Last week I had the pleasure of hosting a roundtable discussion at the Twelfth Annual Coleman Institute National Conference, The State of the States in Cognitive Disability and Technology: 2012.
My topic for the roundtable was “The Next Generation of Service and Support Organizations.”
The discussion at the table was lively as we looked into the near future and the needed changes to services and supports in the field of serving individuals with one or more developmental disabilities. Below are some ideas, in no particular order, which came from the discussion.
The next generation of providers will adopt the use of emerging technology through organizational cultural shifts. Technical skills will override care giving in the description of the new support staff. A generation ago, we spent hours training caregivers how to manipulate a wheelchair and an accessible vehicle. Moving forward, navigating the variety of devices that are specific to the client of services support will take precedence. Providers and Direct Support Professionals (DSPs) will be team oriented and geographically dispersed. They will be connected with other team members and those they serve in real time via social and enterprise network tools. Future DSPs must be able to find a story in the data set and provide a coherent narrative about key data insight. DSPs must also be able to communicate with numbers, visually and verbally.
The next generation of providers will not strive for personal independence among the population it serves; rather, it will create an environment within which people will thrive. Providers will continue to undergo cultural shifts. We have moved from institutional settings to smaller institutional settings, to group homes, to host homes, to maintenance and support in the parents’ home. What happens next? I’m not entirely sure, but I know this – organizations need to be preparing now. For example, at Imagine!, we already have a Tech Architect and an Assistive Tech Specialist. Right now, those titles may sound exotic, but they will be standard positions for service organizations in the future.
Provider companies will be using cloud-based data, and lots of it, to inform company decisions. Company decision-makers will all be data savvy and include a person responsible for managing big data. This will further find its way to direct service and supports. We will collect and have access to huge amounts of real time mobile information that will inform very specific details about support touch points.
End-users of services and supports are no longer isolated. They are far savvier than their predecessors. They have a presence in the social media world. They are exercising their rights to an extent that was unthinkable only a few short years ago. Providers are no longer the decision-makers. Control has shifted, and rightly so. The idea that our goal is for people to be independent is old and ridiculous. Sure, people need touch points of support and service. The goal now is to thrive. The hermit life of independence, lonely self-sufficiency is not it. So let's stop pretending.
The discussion lasted an hour, which was unfortunate, because I felt we could have gone on much longer. I was really impressed by the deep thought and creative ideas that came from the roundtable participants.
I’d love to hear what my blog readers think, as well. Please leave a comment below.
Then again, what do I know?
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