A well trained staff is imperative to delivering services and programs with fidelity and reaching the outcomes you have set for your work. Helping a diverse staff reach competency in any new practice can be challenging. Developing a training and professional development plan that meets the needs of your unique learners is your first step in supporting your staff to reach their potential!
Instructor-Led Training
The traditional route to delivering training is to provide an instructor-led training experience for your learners, and for many of the practices you want to teach, this is probably still the best option. Instructor-led training allows opportunities for your staff to practice their new skills with their colleagues with the direct support of the facilitator while also building team cohesion.
The Instructor-Led Trainings we provide are:
- Motivational Interviewing – Motivational Interviewing, an evidence based practice, is a collaborative, goal-oriented style of communication with particular attention to the language of change. It is designed to strengthen personal motivation for and commitment to a specific goal by eliciting and exploring the person’s own reasons for change within an atmosphere of acceptance and compassion. We provide trainings for all levels of the practice. See linked training menu below for more details.
- Trauma, Trauma Informed Care and Compassion Fatigue – In the social services the vast majority of the clients we serve have some trauma in their history. This training series teaches learners what trauma is, how it affects the mind and body both in the moment and over time, and how to adapt the ways that we work with clients in order to be sensitive to and avoid triggering their trauma histories. We also spend time understand compassion fatigue, the inherent emotional residue or stress of exposure to working with those suffering from the consequences of traumatic events, and how to shore up our defenses to this stress.
- Implementation Planning and Support – Have you ever tried to bring a new practice into your agency? Brought in trainers, spent a lot of time and money getting your staff trained in the new practice? Things start out great. Your team is talking about the new practice and trying it out and it looks like things are going as planned. Then, six months or a year down the line, it seems like that practice has all but disappeared? If so, you are not alone. This is very common. And it is not just because the practice doesn’t fit your work, or your staff just can’t seem to learn it. It is often because there wasn’t a full implementation plan. Research shows that training alone only accounts for about 5% of change in staff performance. Even when you add in ongoing learning, supervision and fidelity measures you are not likely to get to full scale implementation with a more robust plan.
Self-Paced Training
The work flow of social service staff is already overwhelming. We often hear that we can’t fit anything more in! We get it. At the same time, we know that training can help improve this work flow over time. So what do we do? Self-paced learning is often the answer. Newer technology now allows us to design and deliver training that staff can use anywhere, anytime, on any devise. And gone are the days of your basic voice over PowerPoint that learners click through quickly without really learning the material. Software now allows us to create fully immersive and interactive learning products that your learners will want to use! eLearning platforms make it much simpler to track your learners’ progress.
- See our Store to view the Self-Paced Training courses we offer.
- We can also design custom content to meet the needs of your agency. Contact us (on the bottom of this page to set up a time to discuss your needs.
Implementation Planning
Have you ever tried to bring a new practice into your agency? Brought in trainers, spent a lot of time and money on getting your staff trained in the new practice? Things start out great. Your team is talking about the new practice and trying it out and it looks like things are going as planned. Then, six months or a year down the line, it seems like that practice has all but disappeared? If so, you are not alone. This is very common. And it is not just because the practice doesn’t fit your work, or your staff just can’t seem to learn it. It is often because there wasn’t a full implementation plan. Research shows that training alone only accounts for about 5% of change in staff performance. Even when you add in ongoing learning, supervision and fidelity measures you are not likely to get to full scale implementation.
We will work with your training team to develop a full scale implementation plan covering:
- A training plan to get all staff up to proficiency,
- Ongoing learning and supervision to develop competency,
- Fidelity measures,
- A plan to integrate the practice into existing systems and practices,
- Human resources and staff evaluation
- Forms & Processes
- Other practices staff currently use
- etc.
- Integrating the practice into the overall culture of the agency,
- Understanding and involvement of the leadership team.