Assessments, on the one hand, of the trainees' learning abilities and willingness to learn by experienced employees and, on the other hand, of the learning opportunities in practice by the trainees, make it clear that the providers of inpatient nursing care must step up their efforts for in-company training work in order to qualify and inspire generations Y and Z for nursing care for the elderly.

In cooperation with the Institute for Health at the BTU, we have examined how trainee nursing staff can be better integrated into teams and how attention to them in their learning role can be increased. At the same time, it seems sensible to use the special prerequisite offered by practice with its "real team requirements" as a learning field to practice skills for managing interprofessional nursing teams and to be able to bring them in as early as possible after entering the profession. The expectations for nursing professionals in this regard are high.

In addition, it is becoming increasingly difficult for inpatient geriatric care facilities to obtain good staff. Therefore, both advertising (how do I make vacancies known) and the image of the company (what is the corporate culture like, how satisfied are employees with their work?) play an important role. The latter in particular is passed on by word of mouth, so satisfied employees are the best advertisement for their company.

In addition, many future employees get to know the facility through trial work or internships. Here, the support of potential colleagues or trainees is of great importance.

Institutions have concepts, checklists and various tools to guide and support the induction of new employees. The challenges for the induction of new employees are becoming more comprehensive and higher, since the prerequisites of new employees are not only different and growing due to their qualifications. Increasingly, individual differences in the ability and willingness of new employees with the same formal qualifications are being noticed, which can affect their professional skills, attitudes, and ideas about collaboration, participation, and professional development.

This does not result in any inherently new tasks for induction processes, but in different weights. The threading into the particular corporate culture, into grown teams with their values and ways of working, the type and density of support during induction or the effective pointing out of next steps in professional development are some tasks that need to be methodically better addressed in induction concepts. We have compiled a few such opportunities for improvement.

We have taken on the induction of so-called "low-skilled" employees as a special task, and our suggestions in this regard are not related solely to the employee in question, but also to the employee base.

The goal of the project is to look for ways to help inpatient geriatric care facilities effectively and efficiently utilize, retain, and develop their staffing structures.

This often involves changes in processes and responsibilities.

This means changes for the individual employee. Suddenly, tasks are to be performed differently (e.g., a new documentation system) or new tasks are added (e.g., regular interprofessional coordination rounds) or work schedules change (e.g., adjusting care times to residents' daily routines).

In order to clarify the meaning of changes and to support the employees in this process - which can be characterized by uncertainty and resistance - various instruments and measures were tried out and evaluated together with the employees of the facilities.

The sub-project "Communication and Information" plays an important role here.

Continuing professional development is a component of employer attractiveness as well as professional job empowerment and job satisfaction. Adaptation and advancement training can support the employee's willingness to learn, perform and remain loyal if the company's development needs are linked to those of the individual employee and a transformation of new knowledge into the work areas can actually take place.

In addition to the classic forms of formal learning and the multiplier function, more attention should be paid to work-related learning in the form of structure, space and time, since learning also takes place to a particular extent during work, but the results are generally less conscious and consequently less used. In view of the high increase in knowledge in geriatric care, there must be high-performance in-company training work. We have compiled recommended working methods for this and tested them in essential parts. They begin with suitable forms of needs assessment and extend to transfer support. It is clear that the focus on training content is not enough and that more methodological know-how should be in the hands of the professionals.

Communication represents an important aspect of work activity, especially in the social sector. It serves, for example, to motivate and guide other people, to exchange ideas, to de-escalate and generates openness and honesty. It is precisely on this fact that the sub-project 'Information and Communication' is based.

Due to the already diverse tasks that nursing professionals perform, it is often difficult to find the time and resources to implement communication that is ideal for everyone. Especially in an interprofessional workspace, however, this takes on a high priority.

The aim of the sub-project is therefore to support the ability of the addressees to act by providing information and understanding about it, and to form a culture of communication. This should lead to an increase in commitment and team loyalty. The main focus is on information and communication within the facility, i.e., internal communication. This includes improving communication between professional groups as well as communication and information across hierarchical levels. The communication of the facility to the outside (e.g. relatives, community) is dealt with on the sidelines.

To achieve these goals, different methods and practices are developed to facilitate and strengthen information exchange and communication. The project supports the participating facility in the development of a communication concept, on the basis of which the relevant groups of people can communicate with each other in the future without additional burden.

Nursing professionals have a special responsibility for open and at the same time sensitive interaction, for formal and informal discussions as well as for professional consultation and cooperation with relatives.

In the course of redesigning a corresponding concept for work with relatives, we have so far worked with employees and the nursing service and facility management of one of our six reference facilities to explain the following opportunities for improvement:

• Keeping information about the resident available for relatives and also offering it without being asked.
• Be able to present arguments in the context of the new definition of the need for care, and
• Be able to deal professionally with criticism from relatives in informal discussions.

A sequence for dealing with criticism is currently being deepened, then practiced and evaluated.

Up to now, volunteers have been active in inpatient facilities, albeit to varying degrees, but professional volunteer coordination is lacking or at least in need of expansion. A concept must provide appropriate structures and procedures for the work, but also include instruments that make cooperation with volunteers more efficient.

Such a concept with practical guidelines will be developed together with an institution in the project as an example. What is involved and what tasks will be faced by professionals and the entire team during implementation must be clarified sensitively in view of the demands placed on employees in the ongoing work process.

Such tasks are:

• to define the goals and standards of one's own volunteer work,
• to recruit a coordinator for the facility from the full-time staff and to formulate his or her task profile transparently,
• to work out general conditions for the activity of the coordinator with the management,
• to ascertain the motives of those interested in volunteering in order to use them appropriately,
• to describe possible task profiles for the volunteers and also to secure the full-time support,
• to involve the full-time staff in the volunteer work, to respect their wishes, concerns and ideas, and
• Establish a self-image and a culture of recognition that not only attracts volunteers, but also provides them with professional support and recognition.

If nursing, care and domestic support are to reach the person in need of care as a harmonious whole, the team must be able to act in a coordinated manner. The core competencies of the individual professional groups must be called upon effectively and efficiently. This requires that they are transparent and of equal value to the team. This also requires that the nursing specialist must help ensure the performance of all professions, correctly integrate the service contributions into the care or action plan, and be able to manage them flexibly according to need, i.e., also operationally.

Over a period of one year, we investigated values, structures and processes for teamwork in six inpatient care facilities. It became clear that there is still potential for cooperation between the professional groups, especially for the coordination of services between nursing and care. Among other things, a guideline for interprofessional team discussions was developed, which can be used, for example, in the New Structural Model in the course of the SIS and regulated evaluation.

Managers are found at different levels in the facilities. The nursing specialist performs leadership tasks by delegating tasks to other professional groups (e.g., nursing staff, caregivers, housekeeping staff). As a team leader or living area manager, additional tasks are assigned to the manager. Nursing service managers coordinate tasks throughout the facility.

At each of these management levels, information and communication (see the corresponding module) play an important role. At the same time, many tasks have changed over time, with new areas of activity and new demands on the profession.

As part of the project, we conducted a survey among managers to find out in which areas they would like to have better qualifications (further training). Based on these results, customized offers for executives are developed in cooperation with the Institute for Health of the BTU.

Six inpatient geriatric care facilities in the state of Brandenburg are involved in our project.

The following table shows the size of the facility (based on the number of residents) and the breakdown of employees in the care sector.

All facilities share an interest not only in attracting new employees, but also in retaining them in the long term and developing their employability.

In addition, these companies set specific priorities for their strategic work; depending, among other things, on their business model and the regionally specific requirements of the care and personnel market. In the 2016/2017 project period, the managers and employees therefore saw or see different priorities for possible improvements.

In collaboration with the staff responsible for the project at Cottbus University, each facility decided on a sub-project on which it would focus as a matter of priority. The topics arose from concrete needs and interests in the respective facilities and thus directly addressed practical realities. In some cases, several facilities decided on the same topic and then worked together cooperatively.

In this way, building sites or building blocks were created, such as "familiarization ", " further training", "coordination of voluntary commitment " or "cooperation in the qualification mix".