Date: 4 December 2017

Karina Raphael of Whiddon Easton Park and Gail Aukett of Whiddon Maclean have been announced as joint-winners of this year’s Board of Directors Award.

Since 2007, The Whiddon Group’s Board of Directors Awards have recognised aged care employees who go the extra mile and truly live our values each and every day. They celebrate our people and recognise how they make a difference to the lives of those we care for.

With the incredible quality of the nominations received this year, for the very first time, the Board of Directors chose joint-winners. Karina and Gail are very deserving winners and were honoured at Whiddon’s 10th annual gala dinner last week.

Karina Raphael, a Registered Nurse from Whiddon Easton Park, began her journey with Whiddon as a new graduate in 2013. She was one of the first graduates of Whiddon’s transition to aged care program for Registered Nurses.

She then joined Whiddon’s Care Service Manager’s succession planning program. Karina stood out as someone who is talented, flexible, open to challenges and driven. Her high level of performance, professionalism and skills were recognised early on by the Management team.

The incredible start to her chosen career is testament to her adaptability, resilience and willingness to learn and grow. She has embraced opportunities and showed a passion for learning.

Karina relieved as Care Manager and did an incredible job managing a 120 bed service. She embraced this challenge with grace and enthusiasm and has since relived in other Care Manager positions.

Karina is able to quickly build trust with new residents and their families. She is approachable and has a calm and attentive manner that makes people feel comfortable. She’s also been recognised as an amazing mentor; she freely shares her knowledge with students and new staff and gives them incredible support on their own journey.

Gail Aukett, an Assistant in Nursing at Whiddon Maclean, has gone the extra mile to support staff at Maclean in manual handling and to raise awareness of the importance of mobility in the wellbeing of residents.

Gail is constantly sourcing and developing materials to assist clients, even making aids from materials such as pool noodles, all in her own time. She has been instrumental in the development and coordination of the AIN ‘Admin’ role. She ensures that relevant administration operations are up to date and has done an incredible job.

Gail is open to new ideas and champions the development and implementation of new systems and initiatives. Her positive outlook is refreshing. Her opinion is highly valued and she is well respected by her colleagues, residents and families. She nurtures and values the relationships she forms; the residents mean the world to her. She’s also a great role model and mentor.

Katrina and Gail, along with our nominees recognised on the night, have shown great dedication, passion, innovation and commitment.

The gala dinner also paid tribute to long serving employees and recipients of our 2018 scholarship awards. Janice Reynolds has given an incredible 35 years service to Whiddon and Patricia Willis, Jill Baguley, Cheryl Scott, Margaret Scofield, Bev Newby, Gilda Stewart and Rosemary Shephard were all recognised for 30 years of service.

Belinda Wood was awarded the CPS Scholarship and Priya Rangaiya was awarded the Triforce Group scholarship award.

Find out more about this year’s winners by watching the video below.