Monthly Archives: September 2021

6 Ways to Help Senior Parents Without Affecting Your Own Family Life

You’re probably reading this because your parents are seniors, and you’ve noticed they are struggling with certain everyday household chores or activities.

You love them and will happily help them where you can, but at the same time, you don’t want to disrupt your own family life. It’s a situation that many grown-up children of aging parents find themselves in, and it’s sometimes challenging to resolve.

There are some steps you can take to offer as much help as possible to your parents without causing problems with your family life at home. Take a look at these ideas to get started:

1. Determine Each Parent’s Needs

Firstly, it makes sense to figure out the needs of each parent. For example, one of your parents may not have any specific requirements, whereas the other may have mobility issues. You should also look at how much support each parent gets presently.

If you live far away from your parents, it might not be practical to help with some things due to the geographical distance between you all. However, if you happen to live in the same area, it could be possible to provide some daily help like grocery shopping.

2. Take Into Account Your Own Needs

You might be younger and more able than your parents, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t without your own limitations. That’s why you need to take into account your own needs. For instance, you might have a physical disability that prevents you from lifting heavy items.

In such scenarios, you may not have the strength to help your parents with specific tasks like gardening or lifting them in and out of the bathtub.

You’ll also need to consider feelings; do you all have the type of relationship where negative feelings don’t appear if you all spend a lot of time together?

3. Include Your Parents in Decisions

Your parents need help with certain aspects of their daily lives to remain independent. What they don’t want is someone to make all decisions about their lifestyles for them. That’s why you must include your parents in all crucial decisions.

For example, you don’t want to force them to live in a nursing home, especially one notorious for ill-treatment of their clients.

In such cases, you’d regret your choice, particularly as you didn’t ask your parents if it was the right option for them, nor did you do any proper research. Plus, you’d need to hire a nursing home abuse attorney to help your parents claim financial compensation.

4. Review Their Financial Situation

The ugly truth about helping aging parents with their daily lives is that some aspects of help will require money. That’s because they’d need to pay for things like home modifications and adaptions, nursing staff, and anything else to support their needs.

Plus, your parents will still need to pay for expenses like groceries, household bills, and rent or a mortgage. The good news is some seniors are eligible for financial help from the government, so it’s worth looking into how that can help as well.

5. Ensure Their Home Is Safe

Let’s face it: almost everyone’s home has safety hazards, yet householders are aware of them and know to avoid them. The trouble is, that’s not so easy for seniors that have mobility issues, for example, and aren’t steady on their feet.

One of the ways you can help your aging parents is by carrying out a risk assessment of their home. Where in their home are your parents likely to injure themselves? What steps must get taken to diminish or remove the risk of injuries?

Once you’ve done that, you can help them take steps to improve safety in their home. For instance, you might install grab bars in their bathroom, or you might have some loose carpet replaced.

6. Improve Communications With Them

Your parents know they can contact you by calling you on the phone. But, it makes sense to add additional communications methods. For instance, you could help them buy and use mobile phones to contact you wherever they are – even if they aren’t at home.

You could even help them get a simple to use tablet device to make or receive video calls. Plus, if they’re open to the idea, they could have wearable medical alert devices in case of emergencies.

Conclusion

The above are just a few ways that you can help senior parents without causing problems for yourself and your family. The help you can provide and the solutions you can offer will ultimately depend on your personal circumstances and your level of commitment.

 

How To Respond To Negative Online Reviews

There is something of a crisis of confidence happening in the world of online reviews recently. While research has shown that online reviews are vital to the success of many businesses, there has also been a lot of controversy surrounding fake reviews. 

If you run a business, either online or physically, you should be actively seeking positive reviews on sites like Google, Trip Advisor, and Facebook. But what happens when you get a negative review? How should you react and more importantly, how should you not react? 
Read on for some tips on dealing with the situation. 

Consider the merits of the complaint

Before you do anything else, ask yourself if the bad review is justified. Building your company’s social proof is very important for your online presence. Try and look at it objectively rather than with hurt feelings. Depending on what conclusion you come to, there are different ways to deal with a negative review. 

Don’t overreact

Even if the review is less than pleasant, don’t react with a deluge of abuse of your own. It looks wildly unprofessional. You might be spurred on by those posts you see online which show business owners winning a verbal joust with reviewers, but unless you have an Oscar Wilde style wit, don’t get involved. 

Always acknowledge a negative review

It’s good practice to acknowledge all reviews, whether they are good or bad. If you do receive a negative review, say that you are sorry they had a bad experience, that it isn’t indicative of your usual standards, and ask them to contact you directly to help resolve the situation. 

Own up to mistakes

If the negative review is factually correct, then don’t be tempted to lie your way out of it. Simply state any extenuating circumstances and offer to put the situation right. 

Tackle inaccurate reviews with facts

Occasionally, someone will get things wrong. Sometimes this is accidental and sometimes it is malicious. If you know the information on the review is not correct, be sure to mention the actual facts in your response. Again, keep it professional while still defending yourself. If you believe that the review is false or perhaps a competitor, then you should report it to the relevant review platform to have it removed. 

Don’t get into an argument

The internet is filled with arguments, don’t add to it by being confrontational. 

Try and take the complaint off-platform

While it’s always good to respond to people on the review platforms, you don’t want to be conducting all of your communications on there. Instead, offer the reviewer a way to get in touch with you to discuss the matter. Give them a phone number or email address. 

Final thoughts 

All companies get a bad review from time to time. In fact, if every single one of your reviews is flawless, people will probably assume that they are fake. It’s how you deal with them that is the important thing. If the reviews are pointing to an issue within your business then this is something that needs to be addressed as soon as possible. 
When faced with a negative review, respond quickly, professionally, apologize if necessary and take it off-platform if your can. 

3 Essential Office Maintenance Tips

The office is a business’s physical representation. It can be the first and last impression that potential customers have of your company. However, if you maintain an unkempt office, it sends visitors that your business doesn’t care about quality or professionalism. In this blog post, we will give three essential tips for maintaining a clean office environment so that you can improve the first impression of your employees and clients!

1 Adhere to Cleaning Schedules

It is vital to establish cleaning schedules so that you can ensure a clean office. Maintaining this schedule will help reduce the time spent on cleaning, and it makes sure the office looks professional at all times! Whether your company has one person or ten people; everyone should be involved with maintaining their work area and other shared areas of the building. By assigning roles and responsibilities for each employee, there will no longer be any questions about who is responsible for what tasks. Employees feel more engaged in an organization where they are given ownership over certain aspects of the business!

 

2 Implement Continuous Maintenance on Equipment

It is imperative to take care of the equipment and electronics that your business uses every day. Think about how long a computer or phone lasts when it isn’t cared for properly! By taking proper precautions, you can ensure that all office equipment functions at its optimal capabilities, which will help reduce repair costs down the road. For example, air conditioning repair is necessary in some instances, but are occasionally preventable with good upkeep on common issues such as replacing filters, cleaning vents/louvers, and keeping cords free from tangles or other obstructions. These steps may not seem like a big deal, but they really do make an impact on the overall health of your office space, so don’t neglect them!

 

3 Regularly Renovate Small Areas

Minor renovations are a great way to spruce up your office space without having to break the bank. By focusing on only one or two areas at once, you can avoid overwhelming yourself and causing more damage than good! In addition, this method will help prevent significant disruptions in workflow while giving employees new furniture that they enjoy sitting at all day long! Whether rearranging chairs around a conference table or replacing old carpet with new tiles, small changes add instant appeal to any room. In addition, they can keep employees more focused on their work because they are in a comfortable, clean and organized environment!

 

In conclusion, maintaining a clean and organized office is one of the best ways to make sure that your business looks professional at all times. It doesn’t matter if you own an extensive organization or have only a few employees; everyone should be involved in maintaining their work area and other shared areas of the building! By assigning roles and responsibilities for each employee, there will no longer be any questions about who is responsible for what tasks. In addition, employees feel more engaged when they are given ownership over certain aspects of the business, which leads to higher productivity levels!