The GoEasyCare app makes life easier for frontline healthcare workers. Over the last year the healthcare system has been challenged like never before. And the people shouldering most of the load were front line healthcare workers. There were many displays of support and encouragement for our frontline health workers during the worst of the outbreak. But inside those hospitals long term care homes the situation was at times incredibly difficult.
Many workers became ill with Covid-19 themselves. And the system began to strain with hospital administrators left unable to fill critical shifts. Stress, anxiety and depression became real issues for health workers overwhelmed by the sheer size of the crisis. Lockdowns added to the problems as some workers used to picking up shifts in different areas were now limited to just one. That made scheduling frontline health workers extraordinarily difficult.
But Paul Wright already had the solution. Paul is the CEO of GoEasyCare, one of the companies working with Innisfil DMZ. For the last several years Paul and his team have been designing a software solution for health workers. One that lets them easily select the shifts they want to work when they want to work. The GoEasyCare app had already been deployed at several long term care facilities in Ontario. But when the pandemic hit the demand for the product became overwhelming.
The GoEasyCare App
According to Paul, the software is designed to let health workers easily select the shifts they want to work when they want to work them. New to the town of Innisfil, the GoEasyCare app had already been deployed at several long term care facilities in Ontario before the crisis. But when the pandemic hit, the demand for the product became overwhelming.
“GoEasyCare was started when we came across a healthcare agency that had a high manual labor component that we knew we could automate,” he explained.
The team realized the problem and came up with the industry’s first fully automated shift filling system that helped save the agency about 90% of the time they spent filling shifts.
Paul Wright, CEO of GoEasyCare
And The Many Difficulties
It took the healthcare industry a very long time to automate something as simple as this. According to Paul, it’s because these organizations work 24/7, which makes things a little complicated.
“We had to build into our system the ability to handle a shift that starts in one day and ends in the next day,” he explains while talking about the difficulties the company had to face while making the tool.
Fortunately, the software was very well received. It helped the company save time while allowing employees to easily choose shifts, thus streamlining the entire process. However, the roll out process was quite complicated.
The History of GoEasyCare
Paul started the business in 1998 and the company has evolved since. What originally started as a ‘telephony business’ now covers several industries.
“We created a relationship with the largest homecare software provider in Canada,” Paul explains while talking about his company “Workers would clock in through our telephony service, and then clock out when they were leaving, and we did all the time calculation. So that’s kind of where we were.”
The program evolved with time as more businesses approached the company. With time, the team introduced new features to the program, thus creating an entirely new product. Despite stiff competition and the growing demands of consumers, the company has continued to do well due to its ability to adapt to the changing technology. Paul believes that knowing what you want to achieve makes things easier.
“You cannot rely on developers, especially offshore developers, to do the roadmap for you, you’ve got to come up with a plan, you’ve got to know where you’re going,” he emphasizes, “You can’t allow that to direct your business, you’ve got to kind of be in control of those processes.”
How They Helped in The Current Situation
Like most people, Paul didn’t see the pandemic coming but is glad that his company could help.
“All of our customers were heavily impacted by the pandemic, because they’re all healthcare,” he explains.
“We are exclusively in the healthcare sector, particularly developmental services and long term care. These companies had new rules to follow, they had patients and supportive individuals to protect and staff shortage.” he adds while explaining how their product helped.
“Our customers were able to quickly adapt using the GoEasyCare solution,” he says “because we’re a cloud product, those that could work from home can just work from home. With our product, it doesn’t matter where you are, as long as you have access to the internet, you can get access to our product and schedule and manage your business.”
Paul agrees that it wasn’t easy to deal with the situation, especially when it started to worsen.
The Connection with Innisfil
“It’s been really refreshing to have a connection with the DMZ,” said Paul while talking about the venture with the town of Innisfil. He thinks that working with DMZ has proven to be very beneficial for his organization.
“I could probably list the three biggest benefits that we received from the DMZ and why a startup should kind of go down in this direction,” he says while giving these benefits:
- Gives you access to expertise in many fields.
- Let’s you access resources that may cost you a lot otherwise.
- Provides access to dedicated mentors who can help you improve and even answer your queries
Workers were able to quickly adapt using the GoEasyCare solution
The Importance of Learning
Paul believes that learning never stops and it’s never too late to learn something. He believes that sometimes it takes people time to realize that they don’t understand everything. He asks entrepreneurs to be open to gaining knowledge that may come from different sources. If you don’t learn, you will never succeed. Paul thinks that learning or adopting new technology can be difficult. It’s a challenge that many businesses find difficult to overcome.
Here’s what he suggests: “Get the right people who are not afraid to fail.”
“If you’re a person that’s kind of timid or not willing to learn then you’re probably not an entrepreneur anyways, you might be running a company or something, but you just don’t have that hunger that says ‘I’m going to go out there and get it done,’” he wants.
