What Is Positive Behaviour Support / Our Values
To provide support we need to meet regulatory requirements and ensure the support we offer is safe and effective. We have developed a framework of how we support people to begin this from. This framework starts by thinking in a person-centered way. If we are meeting the needs of the people we support then we are usually meeting the requirements of our regulators.
The “4” in PBS4 is because we use our name as a prefix. In the support files of the person you support you will see that they all have a personalised heading. For example, if you are supporting “Joe” the documentation will say “PBS4Joe” at the top. Our support is designed to identify how we can provide PBS “for” Joe. Every single piece of documentation that is produced has considered how this applies for “Joe”. Your focus is not on how you work for PBS4. It is on how you provide Positive Behaviour Support for the person you support, in their way.
Positive Behaviour Support is a recognised approach to supporting people with learning disabilities and challenging behaviour. It brings together 3 key elements
Applied Behaviour Analysis (the science of learning and behaviour) – Person Centred Planning (ensuring the person is central and as in control of their life and the support they receive) – The right to the same things as you and I (enabling people to achieve maximum independence with whatever level of support they need to achieve this).
The starting point of PBS is a functional assessment. Every behaviour we do has a purpose, and challenging behaviour is no different. People with learning disabilities may have difficulties telling us what the purpose of their behaviour is so sometimes a functional assessment is needed to find this out. Our PBS Clinicians may work with you to complete this.
The word “positive” in behavioural terms means “adding to”. Positive Behaviour Support is about supporting people to add behaviours to their repertoire. People with a disability in learning are likely to have learnt fewer behaviours than we have to get their wants and needs met. So in Positive Behaviour Support we take the moral stance to not further reduce someone’s limited behaviours just because we find one of their behaviours challenging. Instead, we choose to support the development of new behaviours to meet this need. If people are empowered to learn better ways to get their needs met, then the behaviours we find challenging become redundant. For example, now we can use a sat nav for directions reading maps has become redundant.
See Jonathan Beebee describe this further:
Usually services put their focus on how they reduce the challenging behaviour. We want to shift this focus to how we meet the purpose of their behaviour. You will learn more about this during your induction training.
Our Values
Enablement underpins everything we do. Our goals are to empower people to try new things, to learn new skills, and to develop greater independence. We celebrate ability and support people to build on existing skills with just the right support to be successful and build confidence. We are privileged to be invited to support the people we work for, and our outcomes are focussed on supporting people to achieve the life they want.
Working proactively gives people opportunities, helps us to plan how we effectively meet people’s needs and we can support avoiding situations that can be distressing for people.
Being disruptive is often associated with being challenging. We want to turn “challenging” on its head to being something that is celebrated. The term “disruptive” is commonly used to describe technologies that replace out- dated approaches. For example, a sat nav is a disruptive technology that replaces reading maps. Being disruptive is fundamental to Positive Behaviour Support. We don’t look to stop challenging behaviours. We look to understand what the function of that behaviour is (what people get from it). Our goal is then to give the person more effective, quicker, better ways to meet this function. People will then have more.
We design support for each person individually. Our name, PBS4, is a prefix we use to ensure that the focus for each team is on how they are providing Positive Behaviour Support for that person, rather than be focussed on delivering things in a corporate way. For example, “PBS4joe” describes how we are providing Positive Behaviour Support “for” Joe. Working in partnership with the people we support, and their families is essential in achieving personalised support. We need open and transparent communication with families and we fully appreciate that they have more expertise in their family members’ needs than we do.
Values
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