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A headshot of a woman wearing a denim overshirt and a purple t-shirt. She is smiling.

When opportunity knocks …

By Our people
HousingNIStaff

When opportunity knocks …

A headshot of a woman wearing a denim overshirt and a purple t-shirt. She is smiling.

Kayla May, Service Coordinator

“The opportunities are there; you just have to take them.”
– Kayla 

Since stepping up to a Service Coordinator role, our Deniliquin-based staff member Kayla May has enjoyed playing a greater role in improving quality of life for her customers.

Kayla’s career path

“I started in this disability home in 2015. I was a casual support worker. Back in my 20s, I started working in community aged care and supporting young people with complex disabilities.

“I found I enjoyed looking after people. When I moved to the disability home, I enjoyed building relationships with the customers. I would do eight hour shifts instead of visiting a person for one hour. It was more rewarding for me. I’ve now got relationships with the customers and their families, and there’s something special about that.

“Since becoming a service coordinator, I’m enjoying a closer connection with the allied health practitioners who visit our house. I have also built a really good connection with our support coordinator. I like to know the ins and outs of my customers’ plans so I can have a say about what funding they might need. If someone needs a holiday, or new equipment, I’ll let the support coordinator know and talk about what we need to do to make it happen.”

A woman is lying in a wheelchair with another woman leaning over looking and talking to her.

Kayla loves her job supporting customers living in Northcott’s disability home in Deniliquin.

Internship program

“In 2022, I had the opportunity to participate in the Northcott Innovation (NI) Supported Living Lab Internship program. I liked the idea of getting workers together without managers to solve some of the complex issues we have. I also liked being given the opportunity to participate from Deniliquin, which is a very long way from head office.

“I really enjoyed getting to know other support workers. Working out in Deni, we don’t have that connection with other staff. It was really good to know that we’re not alone, that others have issues.

“I was very nervous, but also excited when my idea was chosen by NI to be presented to the Northcott Board. I’m now working with NI to develop my project further. It is a really good feeling to know I’m actually making a difference.”
– Kayla

Kayla’s innovative idea from the Internship

The challenge
Customer support plans are often complex. Bringing new support workers up to speed on each customer’s unique support needs and preferences is time consuming. How can Northcott improve this for customers and staff?

The solution
InstaSupport – short, informative videos that demonstrate how customers prefer to be supported – as per their support plans. At the start of a shift, new support workers watch the videos to quickly learn about each customer’s individual needs and preferences.

Working in disability

“If disability is what you want to do, Northcott is a great place to work.

“When I started working here [at Northcott’s disability home in Deniliquin], I never thought I’d be a service coordinator eight years later. It was never in the plan. When it was suggested that I should step up, that’s just what I did.

“A big aspect I focus on in this house is keeping the skills our customers have. For example, we have one customer who can do her own washing. That means a lot to her. Seeing the smile on her face when she accomplishes that, it’s rewarding.

“Working in disability is not as scary as you think. It can be complex at times, it can be difficult at times, but you have all the support you need. It’s really rewarding. It is a great job.”

19 October 2023
Two young women sitting a table talking. They are in front of a whiteboard which says "support workers", "young adults" "communicate.

A role helping all young 
people with disability

By Innovative Projects
Two young women sitting a table talking. They are in front of a whiteboard which says "support workers", "young adults" "communicate.

Tyra Buteux (left) and Hannah Ogden (right) are Northcott’s Community Research Officers.

ResearchStaffWork and Study Skills

A role helping all young
people with disability

Of the Northcott staff who have shared with us that they have a disability, 84% of them have an invisible disability.

Hannah Ogden and Tyra Buteux are customers from our Casula Work & Study service. They have joined our workforce as our first Community Research Officers.

Hannah and Tyra work with Sam Frain, Northcott’s Senior Manager for Research and Innovation, and a team of researchers and co-workers undertaking a research project into relationships between young people with intellectual disability and their paid support workers. As young people with intellectual disability themselves, the pair provide ideas on how to best carry out research with this cohort of young people. They participate in meetings with other researchers and have helped to design workshops so young participants with disability feel comfortable sharing their stories. One of their more challenging tasks is helping to translate complex written information into language that is easy to understand by young people with disability.

Tyra

“Me, Sam and Hannah work with Sally from Flinders University and Karen from the University of New South Wales. We talk about everyday harms, abuse and when things are not going well between a support worker and young person with intellectual disability.

We also work with Ruby and Rachel who are community researchers, like me and Hannah. We see them online on Zoom. I like that we all have different skills in how we work in a team and solve problems.

We are helping to plan workshops because we know what it’s like [for young people with intellectual disability]. It’s important that we tell the other researchers, so they know how to help young people.

The best thing about this job is helping people. It feels good to be helping to make things better. I have also enjoyed going to places and meeting new people. When I first went to the city, it was new to me, so, I got a little bit anxious about it. Afterwards I was okay. I’m definitely more confident when I get to meet new people now.”

Hannah

“Me, Tyra, Ruby and Rachel are all young adults with disability. We are part of the research group because we have a better understanding about what looks right and what looks wrong for people like us.

I got this job is because I wanted to speak my mind and be heard. I wanted to be a voice for people like me to improve the system because there are some cracks that people are not aware of.

It feels really good to have this job. I like being a double agent … I am a staff member on one day, then a customer on the other day.

My favourite thing has been going on to the university campus. I’ve been driving past the uni for the past 26 years going to the Children’s Hospital for appointments. I’ve dreamed of just stepping one foot on there. To be able to go there and be in a meeting room, it’s like my dream came true. We work for Northcott, but we’re part of their research team. So, in a way, we’re staff of the University of New South Wales.”

About the project

Northcott is proud to be a research partner in “Confronting everyday harms: preventing abuse of people with disability”, led by the Flinders University Disability & Community Inclusion research team.

“Everyday harms” is the term used to describe the little interactions which can either build or break a support relationship. These actions, which can include ignoring somebody, silencing a person or simply not acknowledging them, can have a huge impact on the quality of paid support.

Hannah and Tyra’s research project is identifying these types of actions and looking for ways to turn them into positive practice so they do not become forms of abuse or violence for people with disability.

The research is being delivered in collaboration with Flinders University, University of NSW Sydney Social Policy Research Centre, University of Melbourne, NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, Northcott, VACRO, Purple Orange, SA Department of Human Services, Bedford Phoenix Inc, Mable, Disability Advocacy Network Australia (DANA), Novita, and genU. The project is funded by an Australian Linkages Grant.

19 October 2023
A group shot of seven people, all looking at the camera, smiling. They are a culturally diverse group.

Supported Living Lab Internship

By Innovative Projects

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HousingNIStaff

Supported Living Lab Internship

5 PROJECTS from the 2022 program are being explored further by Northcott and NI teams.

Our second cohort of interns graduated from the Northcott Innovation (NI) Supported Living Lab Internship program in September 2023. This unique learning opportunity offers Northcott support workers a chance to learn human-centred design skills while contributing to better outcomes for customers who live in our disability homes and the staff who support them.

Northcott’s innovation subsidiary NI works alongside customers and people with disability to find ways to do things better or solve challenges in the disability sector. One of the team’s initiatives is the Supported Living Lab (SL/Lab). This co-design hub is focused on improving the quality of supports and services provided to Northcott customers living in our homes.

In 2022, NI launched the SL/Lab Internship Program for support workers from our disability homes. An enthusiastic group of frontline workers from across NSW participated in the inaugural internship, and the second cohort will complete their internship later in 2023.

Over 7 months, interns learn skills in communication, problem solving and human-centred design from experts and educators from Northcott and the disability sector. Additionally, through a partnership with the University of Technology Sydney’s School of Design, they gain skills in design thinking and the design process. Each participant brings a challenge to the group that they believe, if solved, will positively impact the lives of customers. Over the course of the internship, participants put their new skills to use to explore and develop a solution to their issue before pitching their idea to the NI Board. Solutions with the potential to make a difference to customers and/or staff are adopted by NI and Northcott for further development and, down the track, implementation.

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Our 2023 Interns

Evelyn
“I have gained an understanding of and experience in Human Centred Service design, which puts customers’ needs, desires and abilities at the centre of the development process.”

Bernard
“I have enjoyed learning how to identify problems, how to choose strategies to address the issues and how to plan and execute the tactics needed to achieve customers’ goals.”

Sofia
“I’ve enjoyed hearing and experiencing how to work with others. It’s been good making new friends as it is hard to find others because we all work in small groups.”

Bernard
“I am walking away with knowledge I can apply at work and in my lifetime experiences. I am not the same guy who started at the beginning of the program. I have grown and am proud of my educators and myself.”

Kumba
“I found it interesting having people with lived experience of disability educate us about their experiences and the ways we can support them better. I also enjoyed the UTS session … and having the opportunity to meet members of Northcott who shared their work experiences.”

Mitul
“This has given me the opportunity to think outside the box, learn from my own experiences, identify problems and find solutions. It has enabled me to be a changemaker and stand up for customer voice and choice.”

19 October 2023