ENABLED AND EMPOWERED
I enjoy helping people and enjoy seeing them move from a bad position to a better position with or without my help. I am particularly interested in the empowerment of individuals rather than their enablement. I saw a precious example of enablement in a client recently. I interviewed Harry earlier this month. He had been granted his refugee status, and shortly after, began working part time, which I think is a credit to his resilience and determination.
Later accommodation was sourced for him and he applied for Universal Credit. He was repeatedly sanctioned – had his award reduced as a penalty for not finding work as he explained to me. His English was faltering but he explained that jobs weren’t plentiful in the area which he had been living in and he preferred to search for work physically because, as he readily conceded he has difficulties with using computers hence searching for work online is difficult for him – small wonder he hadn’t found work quickly. I noticed that he had some difficulty inputting and extracting information from a computer. As a consequence of the sanctions, he found he could not pay the license fees at his accommodation, so he was evicted. I also wondered whether he had communicated this to his Work Coach and if he was receiving support with this.
I completed a referral for housing for him. He needed to supply part of his digital ID and this was difficult for him, I was making a second request to him for this information and learned that he had found a job and accommodation that went with it. I questioned further and the agreement was in his name. He was due to start work the next day and didn’t need my housing referral. Good on him- a self-starter enabled and empowered to improve his situation despite limitations such as a language barrier.