For families navigating the world of self-directed supports - often for the first time - the promise is powerful: choice, control, flexibility, and the opportunity to shape care around a loved one’s life, not just their needs. But for too many, the reality falls painfully short of that ideal. Why? Because we’re expecting families to lead a transformation while working in silos, with patchy information, inconsistent advice, and unclear communication. And frankly, it’s setting people up to fail.
Michael Harty as Director of Home Care Direct, on paper, could be considered a competitor to Karen McCormack in inCharge. Yet they found themselves in total agreement: in the current landscape, self-directed supports are hard to reach for too many families - not because the model is flawed, but because the scaffolding to make it work simply isn’t there.
At its heart, self-direction depends on people having the right support to make informed decisions. But what happens when there’s a vacuum where that support should be? What happens when families can’t get a straight answer, when policies differ not just from one region to another, but seemingly from one official to another? When terms are used interchangeably with no clarity, when guidance is buried in inaccessible documents, or delivered in jargon that alienates the very people it’s meant to serve? Or in some cases, entirely absent.
What happens is families retreat into silos. They reinvent the wheel, make mistakes others have already made, and burn out trying to figure out systems that should be designed to help them, not hinder them. And when that happens, the opportunity that self-directed support offers is not just missed - it risks being undermined entirely.
This comes in a month where Karen has spent hours – hours - looking at insurance options, pouring over administration tasks, navigating applications and funding systems, trying to draw down supports. And more often than not, the forms don’t make sense. The language is vague. The rules behind the systems feel disconnected from real life - whether that’s the lives of people planning for their self-directed future or the realities facing small businesses trying to get off the ground to support them. The level of bureaucracy is, quite frankly, out of control.
There are great people working to deliver supports whether that’s self-directed support packages or social care services. But their greatness is dampened by systemic flaws.
Some families manage to push through. They’re often the ones with the time, energy, resilience, or confidence to dig deep, persist, and build their own informal networks. But should access to good support depend on how articulate or assertive you are? Should it depend on who you know, or whether you happen to find a helpful person on the right day?
Michael said, “We need to stop pretending that "choice and control" is enough of a promise on its own. People don’t make good choices in a vacuum. They make good choices when they are well-informed, when they are listened to, when they can ask questions without feeling like a burden, and when the systems they interact with are joined-up and responsive. And before they become battle weary and exasperated”.
Karen added, “If we want self-directed support to work in Ireland - and we are living proof that it works, it works amazingly for my daughter - it must come with clear, consistent, and timely information. It must be communicated in ways that are easy to understand and be consistent. And it must be underpinned by a shared infrastructure of support that brings families out of isolation and into communities of learning, sharing and guidance on how to do it”.
This isn’t about one app, one service, or one agency. It’s about collaboration.
Michael Harty and Karen McCormick agree, both seeing it from different angles. We don’t need more silos - we need connection. We need to build ecosystems, not empires. Because when families are well-supported, well-informed, and not alone, self-direction stops being a buzzword and starts being a reality.
If we don’t act now to fix this vacuum, we risk turning a hopeful model into a broken promise. But if we do, the impact could be profound - not just for those drawing on care and support, but for the families who support them, and the communities where they live.
Karen McCormack and Michael Harty