Introducing our Managing Director
Over the last 5 years, Geraint has worked in senior board-level roles prior to joining Care is Central as Managing Director. He is passionate about doing care differently and championing carers for the vital work they do. Find out more in our interview below.
My first job after leaving school was in the Royal Navy filling a number of different ones the most recent of which was as a Warfare Officer onboard various submarines working right across the world.
Having left the Navy in 2005, I worked for a short period in a business management role before moving into social care. My first role in social care was as the Home Manager in a large 101 bedded Nursing Home. Over the next 5 years, I had a number of management roles supporting care homes to improve their service or provide care for the first time. This was a challenging but rewarding period of my career where I learned a great deal about what good care looks like and what is possible with the right values and focus.
What does your role entail?
As the Managing Director, I am responsible for creating all of the plans and policies that will assist CiC with achieving its objectives. Duties include developing business strategies, recruiting a team of caring and highly capable people, and writing and implementing business plans to accomplish all of our organisational goals. It is my job to build the right culture and ensure that all of our team members hold each other to a higher standard, look after each other, and are focussed on delivering the very best possible care to the people we support.
What has been the biggest challenge in your care career to date?
Like many people in the care sector, my biggest challenges came during our response to the Covid-19 pandemic where we had to balance the personal freedoms of the people we supported with the need to keep them safe from a virus we knew little about.
We also had to figure out how to implement the advice and guidance from the government, often at short notice, and support our staff to feel safe and confident as they continued to support the people they cared for. The care sector did a stunning job during the pandemic and was often not recognised for quite how brave, dedicated and, amazing they were during difficult times.
What are you most proud of?
I am most proud of starting CiC in partnership with CBC and creating an organisation that is brave enough to try things differently and honest enough to know we will need to adapt and change as we grow and develop. I am proud of my team and the ambition they are showing to make CiC a better place to work and a great organisation to deliver care. We are only a short way into our journey but we are putting together a group of people that want to do things better and are helping to create a company that is going to do things better.
What does high-quality care or ‘doing care differently’ mean to you?
I believe that if you support care teams properly, look after them better and show them what is possible then together we can consistently deliver the highest quality of care. If we hold ourselves and each other to a higher standard, if we celebrate success, and if we take personal ownership when things go wrong we can make care different and better. If we do this, staff will be happier and more committed, service users will be better supported and better cared for and Care is Central will genuinely be able to say we do care differently.
What do you think makes Care is Central different?
We believe that people should have a career, not a job! Everyone is encouraged to dream about where they want to go in their career and we support them to make that ambition a reality; and this is not restricted to advancement in CiC or even the care industry. Every ambition is valid! We believe that if people are growing and developing they will commit 100% of their care and attention during their period with us even if that time is only a few years as they pursue a different ambition and ultimately this will result in a better standard of care and happier service users.
