The improving vacancy picture
On 12 October 2023, Skills for Care published its annual workforce report for England and announced work towards a sector workforce strategy. It described improvements in filled posts, vacancies and turnover during April 2022 to March 2023, while highlighting continuing departures and the relationship between retention and the characteristics of care jobs.
That combination was the important signal: improved capacity did not mean the underlying staffing challenge had disappeared. The report also distinguished people leaving a job from those leaving social care altogether. Our interpretation is that employers needed recruitment and retention information that could show different kinds of movement, rather than treating every departure as the same event.
A job move is not always a sector exit
A provider may replace the same post repeatedly without noticing how much recruitment effort is being absorbed by turnover. A monthly total of applications or starts does not reveal that pattern. Tracking vacancies by service, reason for opening and previous occupancy can help managers identify where an attraction problem may actually be a job-experience problem.
Care roles also need accurate practical descriptions: travel between visits, expected hours, supervision and the learning available to new colleagues. These details influence whether someone can sustain the work. Recruiters should seek approved answers and record candidate questions consistently, while avoiding claims that one administrative change can resolve pay or wider workforce pressures.
Make the route into the service more dependable
Key Med can support social care teams with candidate sourcing, recruitment administration and onboarding coordination. We can maintain clear status records, organise document requests and help managers see cases that are waiting for action. Client-approved screening criteria and service-specific requirements should guide the workflow, with the provider responsible for employment and care decisions.
A useful review combines recruitment records with appropriately aggregated start and departure information. Agree definitions first, including whether a person moved within the organisation or left it. Then use the results to improve the next brief and induction handover. The objective is an informed operational discussion, without claiming that national associations prove a result for an individual service.
The source material
- Skills for Care to develop workforce strategy for adult social care ↗Skills for Care · 2023-10-12
Retrospective briefing · Published 4 November 2026. Historical figures and measures describe their period; consult current official guidance before acting. This article provides operational context. Legal, immigration, clinical and financial decisions need the responsible organisation’s qualified advisers.
