In your role as a care worker, you are sure to meet many new people that you need to help look after. Whilst some of them may welcome you immediately, others may be a little reticent when it comes to accepting you as someone who will be involved in their close personal care. If you are not too sure about how to introduce yourself to a new person that you will be assisting, here are 3 effective ways that are sure to help:
Be upbeat and positive
By being utterly professional and very positive, you will give of an air of warmth and happiness that will have an effect upon your new person very quickly. They will be attracted to your positive nature and begin to put their trust in you. It is essential that you do not only rely on the spoken word when it comes to communication but think about your body language, tone of voice and general demeanour. Focus on being calm, understanding, compassionate, well informed and organised. Your ability to remain this way even during problematic periods will help build a strong relationship between you.
Be friendly and personal
Whilst you need to retain an air of professionalism, building rapport between you will be easier if you treat your relationship as a personal one rather than a formal type of doctor-patient scenario. Talk to them about yourself as this will encourage them to open up about themselves. Chat about your family, pets, holidays, TV programmes and generally anything that will gain their interest.
Be a good listener
Whilst introducing yourself in the right way is essential, you must not forget to ask essential questions such as those appertaining to their lifestyle, health, personal situation, medications and anything else that relates to your ability to care for them. As well as chatting with them, be a good listener too; sometimes the people you are looking after may be lonely and want to talk. Allow them to voice any problems and always treat them with respect.
Do all of these things and you will find that introducing yourself to new people is no longer the hurdle it used to be.
What are the most effective ways you’ve found for introducing yourself to the new people you help? Let us know on our Facebook https://facebook.com/lavorocare or Tweet at us https://twitter.com/joblavoro .
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