For National Disability Employment Awareness Month, we’ve compiled the many tips, strategies, and leverage points that providers identified as critical to their success. These include tips for planning, cultivating partners and funding, staffing, and supporting beneficiaries.
Planning and Preparation for a Successful Transition
Develop and implement a strategic plan.
Take small incremental steps to build infrastructure and slowly reallocating resources.
Establish a committee to identify strategies for the workshop transition. Include parents and caregivers of individuals who have transitioned from the workshop to successful integrated employment on the committee and ensure the committee reports to the provider’s Board of Directors regularly.
Utilize technical assistance resources and subject matter experts, including those focusing on individualized supports and person-centered planning.
Stay connected to other providers who have either gone through, or are undergoing, the same transformative change. Learn from each other.
Create a core team that really believes in the integrated model. The team should get together regularly so they can overcome issues and keep things moving to avoid falling back on the old model.
Implement a holistic approach that includes "wrap-around" services to meet the diverse needs of their customers.
Communicate with families about their fears.
Make sure the community hears about the program’s successes during the transition. Utilize newsletters, email blasts, board meetings, parents groups, and other relevant forums to highlight the positive experiences of successfully employed individuals.
And much more....