I came to Liaise in 2006 and it was my first job in Health and Social care following working in Hospitality and Retail sectors. I initially joined as a part time cook working at Applelea for money to tide me over until I decide what I wanted to do next in my career. This started a long and happy journey into supporting autistic adults. Around one and half years later, I had come to enjoy working with the service users and started working as a Support Worker and Cook. I completed my NVQ Level 2 and 3. On completion of my Level 3, an opportunity came up to be a Specialist Worker at Applelea (now split into Deputy Manager and Positive Support Coordinator roles). I had my qualifications and experience of working at lower level management from my previous workplaces. This then started my journey to Positive Support Coordinator in 2010. I continued to work at Applelea until 2013 when Sansa House opened, and I moved over and learnt about setting up a new service and completed my QCF Level 5. When the Specialist Worker roles were split into Deputy Manager and Positive Support Coordinator my experience showed I was best suited for the Positive Support Coordinator role. I have since completed my BPhil Special Education Autism: Adults DE through Birmingham University adding theory and qualification to my experience. In 2020 I moved to Karibu Place as Positive Support Coordinator to start a new challenge. During my time as Positive Support Coordinator I have enjoyed learning from the Positive Support Team about PROACT-SCIPr-UK®, TEACH and Active support among other support methods and from Professor Andy McDonnell on the low arousal approach, stress reduction and my favourite, the use of “Flow activities”. In my time, alongside my positive approach to life, I have put into practice all that I have learnt to improve the health and happiness of the service users and thus reduce incidents. During my time at Sansa House, I have been part of the team that achieved an overall CQC rating of Outstanding in 2017 and 2020 (“Flow activities” is mentioned in the 2020 report), prior to my move to Karibu Place. With my experience I look forward to supporting Karibu Place to achieve an outstanding rating. Reduce stress, improve health, and increase happiness for co-workers and service users reaps positive results. This is the way.
