Signature Support

Signature Support was established by Wendy continuing her passion for: “Making Change Happen”. Wendy has over two decades of highly skilled practical experience to draw on in disability, mental health, dual diagnosis, education, justice, family violence, foster care and our community sectors.

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Signature Support's Core Values are: Access, Passion, Empowering, Expertise

They are derived from personal and professional attributes during Wendy's career and continue to influence and guide actions and behaviours with how Signature Support interacts with people, families, carers and engages with stakeholders.

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Access

Wendy has always been committed to enabling access for everyone. Her career started in education in the UK. For 13 years Wendy supported the Deaf community providing equal access to communication so everyone could engage in all parts of college life. Wendy completed studies in British Sign Language Level 1, 2 and 3 with ongoing skill development and many other qualifications for the Deaf and Deafblind community. Wendy went on to study teaching for Further Adult Education and for six years, she successfully led and facilitated the Life Skills group for profoundly Deaf students with multiple needs: mental health, physical health, mobility, learning needs and challenging behaviours.

 

After moving from the UK to Melbourne, Wendy went on to study Auslan and supported Deaf students to reach their full potential with Methodist Ladies' College Deaf Integration Unit.

 

Passion

Believing there was more support needed for our most vulnerable people in the community who were impacted day to day with a disability, Wendy went on to work with the Australian Community Support Organisation. She provided valuable outreach support to people with a mental illness and intellectual disability who were linked to or at risk of the justice system. Wendy completed the Diploma in Mental Health, Community Services and Alcohol and Other Drugs along with other training and skill development in mental health, dual diagnosis, forensic and offender training for the community. Wendy also worked on a Consortium Project in collaboration with the Dandenong Magistrates Court, the Neighbourhood Justice Centre and the Australian Community Support Organisation.

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Empowering

When Partners in Recovery rolled out in Frankston, Wendy embraced the chance to co-lead the implementation of a new innovative program. For six years, as a Support Coordinator, she saw great changes in people living with a severe, persistent mental illness with significant functional impairment. Wendy recognised that there were still many vulnerable people not accessing services and created and implemented the Partners in Recovery specialist role co-locating at Pakenham and Cranbourne Corrections with the aim to reduce the risk of offenders with a mental illness, ’slipping through the gap’. When the NDIS rolled out in Southeast Melbourne, Wendy successfully coordinated the transition for clients, navigating the NDIS Access process and implementation of the NDIS plans. Her practical skills and knowledge are further enhanced with ongoing professional development and up to date training with the Support Coordination Academy and DSC - both specialists in Support Coordination consultancy and training.

 

Along with the ability to motivate, this success has inspired and empowered others throughout the community. This has attributed to the strengthening of multi-disciplinary teams with highly regarded collaboration amongst services.

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Expertise

Since establishing Signature Support, Wendy  continued to achieve outcomes with participants which include preventing high risk repeated hospital admissions, diverting others from committing crime and / or re-offending, reducing non-emergency call outs, improving navigation of services in a complex system, enhancing and integrating collaborative relationships within the community.

 

Wendy engages people to reach their potential at their individual pace and continuously strives for equality and access for everyone - “Ensuring people affected by a disability are included and treated as equal members of the community, live a meaningful life, safe and free from harm”