There’s a lot of jargon in community services. Sometimes we have a general idea of what something means, so it helps to have it spelled out. Here, we tackle ‘capacity building’.
Capacity building is developing the strengths of individuals. When done effectively, it empowers people to have an influence over their environment and actively create their own future.
The NDIS see capacity building as making sure people with disability and their families have the skills, resources and confidence they need to participate in the community or access the same kind of opportunities or services as other people.
From teaching life skills like cooking, to developing vocational skills in the workplace, capacity building overcomes different challenges to achieving goals and wraps various services around an individual to make it happen.
If you have an NDIS plan, your Support Coordinator will work with you – and with different providers in your NDIS plan – to help you get the most out of your plan. As Support Coordinators, we can help facilitate the collaboration of different providers in their efforts to assist you to achieve your goals.
For example, your goal might be to cook some meals for your partner. Your Support Coordinator could take the following steps to help your Occupational Therapist (OT) and support workers assist you in achieving this:
Requesting your OT use a portion of the Improved Daily Living budget to assess a certain area of your day-to-day life.
This could include cooking a meal in your kitchen to see if there are any barriers that make this harder for you that could be resolved.
Requesting a plan from the OT that outlines key activities that your support workers can do with you each week to strengthen certain skills.
This might mean a short session with your OT and support workers to demonstrate and talk through the activities with you.
Your support workers would then assist you with cooking meals for your partner and with the exercises and check-ins with your OT as required.
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For more examples of capacity building and how Support Coordination can help you or your loved one, contact Pillar Support Coordination on hello@pillar.org.au or call 08 6253 4700.
