How Do We Find Good Babysitters?
During the time of a pandemic especially, it can be so hard to find RELIABLE, QUALIFIED, childcare providers! As The Baby Mavens have grown over the years we have found that a lot of families have “out grown” doula support- which is exactly what SHOULD happen. But we still want to provide you with the quality care of a babysitter that you have come to know from our company.
We pride ourselves on keeping our team full of women we consider to be “top notch caregivers” no matter what care they are providing. Many of our team members are direct first person referrals- including our sitters. They have come by the way of a friend or a client recommending that we speak with them. Occasionally, we have to reach out to our network of nannies, babysitters, moms, and dads to help us!
Once we connect with someone that is interested in helping us, we always ask for a resume first. HAVING a resume is usually a decent sign of a professional, someone who takes their work as a sitter seriously!
Then we schedule an initial phone call, you can learn a lot just by if the candidate actually answers the phone when they are supposed to! During the phone call we ask them about their experience. We think it’s important that our team members have infant experience, the more the better! We also ask them to tell us about a time when they were watching someone’s children- a time that was challenging, or a time that makes them proud. The best sitters always have the greatest story to tell us.
If we have a good feeling at the end of the call, we will ask the sitter to send us 3 references. And we will call ALL 3! We have been around long enough to quickly catch the “fake reference”, and we immediately remove the candidate who provided it. (And seriously? Who gives us the same phone number for more than one reference?!?!)
If you make it this far, and your references not only check out- but they are glowing, THEN we move to an in person interview. Meeting someone in person (or even over Zoom these days!) really matters! You can tell by their mannerisms- are they fidgeting? Searching really hard for the answer?
While we meet with them, we ask them to take our “Maven Test”- a short 2 page test with simple childcare related questions. This really helps us find out who is confident and who is best qualified to represent us!
It is a lot of work to find the right team members, and the right fit to care for someone’s most precious gift. We do not take it lightly- we put in all the hard work! Because you, your family, and your child deserve the best from us.
By: Laurie Oesterle
