Handover to new nanny - should nanny or parents do this?

[fridayschild]

I have a new nanny (hurrah!) starting at the end of June when my current nanny goes on maternity leave. Our nanny has been with us for over 3 years and the children can remember no other carer - they are 5 and 3.5.

I had assumed that the order of events would be

1. much-loved nanny leaves
2. new nanny starts and is introduced the the role by myself and DH through a combination of holiday/ shirking from home.

However DH says surely much-loved nanny can hand over much more effectively than we can? For a start she knows the mums at school better, so she could introduce new nanny to them. I know faces (well most of them) but not all the names . Also DS2 sticks to me like a limpet when I am around so our new nanny will probably have a better chance of forging a decent relationship with him if I am not there.

Views, anyone?

The ideal, I think, is both.
So, new nanny comes and tags along with current nanny for a couple of days. This should I think be a few days before much-loved nanny's last day, as the last day is likely to be a bit heart-rending; and it also means new nanny has a few days to check things with old nanny as & when new nanny has questions.

Then, when she starts, she tags along with you or dh so she sees how you do things. (Which may be different from current nanny: thus new nanny gets to see the dynamic from both sides.)

PS - nannies we've had say two days' handover is enough.

We had our last levely nanny do the handover for all the reasons your DH mentioned-we however did a whole week so she got to know where everything was-each activity such as swimming etc.Have to say this was probably a bit too long.
However,both nannies were very mature about and have remained friends.
Our nannies were both live in and we did ask the departing nanny if she minded moving into the spare room when new nanny arrived and that was fine too.

We hope to change from nanny to AuPair shortly and am dreading it ass dd aged 3 has only remembers current nanny of 2yrs as her carer.

Good luck!

We had a three day handover. New nanny got to see a reasonable cross section of activities etc. Old nanny also set up a few play dates with nicest other nannies and had a few people round to tea.

New nanny left early on last day as old nanny wanted to do much sobbing and clutching (slightly bemused) DCs to her heaving bosom (she was going to Australia to work for a year). New nanny then got on with it - she is v expereience - and we told her not to worry at all about ringing us at work to ask where the scissors were etc.

We have a reasonably large house but we were definitely a bit over-nannied on those three days. Have no idea how Madonna with her "one nanny per child" thing manages it.

Glad to hear you have got someone sorted. It was Bink who recommended Eden Nannies to me, by the way, so she obviously passed the "grand enough for them" test!

When I had my first live in nanny job the temporary nanny went through everything with me and I made notes of the routine. The mum didn't do a lot.

DD was so crazy about DKiwiN, I think it was slightly off putting at first when our current nanny arrived and did the handover. But it was a good idea overall- new nanny seemed to cope with that w/o a confidence crisis (as one would hope!) and it wasn't for very long in any case.

For me it might depend slightly on how I thought the personality mix would work.

One thing I was slightly worried about is that there was a pay differential between the two people - DKiwiN was more experienced in a variety of ways and did get paid more. Which I was keen for them not to discuss.

I think your DH has a point about old nanny actually being better qualified in some respects... but of course not in all respects. I would let old nanny and new nanny have an initial handover and then I'd pick up and finish it off. There might be some advice from old nanny to new that you would prefer not to have been communicated. But, then as your DH points out, there might be some valuable information that only old nanny can give (like "DD love paymate x, but when x hangs out with y she is mean to DD, so avaoid playdates that include y")

When I was about to get a new nanny, old nanny took it upon herself to creat a handover book for new nanny. Everything from weekly activities to who lives where, etc. I hadn.t asked her to do this and was possitively thrilled when she told me what she had done. But then, one of her tips for new nanny was that you don't really need to get dressed in the morning, just roll out of bed and show for work... That was not tip I would have passed on.

Thanks - very helpful. Now, how do I break the news to DH that he is right?

I bet Bink is a member of the House of Lords, masquerading as a normal human being. Your ladyship, I salute you for your agency recommendations. The new nanny has come from KiwiOz, and is German (?) - so much for English mother tongue as my Really The One Thing Which Is Not Negotiable.

in all of my jobs i havent had a handover period, i just start and beacially am in the deep end so to speak - which tbh is fine by me - having parents around or an old nanny makes things harder for child imo

my last job i left as children were eventually at ft school and family needed after school care only and i showed new nanny the ropes - this was at Mb request - she followd me about for a week - was a pain in the arse tbh

1 day maybe, 5 days - no way!!!