For the most important hire you will ever make, the key is asking the right questions.
A nanny takes care of your most valuable resources, your children and your home, and represents your family. You are the gatekeeper for your family, and in many ways, she will become the face of the family.
Choosing the right agency
The first question to ask is to determine which service to use. It helps to get a personal referral. When you’re shopping for a high end car, you go to the best store. This is not the time to look for a bargain and don’t make the mistake of using several agencies. You’ll likely see some of the same candidates. Read up on how they find their candidates, what their screening practices are. Look for a nice, kind, friendly agency.

A good agency will ask lots of questions. They will want to know your personality and the personality of each one of the children, your schedule, what household chores would lighten your load, like running errands, preparing a tasty dinner a few nights a week, or home management experience.

On Your mark, Get set, Go
Your first job is to decide what you actaully need and want:

  • Daily and weekly schedule- full or part time
  • Duties, expectations
  • Salary range
  • Skill sets, like bilingual, cooking
  • Educational level
  • Flexibility–like being able to travel or help with occasional evenings
  • Live-in or live-out

Be as specific as possible in your description
We recommend finding the best personality match for your family and being negotiable about specific skill-sets.

Narrowing down the candidates 

Your Placement counselor will take your Family Application and the information from the phone interview and go through their data base of nannies to find a handful of very close matches. She is doing the work for you so do consider each of them. She may start with 15 candidates and narrow the list down to 3-5 best matches for you. She is looking at the ages of children the nannies have had recent experience with, how close she lives to you, how her personality matches with yours, skill sets, schedule and salary. She is doing the digging for you. When she says, “meet everyone we send you , even if it’s just for 15 minutes”, do it.

Let the agency save you stress and  time. Trust them. A picky nanny agency will  go through 25 applications before finding one to interview. After an in-person interview, a decision is made whether to proceed with reference and background checks. Our goal is that your choice will be based on the best personality match for your family between a few top-quality candidates.

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The murder of 2 children in NYC by their babysitter/nanny has  everyone  horrified and distraught—especially  parents who have hired childcare for their family. It has every nanny agency owner –almost all of whom are parents—grappling to understand what could have gone so wrong. How did a seemingly capable caregiver go from loving nanny to murderer? Believe me, I have been reading  every shred of news I can find to try and understand how this tragedy could have ever happened.
Those of us owners who belong to an organization called APNA (the  Association of Premier Nanny Agencies) subscribe to the highest level of screening practices. I know we are all wondering, if this woman had come to us, would we have picked up something about her which would have eliminated her from placement. The truth is without all the facts of the case, we don’t know.
Here’s what we do know. Careful screening of caregivers by professionals does help weed out people who should not be taking care of children. Real background  checks—not the cheap ones provided by online sites—are part of the process. But in this case, the woman probably had no prior record. It does appear, however, that her life was unraveling and she was becoming  psychologically untethered.
This case is a statistical anomaly. There are thousands upon thousands of wonderful nannies providing excellent care for children and allowing parents to go to work knowing that their children are in loving hands. But just one case like this is one too many.  No one wants to be that anomaly.  When the facts emerge about this woman, I hope we have some take away that will make us  better at what we try to do best– protect the  safety and welfare of children.
 

One Response to Traged

Judi Merlin says:

  1.  

    Thank you for speaking to eloquently for all of us in the nanny agency business. We are all grieving for this family.
    These heartfelt comments were posted by Barbara Kline, owner of White House Nannies and one of our affiliate APNA Nanny Agencies in Washington DC, who we were just with at the 2102 APNA convention two weeks ago. Her thoughts resonate with our hearts, as we grieve with this family that has suffered such an unimaginable loss.
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Jenny Riojas, Placement Counselor at Caring Nannies is pictured with the staff from ABC Nannies in Denver, CO and The Help Company in CA.

JENNY REPRESENTS CARING NANNIES AT 2012 APNA CONFERENCE IN WASHINGTON DC
On October 11-13, I was privileged to attend the 2012 Association of Premier Nanny Agencies (APNA) annual conference in Washington DC with top-notch nanny agencies from all over the US. Dynamic professionals in the domestic staffing industry networked, shared, and generated ideas to better serve our families and nannies in our own Phoenix community.

We shared ideas about how to exceed client expectations, how to attract top candidates and communicate our vision, expectations and boundaries effectively with our nannies. We want to create a common feeling of pride and belonging and to detail our commitment to them. Events like this help us stay on top of the lastest background checks, providing high quality customer service, and ways to improve our service to our trusted, loyal families. Belonging to APNA (Association of Premier Nanny Agencies) and the INA (International

Nanny Association) and DEMA (Domestic Estate Managers Association) signifies an adherence to rigorous standards and ethics in the direction we take our business. Caring Nannies is continually striving to improve our offerings and give each family the top-notch help they deserve.
We have a vision to be the premier agency in Arizona and we’re so grateful to our wonderful nannies and valued families for bringing us to the place we are now.
We feel that we are not only building a business but building friendships as well.  Since we are the only agency in AZ affiliated with APNA, we have much pride in attending these national conferences and implementing all that we learn to continue to be at the top of our industry.
I reunited with old friends, made new friends, toured the sights of Washington DC, and enjoyed a fulfilling, successful weekend!

Jenny exploring the White House and DC while attending the 2012 APNA conference.

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