I have been a part of presentation teams at the Community Living Ontario annual conference so many times, I honestly don’t know what the count is! More than 10 presentations for sure. This includes representing LiveWorkPlay, but also several From Presence To Citizenship sessions, and now something new, co-presenting with a local partner organization, Total Communication Environment!
I was pleased to be the warm-up act with the important content coming from Julie Kingstone, Grace Hudson, and Robin Myers. We all hope that this was delivered with humility and received in the spirit of learning. A lot of “training” in our sector is, to be honest, shallow and inconsequential. It is something to “get done” and a “box to check” before heading back to business as usual. This partnership is not that. There are real changes happening and this is impacting positively on the quality of life of supported individuals and their families. Real change only happens when you are willing to be vulnerable.
As part of the session, I had asked delegates to consider their mission, vision, values, and other statements about their organization, and how well that actually plays out in their day-to-day work. After a couple of self-assessments that might not have reflected what I was trying to get at, one of the most experienced leaders in the sector put up her hand and said something like…
“We have invested in person-centred learning and training for more than a decade, have brought in consultants x/y/z, and have completed/implemented x/y/z and more. And I would say we are at about a 5/10.”
It felt like that level of vulnerability, humility, and honesty shifted the mood of the entire room. There was no longer a reason to pretend that we are all perfect. After all, in reality, as direct service agencies a lot of what we would like to do and how we’d like to interact with people is literally made impossible.
We don’t control Developmental Services access. So we can’t fix the dehumanizing aspects of that process, and this means by the time people get to us, they’ve already experienced much of the opposite of how we want to be with people.
We don’t control funding. So people who have none, or not enough, come to us with what they do have, and we are often the first people they’ve had a chance to sit with and vent their frustration and despair, when we would much rather be talking about their hopes and aspirations.
And we don’t control the community – physical, financial, and mainly attitudinal barriers that get in the way of inclusion in every aspect of life.
So nobody is a 10/10. It isn’t possible.
But also, none of us is doing the very best that we can, even within this challenging context. A lot of our failures to deliver truly person-centred support that is focused on the best life for the individual have to do with internal barriers of our own making.
And one of those barriers is not seeking out others and being willing to engage in learning where we are open about where we are failing and beubg willing to do something about it.
In some ways the LiveWorkPlay and TCE partnership is just getting started. We have so much to do. But I am glad we all stopped and took stock of some of the real and verifiable progress. Robin’s stories revealed undeniable improvements and benefits in the lives of supported individuals.
It also reveals that (of course) dedicated people working in this field don’t want to be cogs in the machine. They want to make a difference. And they enjoy their work a lot more when they have that opportunity, even if it means extra learning and extra work.
To be continued. Maybe we will have an update at CLO 2027!
Keenan Speaks 