About the city of Salzburg
Salzburg, the fourth-biggest city in Austria, is providing their citizens with multiple Senior Care Centers, based at the third municipal department of the city administration. Christian Kagerer has been employed at the city of Salzburg for almost 30 years, and is the house manager of the Senior Care Center Nonntal. The Senior Care Center Nonntal has been honored with the Austrian Public Administration Award in 2023 and is considered a “pioneer of modern work design in the care sector” as the winner of the Modern Work Award 2022. Over the past five years, Stackfield has supported the 90-person team of the Senior Care Center Nonntal on the journey to a more agile and modern corporate culture. Today, Stackfield is gradually introduced to the other five Senior Care Centers of Salzburg.
Christian Kagerer – House Manager of the Senior Care Center in Nonntal
The New Work
approach in the new Senior Care Center Nonntal
When a new senior care center was built in Nonntal five years ago, Kagerer and his team used the opportunity to make organizational changes. The goal was to establish the senior care center as a New Work
house.
New Work
describes an agile corporate culture and the creation of a meaningful workplace. Autonomy is encouraged with flat hierarchies, no middle management level and self-managing teams. Only the legally required house and care service managers remain and take on an advisory role. Decisions are made democratically within the team. Collaborative forms of work and agile methods create additional flexibility.
However, to properly implement the concept in-house, digital support was lacking. A tool that would ensure rapid exchange within and between teams had to be acquired, explains Kagerer.
An intuitive tool guaranteeing data security and good support
In collaboration with IT, Kagerer set out to find a suitable tool for himself and his colleagues. Finally, the decision was made together as a team (in accordance to the New Work
approach) and in favor of Stackfield. The following characteristics were of prime importance:
Simplicity
Kagerer explains: Nursing staff are socially committed, but often less tech-savvy. The technology should therefore require as little training as possible and be simple and intuitive.
Stackfield's user interface convinced with a minimalistic and intuitive design here.
Intuitive ways of communication
WhatsApp was out of the question for data protection reasons, but as colleagues were already familiar with it from their private lives, Kagerer seeked similiar chat functionalities. Stackfield not only provided suitable chat features but also so-called discussions for topic-bound communication as well as polls for decisions to be made in the team.
Data security
As a public institution, data security was a decisive factor for the Senior Care Center in Nonntal. Thus, Stackfield needed to underly a security check performed by the Data Protection Supervisor – luckily no problem thanks to Stackfield's GDPR compliance.
Modular structure
For each team to be able to decide for themselves to what extent they want to use the tool, the tool should have as modular a structure as possible. Stackfield's rooms are composed of various modules that can be deactivated. This means that a team of less tech-savvy people can now decide to only use the chat and a team with more specialized colleagues can decide to use the project management functionalities.
Configurability
Kagerer wished to be able to configurate the tool at any time and without additional help. This kind of independence was important to me and, in my opinion, such a tool has to offer that.
In Stackfield's rooms he can modify settings, add new people, and create new rooms with just a few clicks.
Good support
Finally, Kagerer wanted to be able to rely on a good support, especially in the beginning. Stackfield was particularly convincing here.
“Good support was important to me and Stackfield offers that too. You get a competent answer in the shortest possible time and that's fantastic.”
Stackfield roll-out thanks to a working group of volunteers
Once the decision had been made in favor of Stackfield, a working group consisting of volunteers was set up and given the task of familiarization. The following questions were to be clarified: Where or in which topics should Stackfield be used? Which rooms are needed? And what rules are needed for using Stackfield?
The instructions and code of conduct were then uploaded to Stackfield and made available to all colleagues. Finally, Stackfield was introduced to the team in a training session. Nothing more was needed to introduce the colleagues, Kagerer praises.
Stackfield's rooms as a central collaboration hub for interdisciplinary teams, professional groups and projects
To ensure that messages and information are always shared with the right people, Kagerer creates a room, meaning a separate, digital workspace, for every team, professional group, and working group.
For each of the ten teams, there is an individual room holding team-internal communication, service handovers, and team meeting protocols. And also every professional group like nursing or day-to-day support has their own room to discuss and work on profession-specific topics. Lastly, projects, like evaluating the nursing documentation, and their working groups receive their own room to distribute and assign project-specific tasks, exchange ideas, and include externals if needed. For news and important information relevant to everybody in the house, Kagerer created the room Info for everybody
as well as the room Help in crisis situations
for emergencies. Kagerer explains: All emergency telephone numbers and other important data are stored here. I can access the emergency numbers or links on my cell phone anytime and anywhere and get help with problems. This is much more practical for everyone.
Asynchronous communication and polls
One of the main aims of implementing Stackfield at the Senior Care Center Nonntal was to improve communication. The autonomous teams should be able to exchange information quickly and make decisions together despite alternating shifts.
In Stackfield, communication is realized in different ways. Messages concerning the whole team, profession group, or working group, are sent in the respective room. Here, team members can quickly react to messages by using emoji reactions. Images and elements can be shared with colleagues. And room activities (e. g., a colleague has finished a task) can be shown or hidden from the communication stream. If a message is only meant for one person, it can be sent via the private chats in the Direct Messages.
With discussions, topic-bound chats can be created in the room. For example, if a resident of the house needs further discussion, a discussion element is created for that specific topic. This way, the chat messages stay bundled together, and can be related to their overall topic at any time. In addition, polls are used for team decisions. To ensure, that everybody required partakes in the poll, a notification is automatically sent to all room members once a poll has been created.
“There is a lot of communication in the rooms. [...] It ranges from very banal things like not forgetting the cake in the basement to more important service handovers, such as reading a colleague's care report or a resident's hospital appointment.”
Whether it's a message, discussion or poll: all relevant information is now stored in the corresponding workspaces in Stackfield and can be traced at any time. The many different working times no longer play a role. All missed messages, changes to items and invitations to polls, appointments or similar are displayed in one's own dashboard and in the chats when logging into Stackfield. Kagerer recounts: “If I'm not around for a few days, I can read up on everything important in Stackfield afterwards. That way I'm always up to date. And if I've read a message, I can be reminded of the message so that no information or task is lost.”
Stackfield in the pocket: Sending messages and accessing information securely and at any time via the Mobile App
In nursing, most of the work is done on your feet and rarely at a desk, thus, Stackfield was primarily introduced as a Mobile App at the Senior Care Center Nonntal. This way, important information and results can be accessed quickly in team meetings, colleagues can be contacted in the event of emergencies and reminders can be set when needed.
To configurate Stackfield, create rooms, or to add new users, Kagerer himself additionally makes use of Stackfield's Desktop App.
Networking and strengthening the corporate culture in Stackfield
As a pillar of the New Work
approach, creating and strengthening a corporate culture is an important topic for Kagerer and his colleagues. For the teams, creating a meaningful workplace together and enjoying their daily work is just as much a part of senior care as the care itself. Stackfield therefore occasionally serves as a social network.
For example, there is a “Swap Shop” room where colleagues can pass on items they no longer need. And sometimes nice moments are shared with the teams in Stackfield, for example photos of birthday parties. After Marshall Rosenberg's “Model of Nonviolent Communication” was introduced at the Senior Care Center, Kagerer also created a room called “Nonviolent Communication”. Here, he shares a tip with his colleagues every week and it is surprisingly well received. “Once I stopped for a while and was asked by a colleague where the saying of the week was,” says Kagerer.
Stackfield as a factor for success
In conclusion, it is clear that the implementation of the “New Work” approach at the Senior Care Center Nonntal of the city of Salzburg was a complete success. Stackfield was a great support, especially in interdisciplinary team communication. Kagerer praises the tool and is pleased that the Stackfield Mobile App in particular is now being used intensively in the Senior Care Center.
“Stackfield supports us massively and is a cool tool that we wouldn't want to miss. [...] We are very satisfied.”