Historically retirement village owners have not had to be too concerned about work-related stress with their limited staff. This is rapidly changing as the profile of retirement village residents narrows to the seriously elderly, thanks to increased government emphasis on ‘staying in the family home’ to receive care.

Marcela Slepica from AccessEAP, has written in Australian Ageing Agenda that the top five workplace issues in the aged care industry are:

• workplace stress
• conflict with colleagues
• conflict with managers
• alleged bullying
• loss of confidence

She particularly refers to conflict with family members, focusing on complaints of not ‘caring properly’ for residents. This will grow in the retirement village sector as well.

These become ‘allegations’ that then require investigation, creating stress for staff. The ‘allegations’ often amount to bullying by the family of the staff members which create their own HR challenge for owners.