If your organization is ready to begin the process of obtaining CARF® accreditation, there’s a good chance that you have considered hiring a consultant to help simplify the process and make it a little less taxing on your employees. Working with a CARF® consultant can help ensure you have the knowledge and resources needed to navigate an otherwise challenging process. If you are considering working with a CARF® consultant, here are 4 questions you should ask them before hiring them.
What Experience Do You Have as a CARF® Consultant?
The experience that a CARF® consultant has will ultimately ensure that your organization’s process runs efficiently and results in a successful outcome. One of the biggest experience signals that you should be most concerned with is whether or not a consultant has experience with the service areas that you provide. This will allow them to focus on past experiences with similar organizations to simplify CARF® standards.
Will You Provide a Timeline for Accreditation?
A good CARF® consultant will be able to provide a timeline to accreditation after performing a mock interview and determining service areas that need to be adjusted before a survey can be performed. This can help create a clear path to when accreditation can be expected as well as create a road map that allows employees to visualize the process. If a consultant is retained early in the process, they can help with standards conformance throughout the process.
What Deliverables Are Included with Your Services?
One of the biggest hurdles that organizations face is finding document templates that are designed to meet current CARF® standards. Even if the consultant doesn’t readily provide them, they should be able to direct you to a service that can help like Accreditation Now, Inc. Consultants should also be able to assist an organization in other areas like clinical records, personnel files and SRP requirements.
How Accessible Will You Be?
Depending on the current workload of a CARF® consultant and the approach they take, you may find that assistance isn’t available when you need it most. For this reason, determining how accessible a CARF® consultant will be before hiring them is crucial for a good experience. You cannot get CARF® assistance if the consultant won’t be available to assist you. Don’t settle for less than you expect and seek out another consultant if needed.
This content provided by: Accreditation Now, Inc.
