The co-design of research, products and services is fast becoming the gold standard, with many funding bodies, including Government, requiring co-design for grants and initiatives, such as the development of the National Autism Strategy. However, there is a lack of understanding of how the co-design processes can be adapted to be respectful and responsive to the autistic community.

The aim of the Self-Advocacy @ Work project was to develop and disseminate employment self-advocacy resources by, and for, the autistic community utilising co-design methodologies.

Co-design is an investigative and creative process that brings together people who are impacted by the product, service, or resource (also known as an 'output') and people with knowledge and technical skills to jointly create something. Co-design aims to empower and put people with lived experience at the centre of the design process, recognising that with lived experience are the people who know best. The purpose of co-design is to bring unique perspectives and expertise together to jointly create a solution, product, or service.

The benefits of co-design include to:

• empower people to recognise that they are experts of their own experience
• help to solve real life problems
• aid in understanding unique perspectives
• provide opportunities for community input
• generate and test ideas, and
• provide valuable insight on whether something is likely to work in the real world.
• There is no single standard framework or process for co-design.

This report provides evaluation of the processes by which the autistic community were engaged in the co-design processes. This work was completed through the Sylvia Rodger Academy of the Autism CRC.