As therapists and behaviour practitioners, our role often incudes providing guidance to disability workers on how to best support people with complex needs.

However, there is typically a gap, as it takes us time to get to know the person well enough to be able to guide others.

In the meantime, workers are recruited to commence their hands-on role. With very little background or preparation, they embark on forming a relationship with the client.

If you are reading this I'm sure, like me, you have experienced situations where the relationship has quickly gone pear shaped.

Often the challenges can be traced to the presence of cognitive-communication-behaviour issues that significantly impact the formation of working relationships.

When workers experience challenging behaviour they may quit after a short time, or the client / family may sack the worker feeling, for instance, that they are not understood.

Turn-over can be high and this is distressing for all parties.

These brief guidelines are aimed at filling a gap while more comprehensive guidelines tailored to the person are developed.