evaluation framework with practical tools and indicators, now serving as a blueprint for future workforce evaluations.
- Evidence-based recommendations: Delivered a detailed final report outlining eight targeted, evidence-based recommendations to enhance the strategic design and delivery of future workforce-support initiatives.
- Real-time program adjustments: Enabled timely course corrections through real-time insights, significantly improving PCW recruitment, retention, and training outcomes in the program's later stages.
Through stakeholder engagement, structured evaluation methodologies, continuous benefits monitoring, and systematic lessons-learned analysis, HealthConsult’s evaluation provided DoHAC withrobust, actionable insights to optimise current delivery and effectively shapefuture aged-care workforce initiatives. The evaluation report was used to design the next funding round for HCWSP.
