VANTAGE: PROJECT REPORT
Power and position in behaviour support supervision
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This report follows the story of the project, from why it began to what comes next.
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AI Use Statement: This project used Claude (Anthropic) and Speechify as accessibility and thinking tools to talk through and structure my own ideas and to support reading and writing. Claude was also used to code the Vantage website and this interactive report, including their interactive elements, accessibility features, and downloadable outputs. Both are hosted on Netlify, using its anonymous, de-identified analytics to count page views. All content, ideas, arguments, and activities, and the premise and process of the resource, are my own, drawn from my reading, study, and writing. I acknowledge the ethical and environmental tensions when utilising these tools and aim to reduce my impact through mindful use and restitution. Details of use can be found in my AI log.
This work was completed on the unceded lands of the Worimi people.
Introduction
What Vantage is, why it was made, and where the name comes from.
Vantage is a free website for behaviour support practitioners in Australia who want to make the most of the supervision they participate in. It is designed to help practitioners recognise and broaden the experience they bring to the role, even if they do not yet have much experience within the field itself.
Human rights are a central part of behaviour support in the NDIS (NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, 2026a; United Nations, 2006), and Vantage is built on the idea that this focus should blend seamlessly into supervision. The work we do with participants and the supervision we receive as practitioners form a continuous loop, like an infinity symbol: the people providing behaviour support should receive supervision that is also person-centred, human-rights-focussed, effective, and ethical.
Why Vantage
Behaviour support in the NDIS is a low-barrier field. To become a behaviour support practitioner, a person needs suitability approval from the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, assessed against the Positive Behaviour Support Capability Framework (NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, 2026b). Much of this rests on self-assessment, with a more experienced practitioner providing supervision and support to a less experienced one. This structure is designed to bring people into the field who may not hold formal qualifications but who have lived experience (Fisher et al., 2024), and that experience deserves to be honoured and acknowledged.
However, the requirements and expectations of supervisors are not clearly defined, and there are no established guidelines for what supervision should involve (Goodall et al., 2024). Behaviour Support Practitioners Australia (BSP Australia), an association for practitioners, is working towards becoming a peak body of connection, accountability, and support for practitioners and the field, but this work is still in its early stages.
The name
A vantage point is a position that gives you a view. Vantage aims to give supervisees that view: a way to see how they are positioned within supervision when they go into it, including the power and positionality that shape the relationship. It also helps practitioners connect the work they do with the people they support to the supervision they receive themselves.
Where I stand
I have worked in the behaviour support space for almost two decades. I have received supervision as a supervisee, and I currently provide supervision to behaviour support practitioners, from those in the early stages of their practice to very experienced practitioners. This semester, I have also been teaching a subject on supervision and performance management, which I had not taught before.
Because I provide supervision and teach in this area, I hold a potential conflict of interest in creating a supervision resource. However, providing free resources to the field is a long-standing part of my practice, and Vantage is another of these. It is freely available to anyone who wants to build their knowledge and understanding, with the ultimate hope of better supporting the participants we work with.
Supervision quality depends not only on a supervisor's experience, but on their capacity to work from a human rights and intersectional perspective. The person with the least standing to recognise this gap is the one positioned to be affected by it.
Looking back, this was a generalised, sweeping statement, and I have since refined it in response to this and other feedback. There are supervisors who do understand human rights and intersectionality, and who apply them in their practice. However, this is not a requirement. Human rights have a significant focus within the NDIS Positive Behaviour Support Capability Framework, which sets out the capabilities we work towards and adhere to as behaviour support practitioners (Fisher et al., 2025). Yet this focus is not clearly embedded in how supervision is provided, or expected to be provided. As a result, supervisors may not understand the impact that intersectionality can have on the supervisees they work with, or consider the richness of diversity, and the experiences of diversity, that supervisees bring to the role and to their work.
The Intersectional Lens
The thinking underneath the project: whose knowledge counts? Click each lens to open it.
Critical disability studies and intersectionality ▸
The lens
- Connects the components that make up who a person is with the way they experience the world, particularly disability (Goodley, 2014; Meekosha & Shuttleworth, 2009; Wickenden, 2023)
- Draws on critical race theory and is grounded in “nothing about us without us”: autonomy, independence, and dismantling ableism
- Builds on the social and human rights models of disability, recognising that people bring their own experiences of disability (Barnes, 2014; Oliver, 1995)
- Crenshaw’s intersectionality: intersecting components of identity can compound oppression and marginalisation (Crenshaw, 1989)
How it applies to supervision
- Relatively clear in practitioners’ work with NDIS participants, but not applied as readily to supervisees
- Research on supporting supervisees is limited, so I drew on social work and allied health literature, which brings a necessary element of critique and interrogation (Ecko Jojo, 2024; Goodall et al., 2024)
- Supervisees often hold less power than their supervisors, or than those making decisions about their work (Cook et al., 2018)
What I learned
- Applying these lenses reinforced how much power I hold as a supervisor
- Vantage needed to be neutral and clear: not telling supervisees they are powerless, nor encouraging them to override their supervisors
- As in the Intersectionality Walk in an earlier subject, we each come from different positions, and those positions shape what we experience
Standpoint theory and hermeneutical injustice ▸
The lens
- Standpoint theory: knowledge is shaped by a person’s position within social structures, and those with the least power often hold insight that is undervalued or unheard (Collins, 2000; Harding, 2004)
- Hermeneutical injustice: supervisees often lack the interpretive resources to name their own position (Fricker, 2007)
How it applies to supervision
- Supervisees need to know where they stand: how they are perceived, and how they fit within the supervisory space
- Workplaces and funding systems create tension, and some components of who a person is can make things more difficult
- Vantage offers language to name experiences supervisees may not have had words for
What I learned
- Standpoint ties closely to intersectionality: our own perspective informs our world view and the way we do our work
- Behaviour support is inherently personal work, applied to help people and aligned with the human rights focus of the Capability Framework
- That framework is directed towards participants, but the same ethos applies to supervisees learning the work: recognising their own position, and how it affects the people they support
An Indigenist lens on knowledge and power ▸
The lens
- I do not claim an Indigenist standpoint; I draw on Indigenous scholarship and principles, particularly Indigenous Data Sovereignty, to inform how the project treats knowledge (Carroll et al., 2020; Lowitja Institute, 2023)
How it applies to supervision
- Vantage is non-extractive by design: no sign-up, no barriers, and no personal information collected, so nothing dissuades people from using it
- Within supervision, the question is how knowledge moves: whether the supervisee’s knowledge is exchanged relationally or extracted
- Vantage aims to bring supervisees, often in a lower position of power, into a more level space where they can share their perspective, their vantage, and information their supervisor may not have
Settler colonialism and First Nations disability
Also, the impacts of settler colonialism with respect to First Nations disability.
- The ongoing impacts of settler colonisation on First Nations people with disability, and on other marginalised people in the disability space, could have been explored further (Delany et al., 2025; Green, 2023), though doing so in depth would have shifted the project’s focus
- We live and work across many different Countries and with many First Nations communities and family groups, where there is a well-founded, historical distrust of government services and of outsiders coming in and taking over (Gerrard et al., 2025)
- To my understanding, there are very few Indigenous behaviour support practitioners, as this is a new and largely unregulated field, yet their perspectives would be highly valuable in supporting First Nations people with disability
- There is a gap between ABS figures on First Nations disability and NDIS participation, with limited data overall (Australian Bureau of Statistics & Avery, 2025), alongside challenges in accessing services, appropriate funding, and plan reviews
What I learned
- Keeping Vantage non-extractive limits how I can assess and evaluate it, but modelling what I aim to achieve mattered more
- Practising what I preach is central: acknowledging different roles and working as a group is as relevant to supervision as it is to behaviour support
Turning the lens on my own AI use ▸
The lens
- The Indigenist lens turns reflexively on my use of AI: whose data it is trained on, and where that knowledge came from (Prehn et al., 2026)
- Knowledge has been, and continues to be, extracted without permission, a colonial and capitalist practice (Schulz & Loewen-Colón, 2026), and this tension remains even when the words and knowledge are my own
- The environmental impact of these tools also connects to Indigenous perspectives of caring for Country
What I learned
- This tension is named rather than resolved
- I am upfront and clear about my use, because these tools are valuable and accessible for me, and help me make resources accessible for others
Outcomes
The three intended outcomes from my proposal, and how each one went. Click an outcome to open it.
1 Supervisees can access clear, standpoint-informed language to understand their position within supervision, and to name experiences they may not have previously had words for. ▸ open Achieved
Vantage explains standpoint, positionality, perspective, and power in plain language, and links to references for further reading.
2 Supervisees are prompted to consider the intersectional and human rights dimensions of their practice, and the ways these intersect with the supervisory relationship. ▸ open Achieved
The interactive activities, including the positionality wheel (Figure 1), prompt supervisees to locate themselves, reflect on their experiences, and add their own notes. A downloadable summary gives them something tangible to take into supervision.
3 The resource contributes to a shift in the field's baseline expectations of what supervision is and can be, by making the tools to understand and navigate supervision freely and publicly available. ▸ open Achieved
Vantage invites people to consider different perspectives and the power inherent in supervision as a relationship, and how this shapes their work, beyond the requirements of the Capability Framework. A clinical lead planning to share it with their team, and a supervisor requesting a supervisor version, suggest it is beginning to shift conversations about supervision.
Measuring it: the three indicators
Click a row to see the data.
| Indicator | What I planned to measure | Result |
|---|---|---|
| ▸ Reach | The number of practitioners accessing the resource. | 266 page views (212 unique) since launch |
Netlify’s anonymous, de-identified analytics recorded 266 page views, from 212 unique visitors, since launch. This fits the non-surveillance commitment: it counts views without identifying who visited or from where (Carroll et al., 2020). | ||
| ▸ Engagement | Completion of the resource's activities, where the build allows. | Not tracked, by design |
I chose not to track activity completion or downloads, to keep the resource fully non-identifiable, so there is no engagement data. In future, I would collect anonymous usage data, stated upfront with a simple cookie notice explaining that it is used only to improve the content. | ||
| ▸ Feedback | Voluntary qualitative feedback, gathered through an open suggestion box. | 731 impressions, 14 reactions, 2 comments (LinkedIn) |
No feedback came through the website itself. Shared on LinkedIn, Vantage reached 731 impressions, with 14 reactions, one repost, and two comments. A supervisor described it as “really cool, simple, practical, and well articulated” and would “love to see something similar for a supervisor”. A clinical lead called it “really awesome” and planned to “pass on to the team”. I had not expected much feedback, so these were encouraging. | ||
Did the focus change?
No. The focus held and connected well with the theoretical foundations. The main change I would make is to how anonymous usage data is gathered, as noted under Engagement.
Strategies and Activities
What I planned to do, what actually happened, and how the pieces worked together.
The plan versus what happened
| Phase | Planned dates | Planned activities | Milestone | What actually happened |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0. Conception and scoping | 15 July to 16 August 2026 | Idea developed and refined, problem defined, theoretical lenses selected. AI use scope raised with the subject coordinator. Workshop attended. Peer feedback exchanged. | Workshop attended; proposal submitted. | Veered, then achieved I briefly veered into Easy Read behaviour support plans before returning to my original idea. Lenses selected, workshop attended, and proposal submitted. |
| 1. Information gathering and environmental scan | 17 to 23 August 2026 | LinkedIn environmental scan of existing public posts using a defined set of search terms. Consolidate content and structure. | Environmental scan completed; content plan finalised. | Achieved An iterative LinkedIn hashtag search (#PBS and #behavioursupport, narrowing to #supervision AND #PBS) found fewer posts than expected, and no supervisee voice. BSP Australia had released its Supervision Hub the week before, on 11 August 2026. |
| 2. Build | 24 August to 6 September 2026 | Develop the web-based resource, including its written content and interactive activities. | Resource built and functional. | Delayed Life intervened, so the build paused and took place in late September, using the buffer. |
| 3. Release | 7 to 13 September 2026 | Publish the resource publicly, with the voluntary feedback mechanism in place. | Resource live and publicly accessible. | Achieved, later Vantage went live and was shared on LinkedIn on 29 September. |
| 4. Feedback and revision | 14 to 20 September 2026 | Gather voluntary user feedback through the suggestion box and refine in response. | Feedback reviewed and revisions made. | Achieved I reviewed reach and comments on 6 October. Feedback was positive, so no revisions were needed. |
| 5. Re-release and consolidation | 21 September to 3 October 2026 | Publish the revised resource and consolidate observations for reporting. | Revised resource re-released. | Not needed Vantage remains live and unchanged. |
| 6. Reflection and reporting | 4 to 12 October 2026 | Reflect on the project against its intent and lenses, and complete the project report. | Project report submitted. | Achieved Report submitted on 12 October. |
What worked, and what didn't
The buffer built into the timeline worked: life interrupted the build, but the project still reached its milestones. Keeping the project small also helped. The main change I would make is to gather anonymous, de-identified usage data, as most websites do, to see which parts people find most valuable, even when they do not say so.
How the pieces fitted together
As I work for myself, I usually create resources when I get into the flow, without external deadlines. Planning this project in stages, from purpose and theory, to the build, to reflection, made progress visible and kept it on track, even though the middle phases did not run to schedule.
Stakeholder Impact
Who the project touched, and what changed for them. Click a stakeholder to open their panel, or open them all.
Supervisees
Vantage reached supervisees, likely in the hundreds, through 266 page views and 731 LinkedIn impressions. I cannot identify who they were or what challenges they faced, but people accessed it, reacted, and commented positively.
Supervisors
Although Vantage was not designed for supervisors, one gave direct feedback that they loved it and would like a version for supervisors.
Practitioners across the field
I cannot identify who was a practitioner, but many supervisees and supervisors who engaged are also practitioners working in the field.
Behaviour support organisations
No organisation contacted me directly, but a clinical lead planned to share Vantage with their team, suggesting it is beginning to reach organisations internally.
Participants
There is no observable impact on participants yet, and none was expected within two months. Practitioners need time to take in, reflect on, and act on this content before it reaches the people they support.
NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission
Vantage was not designed for or provided to the Commission. However, as the Commission oversees the people Vantage is for, any changes to supervision requirements will need to be reflected in future versions, including a supervisor component.
Me, as creator
Building Vantage gave me space to stop and reflect on my own supervision practice, which is a large part of my work.
Did the stakeholders change?
No. All of the original stakeholders remain relevant, and no new groups emerged.
Blocks and How I Got Past Them
What got in the way, and what I did about it. Click each block to open it.
A gap in the middle of the project ▸
Life interrupted the build phase, and no work happened for several weeks. The buffer planned into the timeline absorbed this: the gap ran slightly longer than the two weeks allowed, but there was still enough time to build, release, and gather feedback before reporting.
No way to see who was using Vantage ▸
Vantage launched without any way to measure use, not even a page counter. I addressed this by turning on Netlify’s anonymous, de-identified analytics, which count views without identifying visitors. Next time, I would plan this from the start, as noted in Section 4.
What Vantage Would Look Like Now
Knowing what I know now, what would change?
What I built
Vantage has four sections and takes between 30 minutes and an hour to work through, depending on reading pace. Each combines a short piece of text, with references, and a brief reflective activity that users can download. At the end, users find the references from the content alongside further reading. In response to peer feedback, Vantage also offers a small completion badge that users can download as an image.
What I'd build now
I would keep Vantage largely the same. I have had no feedback yet on whether the activities are too easy or too hard, but I am happy with them, and their number suits the purpose of the site. The key addition would be anonymous usage data, such as which sections people open, how long they spend on activities, and whether they download their responses, to show what is useful and guide refinements to usability and accessibility (CAST, 2024; World Wide Web Consortium [W3C], 2025).
Conclusion and Next Steps
Where the project goes from here, building on the outcomes, strategies, and stakeholder responses above.
Conclusion
Vantage met its three intended outcomes, reaching 212 unique visitors in its first week and a half and drawing positive feedback from a supervisor and a clinical lead. The buffer in the timeline absorbed delays, and the theoretical lenses held throughout. The clearest gap is evidence: with no engagement data and limited feedback, I know people accessed Vantage, but not how they used it, a recognised challenge in social innovation projects (Cunha et al., 2024). Vantage will stay live, and I will continue to check for feedback.
Follow-up actions
| Action | By | Why | Builds on |
|---|---|---|---|
| Add a cookie banner, linked to the existing privacy policy, and anonymous tracking of activity use and downloads | 31 October 2026 | Makes data collection transparent from the start, and shows which activities people use | Engagement indicator; Block 2 |
| Ask users for brief feedback, or at least a rating, before they download their responses | 30 November 2026 | Voluntary feedback was limited. This shifts slightly from the no-barrier design, but a rating is a small, transparent request | Feedback indicator; Outcomes 1 and 2 |
| Begin planning a complementary supervisor version, and how the two might connect | 31 December 2026 | Requested by a supervisor, and strengthens the link between how we work with participants and how we supervise | Outcome 3; supervisor stakeholders |
How I'll use what I've learned
Building Vantage has been a useful point of reflection while I continue to provide supervision. It has sharpened the connection I want to strengthen, both across the field and in my own practice: the values that guide our work with participants, such as human rights, autonomy, and quality of life, should also guide how we work with supervisees (Ecko Jojo, 2024; Fisher et al., 2025).
Supervisors should hold more experience, and guide and support those with less. But when supervisors consider supervisees’ backgrounds, experiences, knowledge, and the intersectional ways they move through the world, the power imbalance narrows (Cook et al., 2018). This strengthens supervisees’ work with participants, deepens supervisors’ understanding of context for both, and ultimately leads to effective, valuable, and meaningful outcomes for participants.
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