Autism YO U R
www.autism.org.uk
Growing independence supplement
MAGA ZINE WINTER 2016
JOBS Q& A Your questions answered
AUTICON
The company that only employs autistic consultants
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OUR NEW EMPLOYMENT CAMPAIGN PERSON-CENTRED TRANSITION PLANNING
Enterprising
The latest in work experience schemes
A home of his own …and the ten-year battle to secure Jon’s care
2007
Welcome 6 10 14
T
Contents
he move into adulthood is never easy. Finding out who you are, what you want to do with your life and breaking away from your parents are huge challenges. All the more so when you are autistic. Jon is 34 now and at last has his own home and 24-hour care from The National Autistic Society. But his parents, Simon and Linda, faced a ten-year battle to get there. Thwarted at every turn by funders, they persevered because they wanted Jon to have his independence. Read their amazing story on page 6. If you’re job hunting, be sure to read our Q&A with Danielle Inwood, our employment expert, on page 10. She answers your questions sent in via Facebook, tackling the thorny issues of whether to disclose your autism, how to cope with interviews and how to ask for workplace support. There’s advice on putting your child’s needs first when planning for their future (page 16) and an exclusive interview with the founders of IT consultancy Auticon, which employs 80 autistic people (page 18). Enjoy!
04 News: Growing independence update 06 Our story: Simon and Linda on their struggle to get a home for their son, Jon 10 Q&A: Our employment expert answers your questions and Rachel explains how she dealt with anxiety at work 14 Feature: The latest social enterprise initiatives 16 Advice: How to make your child’s needs heard during transition
Suzanne Westbury
18 Feature: Auticon, the IT company that exclusively employs autistic consultants
EDITOR
Your Autism Magazine Growing Independence Supplement
DESIGN James Pembroke Publishing www.jppublishing.co.uk PRINT Wyndeham Grange Tel: 01273 592244 F RO N T C OV E R Photography by Steve Hickey https://stevehickeyphotography.com/
The National Autistic Society is a charity registered in England and Wales (269425) and in Scotland (SC039427) and a company limited by guarantee registered in England (No.1205298), registered office 393 City Road London EC1V 1NG
In the interest of providing the widest possible range of information to readers, we may include details of some of the many approaches to autism now available. However, this does not imply our charity’s endorsement of any particular approach or product.
Copyright The National Autistic Society 2016
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News
A round-up of the stories that affect you OUR TRANSITION SUPPORT EXPANDS ACROSS THE UK
Employment campaign launches Only 16 per cent of autistic adults
are in full-time paid employment. And in almost a decade the situation hasn’t improved. That’s why we’re launching a new phase of our Too Much Information campaign, to ensure autistic people get the jobs they deserve. Campaigns Officer, Jessica Leigh, said, “While full-time work won’t be right for everyone on the spectrum, four in 10 of those working part-time feel underemployed. Others feel they are in low-skilled work and employers don’t see their abilities. They see
their autism. They see a problem. Meanwhile, employers have told us that they are worried about getting things wrong for autistic employees and that they don’t know where to go for advice. “We need the Government to take decisive action to double the number of autistic people in work. We need employers who understand autism, the person, and what to do.” Read the report, watch our film and sign the petition at www.autism.org.uk/tmi.
NEW SCHOOL TO FOCUS ON ENTERPRISE We are excited to be opening the latest of our autism-specific schools. The new Anderson School in Chigwell, Essex is expected to open in September 2017 to local autistic students aged 11-19. As part of the Enterprise Campus, the school will focus on developing employment and life skills in preparation for an adult working life. The school will work in partnership with local businesses to achieve this. To keep updated and find out more visit www.autism.org.uk/enterprisecampus.
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Families in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland will now be able to access help from our transition support service. First piloted in England, the free service helps young autistic people, parents and carers to prepare for the transition from school to further education or adult life. We are currently training volunteers throughout the UK who will provide specialist advice and information on transition planning, exploring options, social security benefits and community care. To contact the service, leave a message on 0808 800 0027 (free from landlines and most mobiles) and we will call you back. Or you can email transitionsupport@nas.org. uk or visit www.autism.org.uk/ transition. We would like to thank John and Marianne Swannell and friends for their ongoing support as part of their aim to help to transform the lives of young autistic people and their families. Find out more at www. autism.org.uk/transition.
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FEATURE • OUR STORY
Home sweet
home Simon and Linda Green fought for ten years to get their son Jon his own home with 24-hour care.
Simon and Linda Green, Jon’s parents
“J
on was nearly five when we got his autism diagnosis. First of all we thought he was deaf. I saw our GP with my oldest son, and Jon was sitting on the floor playing. I said to the doctor, ‘while we’re here, could you just look at my younger son’s ears as he doesn’t always hear when I call him’. So he checked Jon over and tried to talk to him and straight away he said, ‘I think I’ll refer you on to the hospital’. A while later we got his diagnosis. Jon started a local nursery until they asked us to take him away. They couldn’t manage him. So he went to a local special school until he was 15. But then the head teacher told us that when he was 16, he was going to be excluded. He said he had the right to do that. Jon was quite a handful in school and they found his challenging behaviour difficult. It’s quite apparent when you’re getting to the end of education and not quite into adult services that neither of them wants to know you. They wash their hands of you in education ‘you’ll be off soon anyway, what’s the point?’ And adult services say ‘you’re not old enough yet, we don’t want to know’. We didn’t want Jon to fall into that 16-18 gap. We managed to get Jon into Helen Allison School, run by The National Autistic Society, for two years. Then he went into a residential house in Kent run by a different provider, with three others from the school. But he was only there
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for a very short time because they couldn’t handle his behaviour. He was in a self-contained flat, down the end of a corridor. I think a lot of the time, they shut the door and left him there. He started having epileptic seizures when he was 17 and a lot of his behaviours stemmed from that. We put a lot of faith into that place. We thought ‘these people are experts’ and on reflection, they weren’t. So it all fell down. To our disgust to this day, after six weeks they said ‘come and take him away’. So we bought
OUR STORY • FEATURE
Jon’s living room is an exact replica of his room in Simon and Linda’s house
him back here and that’s where he was for the following ten years.
FIGHTING FOR CARE AND JON’S INDEPENDENCE We existed on outreach for a few hours a week, initially from the Bromley Autistic Trust (now called Burgess Autistic Trust). Then we upped that to three afternoons a week and he started going to The National Autistic Society’s services at Coney Hall. But he was never really a day centre person. He just used it as a base from which to go out. He didn’t really like all the people making noises and grabbing things off his plate. He obviously doesn’t realise that he makes noise as well! But he used to sit in the corner and wait for us to come and get him, or would just sit looking out of the window. We thought going to a day service, he wouldn’t feel lonely… but in fact he’s quite a loner and in activities he’d just do the barest minimum and withdraw. We gradually realised that a residential place wasn’t for him. He’s very careful about his possessions. He’s got a room where everything’s laid out just so. Even if you dust in there, he’ll come in and straighten things up. That’s the
difficulty with sharing with somebody else, other people don’t know those boundaries. We were told we’d never get funding for his 24-hour social care or for a place of his own. But we knew we couldn’t live like this forever. What would happen when we got to 70 or 80 and Jon’s care became a crisis rather than planning for it? We were bashing away at social services, saying that for years. And they took no notice at all. Social services stopped replying to our calls and emails. Except one day a social worker replied to us, probably in error, pressing ‘send’ too early. Her email closed off: ‘Look,
“They weren’t managing him very well at all and he was in a flat down at the end of a corridor. I think a lot of the time, they shut the door and left him there.” GROWING INDEPENDENCE SUPPLEMENT
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FEATURE • OUR STORY
Abraham and Chris, Jon’s support workers provide 24-hour care
he’s home and he’s safe and we’ve got other priorities so basically as far as we’re concerned he’s looked after and that’s it’. That lit the touch paper! We went to a local solicitor who specialises in special needs and the council got all shirty with us because we’d involved the legal people and why did we need to do that?!
Jon is non-verbal and uses a visual timetable to set out his day
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ACHIEVING FUNDING After a long time and several further assessments, social services decided that we were never going to go away. They started to get health involved and effectively transferred the cost of Jon’s 24-hour care over to Continuing Healthcare [care that is arranged and funded by the NHS for individuals who are not supported in hospital and have been assessed as having a ‘primary health need’]. Jon can be quite challenging and needs a higher ratio of experienced staff to take care of him. Once the support package was agreed, we could go out looking for a place for Jon to live. Jon’s bungalow popped up quite quickly and we were lucky enough to be able to secure the mortgage for it against our own property. So that Jon is not deemed to have any assets himself, we have a complicated arrangement where we had to put Jon’s property into a discretionary trust, which is managed by us and Jon’s siblings. The trust owns the property and leases it to Golden Lane Housing, who lease it to Jon. They claim housing benefit on Jon’s behalf and use that to pay us rent, which offsets the mortgage. The majority of people in his street are elderly. It’s in a close so there’s no rush of traffic, it’s
OUR STORY • FEATURE
Jon now takes on small household jobs including the recycling
a safe little place. It’s near the station so his support staff from The National Autistic Society can get there quite easily.
PREPARING TO MOVE IN We spent four months fitting Jon’s home out. He’s got an obsession with collecting Thomas VHS videos and books. So we ordered a load of videos, all copies of what he’s got at home, had the same bookcase, put them in the same order. We basically replicated his bedroom and living room at home. We made a little picture book where we had photos of our house, his brother’s house and his sister’s house and we said ‘this is Jon’s house’. We took him there one day and let him have a look around. I think he worked out that this was going to be his. He just smiled as he looked around and he was probably thinking, this has got all my stuff in it. Over many weeks we gradually built up to Jon spending longer there with his support workers. Three years on, he does seem to be happy to have his own place. We still do his shopping once a week and we’re landlords, so we come round and fix stuff. But if he happens to come home and catch us there, he acknowledges us
“He worked out that this was going to be his. He just smiled as he looked around and he was probably thinking, this has got all my stuff in it.”
but won’t really look at us because we’re not supposed to be there! Jon lays the table, helps change the quilt covers and takes recycling out. He’ll make a cup of tea, doing everything except pour the water. He’s become more adaptable and a lot calmer. He’s happy, that’s the main thing and as a consequence we can spend time doing things together, look after our grandchildren and even take a short holiday!
LESSONS LEARNT Giving up was never an option. You do get slapped down but you sit back and think and then approach it from another angle. You have to keep going because no one else is going to do it. I’m sure there are hundreds of parents living at home with their kids and just getting older and older – who knows what’s going to happen to their children? If the worst happened, we know that Jon would be happy there and he’s looked after. He’s got his own place, and we didn’t think we’d get anything near that. We wanted to replicate home for him and we got as near as we could. ●
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ADVICE • WORKING LIFE
On the job Danielle Inwood, Employment Training Consultant at The National Autistic Society, answers your questions about the world of work.
For expert advice and information
on any autism-related issues, call our Autism Helpline on
0808 800 4104
FINDING A JOB Q – I would like to take my 14-year-old son, who has Asperger syndrome, to lots of different workplaces to shadow employees as I think he has trouble imagining what it would be like doing a particular job. This would help him think about what he would like to do, as he has no ideas apart from something to do with computers. How would I go about organising it? Is there a list of employers who actively seek to introduce autistic individuals into their workforce? This would be helpful as a starting point for me to contact companies who maybe are more inclusive than others. — Terri Greer
Danielle Inwood
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Identify your strengths and skills that you can bring to the workplace A – There isn’t a list of employers who actively seek autistic people. However, we are launching an Autism Friendly Employers Award in the next few months – and the companies which gain the award will be listed on our website. Before that, work with your son to ensure that he understands what he wants to do and how best to do it. Our Finding Work ebook could be a useful starting point as it looks at exploring the right career choice. To arrange work experience, search for companies of interest and write a speculative letter. Mention when your son would like to start, how long he’d like the placement to last, and for how many days a week. Telling an employer these requirements can help them to decide whether they can offer a
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placement. Once you have sent the letters (which you need to adapt for each organisation) we would suggest waiting two weeks and then following up with a call or email.
DISCLOSURE Q – Should you tell potential employers you’re autistic? — Andrea Croome A – Deciding whether to tell an employer about an autism diagnosis can be difficult. We suggest that you inform an employer or potential employer when you feel comfortable to do so. You should first identify your strengths and skills that you can bring to the workplace. Then identify what you may find
WORKING LIFE • ADVICE
You can ask for a workplace assessment if you’re struggling in your work environment difficult, and what adjustments would be useful. For example, ‘I can find vague and ambiguous instructions difficult, I may need a little more information to enable me to complete a task. Being given this time will ensure that I can complete the task to the best of my abilities.’ When disclosing you should provide details of any services that can support you and your employer. Q – I’m not sure when to say I’m autistic. Should I say at the interview or on the application form? What’s the best way to word it? — Jade JJ Stenton A – We recommend that a job seeker discloses their autism when it becomes a barrier to their
application. This could be on the application form, prior to an interview, before starting a job or after starting a job. Identify positives and negatives to disclosing at each stage of the application process. Provide tangible examples of adjustments that can be provided at each stage and how these will benefit you. Case studies of other jobseekers’ experiences of disclosing can be found on our website at
www.autism.org.uk/jobseekers.
JOB INTERVIEWS Q – I struggle to keep eye contact and remain calm in a job interview. What can I do about this? — Isabel Greensmith A – We would suggest that you disclose to potential employers prior to any interviews you
“We recommend that a job seeker discloses their autism when it becomes a barrier to their application.” GROWING INDEPENDENCE SUPPLEMENT
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ADVICE • WORKING LIFE
attend. This could be once you are invited to interview if you are not comfortable to disclose on application. By disclosing, adjustments can be embedded into the interview to help you. You could, for instance, request the interviewer asks you clear, specific questions based on your past experience, and avoids hypothetical questions. Ask them to prompt you using additional questions so that you give all the information needed. Mention that your body language and eye contact may be different from other candidates and they should not interpret it as a lack of interest in the role. You can ask for a support worker to attend the interview with you and act as an interpreter. You can also suggest to the employer that a work trial or placement evaluation would be more suitable for them to assess your skills.
WORKPLACE SUPPORT Q – What support can I expect to receive from my workplace? — Lianne Jayne Faulkner A – As per the Equality Act 2010 in England, if you have a disability, you are entitled to be given reasonable adjustments to best support you in the workplace. We suggest that employers and employees access guidance from autism specialists. Our Employment Training and Consultancy service offers workplace assessments, autism awareness training for managers and colleagues, and training to help you understand the workplace, including communication skills, managing anxiety, organisation skills and assertiveness. These services should be funded by the employer or you can apply for Access to Work funding. Find out more at www.gov.uk/access-to-work.
Q – I struggle with people assuming I know what to do all the time. I know I can’t expect my boss to tell me every time I need to do a task or see someone, but I feel people must think I’m being lazy if I’m not doing something constantly. How do you get the initiative/confidence to find out things for yourself without bothering people? — Rebecca Macleod A – A process should be embedded to help you plan your work tasks. You should meet with your manager or supervisor in the morning and create a task list for that day. Managers who invest this time realise that it takes away from interruptions throughout the day, helping employees become more independent. Depending how much support is needed, you can create a tick list to help stay on task. Managers and employees may wish to work electronically, therefore a bullet pointed email may help. Q – Do you have any tips for handling a problematic manager who doesn’t understand autism? — Anonymous A – Speak with your manager and make them aware of the support that is available to them, as well as you. We offer training courses, and, after attending, managers often comment that they feel ore confident in supporting their autistic employees, and workplace relationships improve. They also acknowledge that a lot of the strategies are good practice for all employees.
Xxxx xxxx xxx xx xxx xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxxx
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For more details of our employment training and support services, visit www.autism.org. uk/employmentservices.
WORKING LIFE • ADVICE
Rachel needed support to control her anxiety
RACHEL’S STORY As an Office Services Officer at the Notting Hill Housing Group (NHH), Rachel is now thriving. But she needed strategies to overcome her anxiety. “I started at NHH in September 2011, five years ago. I had three other jobs before working there. It was shortly after I started that NHH contacted The National Autistic Society. I wasn’t coping and was having anxiety attacks on a daily basis. This is not like regular stress; they were crippling panic attacks
us to improve our understanding of autism in the workplace all round. My team now know that I am not just acting up; I do have a condition and that is why I behave as I do. They know what to expect and this has enabled my manager and I to put in place a clear procedure for when I do feel anxious. This means that I can quickly recover and the impact of my autism on my work and team is reduced. I would like to tell employers that autism is not something to be afraid of. There is support out there that can be paid for by Access to Work and the employee on the spectrum can be a great asset to an organisation. I pay attention to detail, and can seek, use and evaluate information to consistently process invoices and spot any irregularity at year end. I am also very punctual and reliable. Employers should treat the employee as a person, not just “x who is autistic”. They should see how the employee should deal with the difficulties caused by their autism instead of seeing autism
“I would like to tell employers that autism is not something to be afraid of.” and I could lose hours. Now I have a support worker who comes in for one hour a week to discuss any issues with me and my manager. She advises me how I can deal with problems better, and has helped with tools to combat my anxiety. The National Autistic Society has also provided training to myself, my colleagues and my manager which has helped
itself as a difficulty. I’d say to other employees, if you have not declared your autism, do so NOW. If you are not comfortable speaking to your manager, perhaps approach HR. I feel strongly from my own experiences that declaring autism is the best way to start engaging with your employer. Once they know what the issue is, they are better able to deal with it.”
Finding work ebook Our Finding work digital workbook is designed to help autistic adults prepare themselves for employment.
Developed by employment experts at The National Autistic Society, it will support you through the job finding process with information and activities at each stage. Topics include: understanding your autism better, choosing a suitable role, applying for roles, preparing for and getting through interviews, finding work experience, working on your communication and social skills, managing anxiety and preparing for the workplace. The Finding work ebook is priced at £20. Find out more at www.autism.org. uk/findingwork.
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FEATURE • SOCIAL ENTERPRISES
The future of
Harry Specters chocolates
enterprise Looking for work experience but not sure what’s out there? How about working in a chocolate factory or mending bikes while learning catering? We spoke to two company founders providing work for autistic people.
HARRY SPECTERS CHOCOLATES Founder Mona Shah says, “My son, Ash, is autistic. We were really worried what he was going to do when he left his special needs school. I wanted to do something, for Ash, and for others like him. I went on a course at the Academy
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of Chocolate (yes, there is such a place!) and I realised that the whole chocolate making process is quite structured. It’s very precise with the different temperatures needed and I thought, this might be something that autistic people could enjoy doing. I got Ash to help with dipping
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truffles in chocolate which he really enjoyed, and his friends did too. I started to get orders. We began very small scale from the back of our house in December 2012. Our social mission is offering employment for autistic people. I have my own staff, one full-time person with autism, two part-timers and six contractors. We also take autistic students on work experience from both special needs schools and mainstream sixth form colleges. When the students come in, I go through the whole hygiene process and then they start making the boxes. All our boxes come flat packed so they assemble them, package the chocolates, tie the ribbon, and fold the menu cards. They work as part of a team which they really enjoy. They can ask as many questions as they like and they can keep on asking the same question, I don’t mind. Last year we had an order from a German company for 132,000 truffles, to be made and packed in a month. I got stressed but my employees and students didn’t. They just focused on what they had to achieve that day. We made the order with 10 hours to spare! Our company has won nine awards in just three years – and these are the Great Taste Awards, the highest awards in the fine food industry. It is the quality of our products, together with our social mission, that makes people buy from us. Earlier this year we moved to a proper factory. This is just the start, we’re looking to have social enterprise franchises in local communities and to be able to help hundreds of autistic young people. I’ve had so many emails from all over the UK saying how can our kids benefit from what you’re doing? I say, we’re working on it!” Read more https://www. harryschocs.co.uk.
SOCIAL ENTERPRISES • FEATURE
MECYCLE MeCycle grew out of an advert in the local paper in 2011, explains founder Jon Gordon of Autism Initiatives in Liverpool. “I made the mistake of saying ‘local charity setting up bike recycling business’ and we got absolutely swamped with 600 bikes! “We built up a reputation locally for supplying good quality refurbished bikes and doing reasonably priced repairs. Then we decided we would earn more if we put the same bikes in a shop window. The new shop gave us the chance to provide work placements to autistic people on the customer facing and noncustomer facing side. When I was researching the project, I was in London and came across some quite cool cycle cafes and I thought, the problem with a cycle shop is who goes to buy a bike on a Monday? Maybe Thursday afternoon you might start thinking you need a new helmet. So I thought, why not make it a café too. So we opened up the recycled bike shop and café all in one go and the work placement offering developed. In the North West that’s sensible, because there’s tons of employment in catering. I made MeCycle into a really attractive place to work. It looks like Brick Lane, London but it’s in a suburb of Southport and people want to work there whether they’ve got disabilities or not. Local authorities are not keen to fund social enterprise, so the majority of our income comes from sales of bikes, coffee and cakes. Every time a customer walks in we have to make sure they’re happy and they pay the bill. We need the staff levels to handle the customers and to build up the young people’s confidence. The young people start at really
MeCycle bike shop and cafe
quiet times and as the person progresses we can adapt that to lunchtimes and weekends. They can go through training in food hygiene, manual handling – it helps build up the portfolio. We see people develop incredibly well. After a young person completes their placement, we try and get them into small, family businesses which can offer them extra support. Our best success is a young lady who came back to us after she’d left, saying there was a job in her local café. We visited and
said ‘she is trained – would you consider her?’ We arranged a work trial and the husband and wife took her on. Recently, she got back in touch as she had an interview at a hospital in an admin role. We did some travel training to make sure she could get there and our staff attended the interview with her. She got the job on a temporary contract and she’s just been made permanent. It’s another fantastic step in this young lady’s life.” Read more http://mecycle.co.uk.
Find out more
The National Autistic Society also runs a number of enterprise projects. Find out more at www.autism.org.uk/services/work. Read about Dan who works at our Café Autisan in Lancashire on page 46 of Your Autism Magazine.
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FEATURE • TRANSITION PLANNING
Preparing for the future
planning Person-centred
transition
How can you put a young person’s interests first when planning their transition from school to adulthood? Clare Macer, The National Autistic Society’s Education and Transition Advice Coordinator (Scotland), explains the process of person-centred transition planning.
L
eaving school can be a daunting experience for any young person. For autistic young people, the process may be even more challenging. In addition to the many options available, there are important questions to be asked about what support will be needed and how this can be accessed. For a transition to be successful, it is essential that the planning process begins early and considers not only the views of family and professionals but also centres on the young person themselves. Planning to leave secondary school can be a long and difficult process, and autistic young people often struggle to effectively communicate their views on what is happening next in their lives. One planning strategy commonly used during
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the transition to adulthood is person-centred planning (PCP). This approach is designed to ensure that a young person and their interests are central during preparations for their own future. PCP aims to strengthen a young person’s voice to ensure their views and wishes are always considered by all those involved in the transition process. This is crucial, as it ensures that transition is well managed and personalised for each individual, rather than slotting them into whatever service is convenient.
WORKING CREATIVELY WITH YOUNG PEOPLE To gather all the information needed to ensure transition planning is person-centered, young people should be actively involved in the process by attending a planning meeting in which their
TRANSITION PLANNING • FEATURE
“Autistic young people often struggle to effectively communicate their views on what is happening next in their lives.” own views are presented. The meeting facilitator should work with the young person prior to the occasion to make it as accessible to them as possible. In some cases this means working creatively so the young person can contribute through written information, photos, videos etc if they find face-to-face situations difficult. It is the facilitator’s responsibility to ensure that the young person’s input is recognised in a way that is appropriate and meaningful to them. The facilitator is also responsible for recording what is shared during the meeting.
advocates that they really enjoy being with animals, the transition plan could explore college courses in animal care. Young people will require different review headings at different points of their transition planning to ensure that everything is covered, so it is vital that each meeting is planned and based on the young person and their needs at the time. Following the meeting, an action plan will be created from the points identified. This will identify outcomes and future actions to facilitate person-centered change. These outcomes describe the specific things that the young person will require over a short period to help them achieve their long-term aspirations and must be specific, measurable and achievable. Providing a structured approach based on the young person should ensure a much smoother and successful transition to adult life. ●
Clare Macer, our Education and Transition Advice Coordinator (Scotland)
THE CIRCLE OF SUPPORT The people who are involved with this process are often referred to as the ‘circle of support’, which should involve all the people who are important to the young person and involved with their transition. The facilitator should work with the young person and/or people who know them best to know who to invite to the meeting. The meeting will cover a range of topics using a person-centred approach to explore the young person’s perspective. Questions are asked to establish the young person’s interests, wishes for the future and how to ensure their needs are met to provide a good quality of life. These questions could include: “What is great about me?”, “What I like?”, “How to keep me healthy and safe?”. You can use our resource booklet, This is me, as a prompt, which is free to download at www. autism.org.uk/this-is-me. These responses can be used to learn what a young person might like to do in the future. For example if a young person
Find out more
For more information on transitions, go to our new transitions web area at www.autism.org.uk/transition, which has resources on leaving school (and other transitions) including decision making toolkits for parents and young people. Our Transitions Support Service can help you secure a successful transition into further education or adult life. Call us on 0808 800 0027 – free from landlines and most mobiles.
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FEATURE • EMPLOYMENT
All about
Auticon Auticon is an IT consultancy that employs more than 80 autistic people as IT consultants and in administrative roles. Viola Sommer, Head of Operations, and Ray Coyle, CEO, tell us more about the company. BY ELEANOR WHEELER
What kind of clients do you work with? Ray – In Germany, we’ve been working with the biggest 30 blue chip companies since 2011. We launched in the UK in 2016 and now deal with large banks and technology companies and with medium and smaller businesses. Have they been attracted to your ethos as well as your services? Ray – Definitely. Businesses want to work with us because they can see the benefit. Some have corporate social responsibility goals, and others are making an effort with diversity. They realise that if you put employees through diversity training, then a lot of the time, you have people in a room waiting for the end so they can sign their name and say they’ve been through the training. Whereas we offer companies an opportunity to put somebody on the autism spectrum into a team. Their
employees can work with them, socialise with them and see the value they bring to the business. That gives you diversity awareness far more than any training session. Viola – We’ve had a few success stories in Germany where a big client − such as Allianz – started working with our consultant. Then they got more autistic consultants for their own teams. Those are really nice examples of how it does work. How have clients adapted to address difficulties your consultants have as a result of their autism? Ray – It’s really only minor changes that are needed. We send in a job coach with each consultant who will review the workplace for them. They might identify that a seat underneath a strip light may not be the right place for a consultant, or that a noisy office across a corridor could be a problem. Employers are keen to
make the adjustments because they want it to work. Viola – We brief our clients on autism in general but also on any individual characteristic that the person might have, because everyone is different. Once the client has understood the type of communication that the consultant finds most helpful, they tend to really embrace it. It’s not just autistic employees who benefit from straightforward communication, clear feedback and a structured workload. Tell me about the role of job coaches in your business. Ray – The job coach’s role is to support our consultants. They really get to know them. They understand their capabilities and can match a project to the right consultant. They’ll also brief the client, do the workplace assessment, and make reasonable adjustments so that the consultant can work to the best of
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EMPLOYMENT • FEATURE
Auticon’s IT consultants all have job coaches
Photo © Auticon
their ability. Then when the project starts, they will give the consultant the level of support they need. That can vary extremely widely. As Viola said, there’s no one-sizefits-all approach. We could never do a project without a job coach being involved. Do you think you’re quite unique? Viola – I don’t think there’s another business in the world that employs as many autistic people as Auticon does, and also knows about it. I’m sure there are lots of autistic people everywhere, but they might not disclose it. Having 80 autistic people on permanent contracts, I think that’s a massive achievement. It keeps growing, and I can’t help but be really proud of that achievement. Do you employ any adults with learning disabilities? Viola – All our consultants have Asperger syndrome, so none of them
have a learning disability. That’s for very simple logistic reasons. We need our colleagues to be able to work fairly independently, and perform the role of an IT consultant who works with mainstream clients. We do have employees with learning difficulties, but they work in our admin team. Ray – The admin team doesn’t do the menial stuff. Our team is split into consultants and admin. I’m in admin – that’s just the other part of the business. How can parents of autistic children who aren’t ‘IT geniuses’ feel encouraged by what you do? Ray – We’re an IT consultancy, but what we’re doing is built around a model that demonstrates that autistic adults, given the right support, can perform fantastically well in the work environment. And I think doing that will shift people’s perceptions, so they realise that the workplace is not
built with autistic people in mind. If a few changes are made, then we can unlock a lot of lost skills in the economy. On a more practical note, we’re currently starting to do compliance projects which are far more wordbased than computer code. I was a lawyer for many years. I’ve seen a lot of work in the legal sector where the skills of our consultants could bring a lot to clients. The conversation’s starting to move on now from people looking at autistic adults and wondering how to monetise their skills. We’re seeing a more advanced conversation. People are saying ‘if I have a neurotypical team, they’re all going to look at it the same way. But if I have a more neurodiverse team, they are going to look at it in different ways and have more innovative solutions to problems.’ ● Read more at auticon.co.uk.
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