What do you see as the similarities and distinctions between the role of a support coordinator and the role of a local area coordinator? Could either or both roles evolve as part of a sector strategy to assist with managing burnout?
KR – The biggest distinction is that a support coordinator works for the client, whereas the local area coordinator works for the NDIS.
I would always trust a support coordinator over a local area coordinator any day of the week. The roles are very similar, but the motivations are very different.
RA – From my experience, local area coordinators do not have the knowledge about services in the area and are much too hard to get hold of, and we can wait weeks for an answer about something specific.
Local area coordinators are not involved enough in participants’ supports to completely understand their personal situation and have far too many participants themselves. I personally feel that a local area coordinator has an even harder/thankless job than a support coordinator and I find that many burn out, and there is a high turnover.
ZD – One distinct role of a local area coordinator I have been doing as a support coordinator with my clients is the implementation meeting, as I found some clients did not understand a word of what the local area coordinator was saying to them in the implementation meetings as the local area coordinator did not know the client at all and did not know the client’s capacity of really understanding what they were saying.
SM – Could either or both roles evolve as part of a sector strategy to assist with managing burnout? Honestly, I see no similarities in the roles and their functionalities are very different. Local area coordinators with their KPIs do not have the time to complete the role of a support coordinator from a research and implementation perspective – and going the other direction, support coordinators don’t have the capacity for plan building.
VS – I believe both roles are similar. However, from my experiences with clients transferring to a support coordinator from a local area coordinator, the usual statement was that the local area coordinator was hard to reach and often did not follow up on requests.
I am not involved with local area coordinators unless they have been appointed instead of a planner for the NDIA.
SH – This will sound very negative but, as yet, I have only had one local area coordinator that has been engaged – most just send out the plan and there is no further communication. This is something I feel needs to be addressed so that the local area coordinator thoroughly understands the obstacles the participant is facing.
AT – They’re very similar in roles, however I find the role of a support coordinator has far more responsibility than a local area coordinator.
If they both evolved, yes possibly it could assist in managing burnout, however I feel it needs to start with the provider in managing burnout and realistic caseloads for support coordinators.
EH – In the old days, when the local area coordinator role was introduced, there were two huge things:
1) I was going to be out of a job; and
2) They were going to be able to provide support for all participants that didn’t have support coordination.
Surprise, surprise, this has not happened, and the reason for that is the roles are currently completely different. The local area coordinator role is a forward-facing role for the NDIS – they are not able to provide a lot of individualised support and, in all reality, don’t have time to provide the level of assistance many participants in the Scheme need.
If the roles were to evolve, two things would need to happen. The first is that the local area coordinator role would need to move closer to the implementation of a plan, rather than the plan gathering and justification it currently does, and local area coordinators would need to be more able to individualise support. At the moment, local area coordinators are more likely to hand a list of providers to a participant and say good luck.
The second would be for participants who are able to get support coordination to not have to have information handled by many hands during the planning process. Giving some of the responsibility for planning to support coordinators (we already do a lot of the pre-planning with our clients) would reduce the multi-handling and increase the amount of time local area coordinators can spend with those who don’t have a support coordinator.
(DB) – The roles are similar in terms of supporting people to connect with the services and supports they need. The distinction is really the intensity of this work.
Support coordinators work more intensively with people, helping, not only to find the right supports, but checking in on the extent to which those services and supports are helping them towards their goals and working with people to overcome barriers that might be in the way.
