Speaker 1 00:03
With information on the latest developments in assistive technology and initiatives, from the studios of two RPH in Sydney, RPH Australia brings you AbleQuest. Hello, I'm Manny Roper. Today's guest is Lone star Makoni, founder and CEO of Breaking Barriers Disability Service at Wyong on the Central Coast of New South Wales.
Originally from Zimbabwe, Lone Star worked in his father's business in farming and retail. He followed his family to Australia and worked as a chef for eight years before being drawn to the disability sector. That was 17 years ago and now he heads up the Breaking Barriers Disability Service with more than 150 staff who offer travel and transport assistance for people with disabilities. The service also offers community nursing and help with daily living skills at home and in the community. Lonestar was recently honoured as most outstanding CEO-director in the 2023 Australian Disability Awards.
Elaine Wziontek asked him about the award and his management style of working alongside employees. They also talked about his person-centred approach of matching rather than allocating staff with clients to encourage them on their journeys. Lonestar believes this is the best way to involve and support users of the service to make the best match possible for both them and members of the Breaking Barriers team.
Speaker 2 01:49
[.... on] the Program, Lonestar.
Speaker 3 01:51
Oh, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 2 01:54
[?], can you tell me about the award and what it means to you and your organisation?
Speaker 3 02:01
It means a lot for me and the organisation and everyone contributed for us to be where we are.
Speaker 2 02:10
So your organisation [?] called Breaking Barriers Disability Service.
Speaker 3 02:18
There are a lot of barriers, for example, I originally am from Zimbabwe.
Speaker 2 02:23
Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3 02:24
If I talk about people with disabilities, they don't have NDIS, they are on their own to make sure that they look after their children, often the members with disabilities. So as I kept Australia in the sort of thing before I worked as a chef, then I decided to change into moving to the disability industry. I want to be able to make a difference. I want to do something that, you know, even when I'm long gone, I will be remembered. In the respect of barriers, we will not only help people with disabilities, we also help people in the community, we also help people in these crews.
So we are trying to integrate people with disabilities and even age people and single mothers or single parents to just help everyone to be able to achieve whatever they want to achieve.
Speaker 2 03:23
That's terrific. So you provide services on the central coast, is it community nursing and daily tasks?
Speaker 3 03:33
So we do support as independent living, community nursing, daily tasks, community access. We do support coordination. We do community transport.
Speaker 2 03:41
So I understand that you match rather than allocate.
Speaker 3 03:47
Yes, philosophy. When we get a new participant, we go meet the person first, and then when we meet the person, we see what sort of a person they are. And then we try to look for people from our staff with similarities or we share the same common, for example, someone that likes soccer or rugby. There's no need of me putting a staff member who doesn't like rugby to work with someone who is more into rugby because it's all about interacting with our participants. So we try to make that. What we do, we get those people to go and meet the clients.
And then when they meet the clients, the clients after they meet with those few individuals, and then the participants usually come to us and say, look, I like the A, B, and C. And then that's when we start building our supports from, because also the things that we have been trying, just like you and me, I don't want a stranger every day in my house, a different person every day in my house. I don't want different faces every day. I'd like to have that consistency. So that's why we try to do that.
Speaker 2 04:56
So it's like getting a relationship with somebody and that you feel comfortable with, a carer feeling comfortable with the client.
Speaker 3 05:02
Yes, it has to be both ways where the carer is comfortable and also the participant is comfortable with the carer because we don't want people to be awkward.
Speaker 2 05:12
As well as the caring, the matching, your website says there's a focus on leveraging technology to revolutionise the way disability services are delivered. Can you give us some examples of that, how that works in overcoming limitations?
Speaker 3 05:29
Look, we have been working with some OTs where by, for example, we've got some participants who are non-verbal. So they see this technology like in iPad, which is where they can help them to interact. We've got OTs in speech pathologies. They come with these lovely daily planners, like both, that they put in the houses, that the participants, they can use to express what they want and how they want their routines to be like. And we've got OTs that makes our jobs easier to, and protects the staff and also the participants. So, when you're transferring them, if you're including a wheelchair, an electric wheelchair, these things have been helping the participants to be able to be independent.
If they want to move, of course, somewhere for, sometimes if you don't need people to be pushing you around, you just need your own space. If it's an electric wheelchair, you're going to just go by yourself and you don't just get a bit of stress.
Speaker 2 06:23
So where you can use technology, you can. Yes. So make people more independent.
Speaker 3 06:31
Exactly, yes.
Speaker 2 06:32
I'd like to know a little bit more about your background. I understand you were born in Zimbabwe and you worked in your father's business. What was that?
Speaker 3 06:41
Oh, yes, so my father had a farm, he's called a farm, or he's passed, no? So he had a farm, he had some Photoshop, some packets, and a bunch of other businessmen.
Speaker 2 06:51
So your father had bottle shops and did you see...
Speaker 3 06:53
Say butchers. Butchers in supermarkets. So he was a businessman.
Speaker 2 06:59
And you've been a DJ and a chef as well.
Speaker 3 07:03
DJ is something that I like to do. I like to work, it's something that I like music so, yeah.
Speaker 2 07:10
And what kind of chef were you?
Speaker 3 07:14
In [?those terms].
Speaker 2 07:15
Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3 07:15
I worked at a German restaurant, I think, in Central Coast, there's one called Bavarian Beer Cafe, but I used to work at the rock restaurant, and then I worked at [?] Menly Leagues Club in Warrington.
Speaker 2 07:31
Yes, yes.
Speaker 3 07:35
There was a restaurant there which I used to cook in and work here on the course for the RSL.
Speaker 2 07:45
And then you changed your mind, you decided on a different career.
Speaker 3 07:50
As I said, something that, by me, even going back home, seeing God's family members directly is a disability. So it was something that I really wanted to get into, to be able to help.
Speaker 2 08:07
And were you able to use the experience of being a chef and working for your father? Have you drawn on that experience in managing people in your team?
Speaker 3 08:16
Yes, as you know it's difficult to manage stuff but I think that experience that I got from my father since I was a kid.
Speaker 2 08:26
Mmm.
Speaker 3 08:26
It has helped me with my people skills, I believe, where I don't ask staff to do something that I'm not going, I'm not willing to do. Up to now, I still go and work on the floor to the support worker.
Speaker 2 08:40
You're still working as a support worker, huh?
Speaker 3 08:42
Yes, yesterday I actually did a shift to where I went and picked up a participant from [?] CREIH and you know, so I was still to work on the floor. Whenever they need I'll always put my hand up and my staff actually they will roast at me sometimes not even telling me they'll just send me to say look you've got a shift at this time and then I'll just accept and say yep I'll go do it.
Speaker 2 09:04
So what kind of a boss do you think you are? What would your team members say?
Speaker 3 09:08
they all say that, I mean, I've got an open door policy where I am not a detector. I get them to come in and come up with ideas and work together. Sometimes, you know, people come with ideas and then sometimes they might. I might be a local. I don't think at the moment we are in a position to do that, but I do try by all means to listen to them whenever they've got any situations or issues.
Speaker 2 09:33
Does your role as a CEO involve what kinds of things do you do in a week?
Speaker 3 09:38
So pretty much like I've been an open door policy, I have to be, I have to be able to manage conflict and I have to be able, I have to be a good listener. So staff, they might come with personal or family or work issues. I don't discuss them and say, look, I'm busy off you go. And even staff, if someone is struggling to do their job, I'm always there to help them. They know they can come to me and ask for help. They're not going to be scared to say, oh, he's going to say, why am I paying you for that? He's going to do this for you. So I am someone who is always with...
Speaker 2 10:15
So how many staff and how many clients do you have, roughly?
Speaker 3 10:21
At the moment, I'm not mistaken, we have about 150 staff, and then in terms of clients, which I think we are on the eventual 80 staff members who participate for the 150 staff and then I think that was...
Speaker 2 10:34
80 people and some of them young and some of them old. Can you tell us a little bit about the clients?
Speaker 3 10:42
We've got some who are young, who are still at school, and then we've got some who are like in their mid 30s or 40s, and then we've got some who are like 60s. And then we've got some who are like teenagers. So we've got a variety.
Speaker 2 10:57
And how do you help the teenagers?
Speaker 3 11:00
I look like we do, for example, one of my senior team leader, he was a PE teacher at high school, and he used to do senior, yes, especially if they're boys, he was good with them, and then of course my service manager, she used to be a chef. She's good, some of the girls are like cooking, even the boys, they're like cooking, so we do certain things like a day though we can say, okay, we're gonna do a barbecue, we're gonna do some mix on sushi. So we do sort of like programs to try to help and integrate them to make sure that they're also having fun.
Speaker 2 11:33
These children that are homeless or are they just come from families that are broken down or...?
Speaker 3 11:39
So some of them, they will be either the family they've broken down, so some of them they end up going into our steel houses, so we look after them 24 hours every day now on some of our group homes, and then some of them they'll come in, they'll do a respite where they'll come in, be with us for like a week or so, and then go back home to the same of breaking if the families are bad.
Speaker 2 12:02
I see. And I understand you came from Zimbabwe with your wife or did you meet her here?
Speaker 3
I met her here.
Speaker 2
Ah, does she work with you in disability or something different?
Speaker 3 12:12
She does, she works at Bayon Hospital, she's a regular nurse, but she also helps us, she also works at the company.
Speaker 2 12:21
And her name is is it revimbo?
Speaker 3
Correct, yeah.
Speaker 2
Yeah, okay, I saw a nice photograph of you when you... were at the awards - were you surprised that you were nominated for this award?
Speaker 3 12:32
I was surprised. I didn't even know about that until I got an email.
Speaker 2 12:37
If somebody wants to find out more about Breaking Barriers Disability Service at Wyong, where can they find out more?
Speaker 3 12:45
So again, we've got our website so if they go on www.breakingbarriers.com, they will be able to open our website and they [?] site. There is access to referrals. If they want to see or support, or even if they're looking for work, there will be also those opportunities.
Speaker 2 13:06
So it's www.breakingbarriers.com. Well, once again, congratulations on the award and thank you for giving up your time to talk to us.
Speaker 3 13:19
Thank you so much. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 13:21
Okay, bye. And that was Lonestar akoni, founder and CEO of Breaking Barriers Disability Service at Wyong on the Central Coast. Lonestar was recently honoured as most outstanding CEO director in the 2023 Australian Disability Awards.
Speaker 1 13:44
With information on the latest developments in assistive technology and initiatives, from the studios of 2RPH in Sydney, RPH Australia brings you Ablequest.
