The Tasmanian Training Consortium (TTC) is pleased to announce the addition of Lifeline Tasmania’s trauma-informed learning series to our public course calendar.
The sequence of three, one-day face-to-face workshops includes:
TTC has introduced these workshops to help workplaces to demystify trauma and to improve their practices to create safer working environments for their employees and the customers who interact with them.
What is Trauma?
Trauma is a natural response to an event that is beyond an individual’s capacity to cope. While not everyone responds in the same way, the impacts of trauma can be all-encompassing, affecting a person’s physical, mental and social wellbeing. Research has found that trauma can also increase an individual’s risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviours. Furthermore, the social impacts of trauma can stretch across one’s lifespan, the community and even across generations.
About the workshops
The series of workshops starts with learning the foundational concepts in Introduction to Trauma, which is a prerequisite before exploring more detail in Trauma Informed Practice and The Trauma Informed Organisation.
Trauma Informed Practice aims to provide participants with an increased confidence in their ability to communicate trauma informed principles and a strong understanding of how to integrate trauma informed practices into their work. Further expanding on these concepts, The Trauma Informed Organisation explores how to systemise an organisation around trauma-informed principles.
All workshops in the series are delivered by either Tracey Groombridge or Holly Davies-Freeman from Lifeline Tasmania. Lifeline have been running trauma training since 2017 in an effort to reach their vision of a resilient Tasmania, free of suicide.
The original Lifeline trauma workshop was developed through a partnership with Charles Sturt University and has since undergone regular rounds of review and development in alignment with emerging research. Most recently, in October 2022, the content underwent a full review by an Adjunct Senior Researcher at the University of Tasmania with over 40 years of experience in the trauma field.
What it means to be trauma informed
The trauma-informed learning series is designed to enhance people’s understanding of the impacts of trauma and to teach the necessary skills that can enable a trauma-informed approach to occur at every level of an organisation.
Project Manager James Ryan from Lifeline Tasmania says that it’s about teaching people to “understand the mind and heart of someone who has experience trauma and how best to work with that person”. James hopes that the workshops series will encourage deep reflection and a level of change in organisational systems and individual practices towards those impacted by trauma.
“Many people carrying trauma won’t engage with services, however, when individuals and organisations are trauma informed safety becomes a clear focus at every staff, client and system touchpoint, removing barriers, stigma and creating a safer workplace”, says James.
Why should organisations and their employees be trauma-informed?
When organisations and their employees operate in a trauma-informed way, it promotes an understanding of those impacted by trauma, which can help to build trust and empower resilience in teams and more broadly across an organisation. Adopting trauma-informed strategies may also help organisations to improve staff wellbeing and retention.
Furthermore, witnessing, investigating or being exposed to traumatic events or materials in the workplace is a psychosocial hazard, meaning it can result in serious psychological of physical harm. Under the model WHS laws, a person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU) must manage the risk of psychosocial hazards in the workplace. Ensuring employees and organisational practices are trauma-informed can help workplaces to manage these risks and keep their people safe from harm.
Who should attend?
Participation in both Introduction to Trauma and Trauma Informed Practice is recommended for anyone whose work involves contact with customers or clients who may be affected by trauma, particularly those who lead other people, work in front-line service roles, prepare policies and advice and/or work closely with the community.
Further participation in The Trauma Informed Organisation is encouraged for leaders, team leaders, managers, executives and people and culture teams who can implement systemic changes to create trauma informed organisations.
The three Trauma-informed workshops can be booked through the our course calendar.
If anything raises issues for you or someone around you, you can reach out to the following services:
- Your agency’s Employee Assistance Program provider
- Lifeline – 13 11 14
- Beyond Blue – 1300 224 636
- 1800RESPECT – 1800 737 732
- Suicide Call Back Service – 1300 659 467
- MensLine Australia – 1300 789 978
If you are experiencing an emergency: call 000
References:
- Lifeline, Support Toolkit, Trauma: https://toolkit.lifeline.org.au/topics/trauma/about-trauma
- Safe Work Australia, Psychosocial hazards: https://www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/safety-topic/managing-health-and-safety/mental-health/psychosocial-hazards