I agreed, contacted the young man and his family and some of the other professional people that made up his local circle of support. I arranged a time and date to meet with the young man, although the arrangements where a little tricky to organise. The young man, John, had been informed that I was going to be carrying out an ‘assessment’ with him which had immediately caused him a great deal of anxiety and despite my attempted reassurance over the phone, that this was in-fact just a chance to meet him and have a chat, John had himself introduced a few personal safety measures.
John had been to meet with a few of the professionals in his circle of support and informed them about the ‘meeting’ and hence a day later my pre-arranged chat with John, had turned into a full blown multidisciplinary meeting at a local council office meeting room.
A week passed and on the day of the meeting I had arrived promptly, well, a bit early really, which as it turns out was the best part of the meeting! Upon signing in, I sat in the 2 seater waiting room and moments later John came into the building and made himself known to the receptionist, he signed in and sat on the other chair in the waiting room. John seemed calm and collected, not at all nervous or anxious so I took the opportunity to introduce myself to him. The next 15 minutes, were golden. There was John and I both waiting for a meeting that neither of us was really keen to attend, sat in the same cold, slightly torn seats, in a small dark waiting room. John and I began to chat; firstly about whether he found the building ok, how he had got there, how far away he lived, discussions about the horrible weather, how it had impacted on his plans to watch football in the park yesterday etc, etc... and before we knew it the 15 minutes had passed and we were invited to come through to the meeting room.
This is where things dramatically changed. John pulled his baseball cap further down his face, so it was now impossible to see his eyes or read his facial expressions, his speech became extremely fast and as a result I really struggled to understand what he was saying, which in all honesty was very little and only when prompted by one of the people in the room who knew him better. The meeting lasted 30 painful minutes before I finally found the opportunity to jump in and call an end to the proceedings.
John and I signed out and stepped out the front door into the fresh air and now slightly better looking day. ‘Which way are you walking John?’ - I knew he was walking and not riding his bicycle as we had discussed it earlier. John immediately lifted his cap and pointed in the direction he was going which turned out to be the opposite way to me, but something told me that this was too good an opportunity to miss. We both walked together along the street once again resuming our conversation, we discussed what the rest of the day had in store for us; John was off to work with his uncle who it turns out is John’s inspiration for wanting to re-access education in the first place. After a short while I realised I was now a long way from my car.... in fact where was my car? I stopped John mid flow and exclaimed, ‘John I think I am lost, I parked on ........... street’. ‘No problem, I am great with directions, I read the maps when I do deliveries with my uncle’ replied John. ‘Excellent’ I thought!
John and I said our goodbyes and headed off in separate directions. Later on that day I sat down to write up my ‘assessment’. I started to work my way through my notes from the meeting (they barely filled half an A5 piece of paper) how was I every going to write a support proposal based on this information? Well, it was easy, I knew everything that I needed to about John’s medical and educational history, the paperwork I had already been sent was up to date and relatively comprehensive. It was however not these professional reports that gave me the real information that I needed, it was the time that I had spent with John, just chatting, enjoying each others company and making what could have been a short exchange into a Great Interaction!
I wrote up my proposal and ‘assessment’ and sent it to John with a note; ‘Nice to meet you John, thanks for the chat, I hope the weather's better for football this weekend’, Sam.
Sam Collier
Business Development Manager
My Way