In this post, we are sharing some fundamental elements to establishing best autism practice support within services.

1. Staff knowledge and confidence

Whether you work in support, education or customer services having knowledge around autism can enable you to consider how best to support an autistic person. Understanding the unique abilities and varied needs and barriers that can be faced by an autistic person can help you to reflect on how you are currently practicing and where you may adapt and improve.
 
2. Self-reflective practice and consultation

With a stronger knowledge base people are able to begin to reflect on how they currently practice. Having a framework of best practice to support this process can set the standard they wish to achieve and  create a level of consistency and reassurance that they are focussing their developments in the right areas. Having a framework of best practice can also support the staff team to consider which areas they wish to focus on in order to gather feedback from autistic people themselves and also how to involve them with the process.
 
3. External support and verification

External verification not only enables an objective view of the practice taking place but can provide both a celebratory achievement if standards are met and constructive feedback on where further best practice can take place. It provides credibility to the service as to the standard of practice they operate at and adds extra reassurance to autistic people, families/carers and professionals in regards to the abilities of that service and staff team.
 
If you would like support to develop, embed and celebrate best practice within your organisation the NAS Autism Accreditation programme can support you.  For more information go to https://www.autism.org.uk/what-we-do/autism-training-and-best-practice/autism-accreditation.