Crawford CBDD, Job Coaching, and Inclusive Employment Success

SPEAKERS: Randy Bigley, Gina Stewart, Conner Allen, LeeAnn Hoffman, Clarissa Pierce, Troy Gilliland, Chip Crawford

Randy Bigley (Host): Welcome to Community Spotlight. My name is Randy Bigley joining me right now. It’s the Crawford CBDD. It’s a DSP Appreciation month and uh, Disabilities Employment Awareness month is all that too, right so.

Gina Stewart (Crawford CBDD): It’s yeah. September is DSP Appreciation Month. In October is National Disabilities Employment Awareness Month.

Randy: So we’re going to talk with Connor today, right?

Randy: Yes, Connor, a little bit about yourself. Umm, you know you work at Champion Food Service, right?

Conner Allen (Champion Foodservice Employee): Yes, I do.

Randy: And what do you do at Champion Food Service?

Conner: We we package meals.

Randy: OK. And what do you like about your job?

Conner: I’ve been out there a long time.

Randy: How long have you been out there?

Conner: 11 years.

Randy: 11 years? Wow, that’s quite a long time. How is your job coach helped you out? What kind of things does your job coach do to help you? Does he train you? Does he train you and work with you?

Conner: Yeah, he trains me.

Randy: He Trains you OK?

Conner: Yes.

Randy: And he’s with you quite a bit, right? Yes, right.

Randy: And what did you learn from him?

Conner: How to do my job? Yes.

Randy: What are you most proud of at your job? Like if you could think of anything that you really like doing in your most crowded doing, what is your favorite thing to do there? What are you most proud of? Uh.

Conner: Running machines?

Randy: You like to run the machines?

Conner: Yes I do.

Randy: Very cool. Alright, Connor, 11 years. That’s quite a while. Yeah, Yeah. We’re gonna move on to Clarissa. Alright. What is the DSP program exactly?

Clarissa Pierce ( SSA at Crawford County Board of DD): The DSP program is like, uh, there are umm, individuals who work umm, with the individuals that we serve at the county board. I am an SSA so I am a Service and Support Administrator. I connect the services with individuals that qualify for our services depending on their needs. It could be with in the home or in the community.

Connor is one that has services range from community employment so we connected him with employment specialist who is the DSP and he worked with him on helping him in the different areas and needs that came up at work and what it means to even get hired in, look for a job and then kind of check in along the way as kind of like a follow along. Clarissa:

Randy: How do you match people up with a coach? How does that work?

Clarissa: Well, it depends. We go based on what Conner’s needs were.

Clarissa: We have a couple of different development programs that work with individuals for employment. Uh, it’s Connor that has the choice of who he wants to work with. Umm, a lot of times it starts out where we do a referral to OOD, which is Opportunities for Ohioans for Disabilities and they will connect him with a job developer and then he’ll have a job coach that works with him on the site and it just really depends on what kind of needs he needs at the time and that kind of determines what kind of services that they have.

Randy: What about transportation? How does that work for to and from jobs?

Clarissa: That is one that we look at too. We can depend on whether or not they can drive themselves, if they have natural supports like family members that can take them. We do have one main transportation service in this counties. That’s OSS, Ohio Specialty Services, they have been really great with doing whatever it takes to help work on the schedules of individuals to get them to and from work.

Conner has used OSS in the past. He actually still has them as a backup because Conner does drive himself. He has his own license and he has his own car.

Randy: Pleasure. Thank you so much. And we’ll talk with Chip now. Chip is from Champion Food Service.

Chip Crawford (Champion Foodservice): Yes, Sir. Good morning.

Randy: Good morning, Chip. Uh, What is Connor like as an employee and uh, members of the team? What’s he like?

Chip: Oh absolutely. Hey, Connor is a very good, member of our team Umm, he does anything that’s asked of him, downtime- Hey, he jumps on it finds something to do himself. Even better he’s been credit with helping teach others to do the job and run the machines.

 Randy: Wow awesome.

Chip: Very positive asset.

Randy: What strengths does he bring to the to the to the workplace?

Chip: As we all know in our jobs, dependability, right?

Randy: Yeah

Chip: That’s what it’s all about. He’s always there. Always got a smile on his face. Happy to be there, opens everything that we need done. Keeps the lines running, does a great job.

Randy: So in in your perspective what helps this partnership successful?

Chip: Yes Sir, so teamwork between both companies. One needing help and the other providing where help is needed. It’s a win, win for, for both opportunities for both companies.

Randy: Now, what would you tell other employers about hiring someone with a disability?

Chip: Absolutely. Thanks for asking.

It’s a very rewarding opportunity to give everyone the right and chance to work. Everyone deserves a chance to shine and feel the pride of self accomplishment.

Randy: Chip, thank you so much. You’ve got a great employee there. Thank you.

We’re gonna talk with uh, let’s talk with Troy from RNI. Troy, you’re the coach, right?

Troy Gilliland (Job Coach/DSP at RNI): Yes.

Randy: What kind of growth have you seen in Conner?

Troy: Since I’ve started working with Conner, I’ve seen him. He was already independent. He was already well established in this job, but I’ve seen him become more from the self-advocate. He is speaking up for himself when it comes to his career path. That’s probably the biggest growth, as well as becoming comfortable with driving.

Randy: Yeah, OK.

Troy: That was very important for Connor.

Randy: How’s it helped his confidence and independence?

Troy: That’s a great question. Yeah, I believe Connor, when I started working with him, was very independent anyway. But his confidence seems to have blossomed as he started driving and as he went from his original position when I met him at Champion to working on the machines like he’s doing now.

Randy: How do you support someone by also encouraging their independence?

Troy: Well, for me. I like to tend to stay as hands off as I can and let them do everything. Let them learn, stay behind the scenes a little bit. If they need the help, I’m there. Give them guidance and encouraging them to act for themselves.

Randy: How do you help Connor prepare for and succeed at work?

Troy: That was easy. Connor really just needed someone to help him understand how successful he was and talk for himself.

Randy: Here’s one for you. What makes being a DSP and job coach important to you?

Troy: That one is probably the easiest one. I came to this job as a client and what makes it important is being able to pay forward, what I got. Also getting to see the look on the faces of the Folks that I work with, when they realize that they have power to themselves.They’re making their own money. That is what I call an intangible benefit and is probably the single most important thing.

Randy: How long have you been doing this?

Troy: I’ve been doing this since 2018. Oh my gosh. [laughing] Math is one of my disabilities. Randy: [laughing] That’s alright. Yeah, sometimes struggle with math too.

Alright. Well, thank you so much. It sounds like you’ve got a really good job.

Troy: I greatly enjoy it, thank you.

Randy: Alright, we’re going to talk with Leanne, with Connor’s mom, How does that sound?

LeeAnn Hoffman (Conner’s Mom): OK

Randy: So first of all, what changes have you seen in Connor over the years?

LeeAnn: He has certainly grown in his confidence and independence over the years. Like Troy had mentioned. Umm, he did used to ride with OSS every day, you know, and then we slowly, umm, worked his way to, he drives to and from work every day. Actually, I have car problems and he picked me up today.

Randy: [laughing]That’s awesome. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

LeeAnn: Umm, he’s learning how to get more places, you know, and it’s been really great practice for him with his driving and he’s become more vocal for sure.

Randy: How’s it done with his confidence.

LeeAnn: Oh, it’s great. He’s very proud of how he has been there for so long, which is really awesome for him to be there over 10 years now and umm, that he drives to work every day and he just keeps growing.

Randy: What are you most proud of?

LeeAnn: I’m very proud of Connor’s, His work ethic. I think it was mentioned earlier, he’s always there. He doesn’t like to miss work. If we’re something going on, you know, a home thing that he needs to miss work. I sometimes have to talk him into missing a day because he doesn’t like to miss work. And that that’s something to really be proud of, you know, because he has such a great work ethic.

Randy: Well, Leanne, what do you think? What do you hope for Conner’s future?

LeeAnn: I hope he continues to grow and become more and more independent. And that he keeps in stride with how he’s going right now and understands that the Sky’s the limit.

Randy: All right, uh, well, thank you so much. I’m so happy you came in here. And, uh, for one time Clarisse, I had another question for you, if you don’t mind. First of all, what do you hope that listeners take away from Connor’s story?

Clarissa: Well, I hope that they just hear the fact that given the opportunity of individuals with developmental disabilities can be very independent. Everybody is at their own little level. You know, we really look based on case by case basis of what it is they want to do and how do we get there. Everybody’s different obviously and Connor is one that even from the time that I started working with him, he has, uh, went from one that would always speak when spoken to. Now he’s advocating for himself and, making such decisions. Sometimes it’s just figuring out what it takes the to get them to where they want to be. It takes a little bit of trial and error. It takes a little bit of not focusing on the what ifs and just kind of stepping back and letting them lead the way. I think other individuals, we have so many that we serve that. Love to work and are very proud to be able to get out and get a job in the community. It is very hard to find jobs for them around here, but being so rural. But it would be nice to be able to make those connections to have more opportunities because it’s just like Connor, you know, they don’t like to miss work. They are proud of what they do and they’re probably some of the most loyal workers that our employers that do have them will say.

Randy: What would you like employers to know about people with development disabilities that really want to work?

Clarissa: I think they should give us a chance and give them a chance. Be open to see what we need to do to make it work. You know, sometimes it’s just a little bit of accommodations or, you know, figuring out what it is that they need that individuals to be served could do. They don’t need to work 40 hours. A lot of them like to work the 20 hours and you know, four to five hours a day, it just really depends on the individual, but they’re still willing to do what they need to. And there’s accommodations that can be put in. There are things that we can do to help so that they can be successful in their job. We just need the opportunities to connect them and show them.

Randy: What could the community do to create more opportunities like this?

Clarissa: They can reach out to the County Board and say that they are interested. We can help by connecting with them. There are a couple of providers that work in this area. RNI Richland New Hope is one of them. Abilities in Action is another one. They do a lot of the community connections, the job coaching, so there will be ones to connect with as well. Even with OOD, because OOD is one that we work with too, that will help find some of the jobs too for individuals. So there’s different avenues out there to make that connection and they can reach out to any one of them.

Randy: So ifsomeone would like to get more information or reach out. What can they do? How do they do that?

Clarissa: They can give us a call at the Crawford County Board of DD. We can help direct them.

Randy: All right, Clarissa. Thank you so much.

Clarissa: You’re welcome.

Randy: Anything you’d like to add?

Gina: I ditto what Clarissa has said she said it beautifully as far as having employers reach out to Crawford DD, they can either call there at the board or they can go to Crawfordcbdd.org and get information there. We hope that this helps not only give people an insight to what DSPS can do, we hope that it also gives people and employers insights to opening those doors to people with disabilities. Because I think that there is an untapped talent in our community that’s very passionate about working and passionate about being part of the community. I think that they’re just a phone call away from tapping into those types of employees.

Randy: Thank you so much, Connor. Thank you for coming in today. Awesome. Thank you guys. Thank you for all for coming in.

Conner: Thank you!

Clarissa: Thank you.

Gina: Thank you.

LeeAnn: Thank you.

Troy: Thank you.

Chip: Thank you.