The Pros and Cons of Self-Direction from Fall MAD'12
The following is the Straight Talk article from the Fall Making a Difference magazine.
The Pros and Cons of Self-Direction
By Ryan T. Mercer
I have been self-directing for about three or four years using the Georgia Independent Care Waiver Program (ICWP), and in my opinion, self-direction has both its advantages and disadvantages. It affords you the option to choose your own staff and to pay them higher salaried rates, depending on which waivers you have and what their requisites are. Although you are responsible for the paperwork portion of it all, I feel that self-direction is the way to go!
Perhaps one of the greatest advantages of self-direction is being able to pay your staff a higher wage than they would typically make through an agency. In most situations, you can decide the employee's pay rate, as well as their schedule. An agency takes an "overhead cut" because they're handling the paperwork portion of your caseload, which affects the amount that they're willing to pay. With self-direction, you do all of the paperwork yourself and eliminate the middle man.
Another important advantage to this approach is having the freedom to choose your own employees and to conduct your own interviews and hiring processes. Unfortunately, agencies are known to send whoever is available at the time. Sometimes they don't take in mind certain factors and some of these people are hired on a whim. For me, one of the reasons I started self-directing is because the agency sent me people who did not communicate well and could not understand the services I needed or wanted.
With self-direction, having the freedom of choice allows you to better match personalities and qualifications to your specific needs and screen out those you don't want without further explanation.
Often, agencies send individuals who lack people skills and leave you feeling stuck with them. Choosing someone who matches your own personality can make all the difference in the world.
While filing your own paperwork, keeping track of your own budget and monitoring your staff's hours may be tedious at times, I feel it's worth it to have choices. You only have to obtain the information on each employee for five years. This is strictly for audit purposes with the State.
Also, sometimes an agency does not consider or adapt to the support you need or want. For example, if you have a vehicle, an agency may not like to have one of their employees drive it and you will need to find other options for transportation. If you're self-directing, you have the control to hire someone you know will drive your vehicle.
This is how I feel about self-direction and what is best for my situation, but every person and each situation is different. Some people might prefer to choose the route of going with an agency. It just depends on what option works best for you.
About Ryan T. Mercer
Ryan T. Mercer is a 26-year-old advocate with Cerebral palsy. He has been involved in advocacy work for six years now and is currently active in numerous advocacy projects including People First of Georgia and the Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental Disabilities (LEND) program at Georgia State University.
