Supported decision-making

What supported decision-making is and how you can apply it.

Supported decision-making explained

Support decision-making is about bridging the gap between someone’s skills and what they need to make decisions.

Rather than 'substitute decision-making' where the support person makes all the decisions on behalf of a person through solely their own judgement, supportive decision-making follows the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

This states that a person has the right to their own will and preferences.

Article 12 states that all people have the right to make their own decisions and that if a person does need someone else to speak for them, this should be done properly. Disabled people have equal rights to own or be given property and to control their own money.

There can be lots of reasons why a person might need support to make decisions. It could be a learning disability, neurodivergence, a communication impairment, or due to mental health impacts.

Steps to support people’s decision-making

There are lots of ways to support a person making their own decisions in a mana-enhancing way. Erika Butters of the Personal Advocacy and Safeguarding Adults Trust says there are seven steps to decision-making. Simply taking a person through each of the steps can be enough to help them make their own decisions, small or huge.

Describe: what is the situation?
Accessible information: do they have all the information in a way they can understand it?
Explore options: use as many senses as possible to take a look at what the choices are.
Consider consequences: what would happen if different decisions were made?
Make decisions: decide which option works best.
Act: do what you need to put that decision into practice.
Review: look back at what went well and what didn't. Even a bad decision is good if we can learn from it.

Tips for supporters

If you're a trusted person wanting to provide supported decision-making for someone, key things you should take into account include:

Respect for autonomy: supported decision-making respects an individual's right to make choices and decisions, even when they may need assistance.
Collaboration: it involves working with the individual to understand their preferences, values, and wishes. It’s a good idea to keep a record of the person’s preferences.

Communication: effective communication is crucial to understand someone's needs, preferences, and limitations. It should involve using accessible and clear language and even alternative communication methods when necessary.
Assessing capacity: it is important to assess the individual's decision-making capacity to determine the level of support required. This assessment is typically carried out by medical professionals who then pass their assessment on to legal authorities.
Read more about this on the Community Law New Zealand website
Identifying support networks: supported decision-making may involve identifying family members, friends, or professionals who can help the individual in making decisions. Sometimes having a bit of distance from someone allows you to be a more neutral trusted person. It's important to consider how your own wishes are influencing someone's decisions against their will.
Tailored support: the level and type of support provided should be tailored to the individual's specific needs and circumstances. This can range from simple assistance with understanding information to more complex decision-making arrangements.
Safeguarding against undue influence: it's important to protect the individual from coercion or manipulation by ensuring that support is provided in the individual's best interests. This can be really challenging but identifying where you have conflicts of interest will reduce harm you may unintentionally cause and protect a person's rights.

Tools and resources

Volition

Volition is an app for supported decision-making. Decision-makers can enter information about their preferences - i.e. what they like, don’t like, what’s important to them, and how they want to receive support. These preferences can be every day things like what they want to eat, or big things like where they want to live. Decision-makers can share this information with their supporters via the app, so they don’t have to repeat themselves over and over again, helping with the decision-making process.

The base version of the Volition app is free for decision-makers to use.

Visit the Volition website

Whaimana - Support my decisions

Whaimana - Support my decisions is a website that shares information and resources about supported decision-making. The site in run by Whaikaha - Ministry of Disabled people. It includes resources for decision-makers and supporters.

Check out Whaimana - Support my decisions

Supported decision-making

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