Faye Spiteri OAM
CEO, Fronditha
Biography
An accomplished strategist Faye has extensive experience in executive leadership roles across government, corporate and for purpose sectors.
In February 2021, she was appointed CEO of Fronditha Care – a leading provider of aged care services and is committed to building on the legacy of the organisation in provision of care to the Greek and broader Australian community. She was also the first female President and Board Chair of the organisation and ended her 9-year tenure in 2019.
Her areas of expertise include aged care, cultural and religious diversity, gender parity, social justice, access and equity and social cohesion.
Passionate about achieving better social outcomes driven by genuine collaboration and engagement, in 2021 she was recognised with a Medal of the Order (OAM) for her contribution to driving social change and inducted to the Victorian Honour Roll for Women as a Change Agent in 2019.
Shaping Tomorrow’s Aged Care: Adapting for Sustainability and Leveraging Organisational Capabilities to Deliver Purpose Driven Aged Care Services
Overview
Cutting through the dominant discourse of an aged care sector that is not performing – how Fronditha Care disrupted the way we work and think to be a part of a sector that stands for respect and collective hope about the future of elders and our community. On April 26, Fronditha Care celebrated its 46th anniversary and service to the Greek diaspora and contribution to the Australian aged care sector.
Appointed Fronditha Care CEO in February 2021, during the global pandemic and facing a multi-million deficit, I have witnessed the many challenges facing the sector in person centred care and the urgent need for a strong and invested aged care workforce.
The Challenges
Bold steps forward are underway in the aged care sector, signalling major reform and redesign of a health system under pressure has seen major disruption and change in thinking related to delivery of aged care services across the spectrum. Fronditha Care underwent its own significant transformation since the beginning of 2021 after a very challenging 2020 under different leadership when it lost close to $10m.
While the impact of a difficult 2019-20 was felt in 2022 and continues in 2023, we ended the FY2021- 2022 year in a relatively strong financial position and profit, and this has continued into FY2022-23.
Development of a solid 10-year strategy was critical in the organisational response to pave the way forward.
1. An exceptional client experience
2. Sustainable growth
3. An engaged and competent workforce
4. A high performing organisation
How did we achieve this? Adaptability underpinned by Purpose
Our competitive advantage is perspective – we run our business as usual and change strategy and transformation at pace as we remain grounded in our purpose. We delivered better governance and transparency in operations underpinned by three key areas of focus:
1. Strong financial plans for getting back to profitability
2. Review of the service delivery model to be future ready
3. Workforce strategy
Maintaining focus on the potential to transform crisis into opportunity Fronditha Care has achieved:
• 98-100% occupancy across Residential Services with full re-accreditation of all our facilities
• 80% volume growth of Fronditha Care’s Community Services with demand outweighing capacity to meet
• 98% commitment to purpose and growth of workforce from 600 to over 850 with significant effort, in the past two years, into developing its Employee
Value Proposition reviewing renumeration of all teams and paying above award.
• targeted market research to determine our model of care and the continuum of care into the future.
Maintaining Optimism
The aged care reform agenda underpinned by legislative changes to put older Australians first, improve quality, safety and choice in aged care is still in many ways in its infancy and transformation can take years. Because we know who we are, and we know our purpose we adapted, we changed – quickly.
We are continuing to harness the forces of disruption, driving cultural change, improve our business across key domains of clinical and personal care, operational and financial performance and especially the elder experience.