Safeguarding

On Course for a Personal Best

This entry was posted in Updates and tagged Change Management Complaint Handling Continual Improvement Customer Focus Drama Based Training Employee engagement Inclusion & Diversity Leadership Development Organisational Development Safeguarding on by

So, I wrote a while back about how Enact got off to a flyer in our first quarter. Well, I’m pleased to report that as we enter 2016, the mid-point of our financial year, we’re still going strong. The last quarter has in fact been our busiest on record. We’re on course for a Personal Best. (Okay, I know, I’ll stop with the athletics thing. It is the Olympics this year though, you know?)

My gratitude and thanks for our ongoing success go equally to the great, talented team we have here at Enact and to all of our clients for giving us the opportunity to fill our days with enjoyable, stimulating, and rewarding work.

I thought you might be interested to hear a little bit about what we’ve been up to…

The word is out

National Grid continues to be a major client. The more we do for them the more the word spreads throughout the company. From our point of view, it’s great when a client appreciates the effectiveness of our experiential approach and recognises its strengths over conventional training approaches.

So far this year they’ve commissioned us to do a range of projects, including:

  • New Ways of Working
  • Leading Improvement
  • Unconscious Bias
  • Effective Complaint Handling
  • Building Sustainable Relationships
  • Stakeholder Management
  • Customer Focus
  • Team Leader Workshops
  • Collaboration
  • Frontline Leader Workshops

We’ve also been busy working on projects for Adidas, AstraZeneca, NHS, Your Homes Newcastle, UCLan, University of Westminster, RMD Kwikform, and BESSO to name but a few!

New Horizons

It’s a buzz to see us not only doing well and growing in our traditional product areas, long term specialisms like Inclusion and Diversity (where we continue to innovate with our Unconscious Bias workshops), but increasingly in our newer areas of expertise.

More and more we’ve been helping our clients with organisational development challenges like leadership & management development, employee engagement, building high performing teams, change management, and continual improvement.

On a personal note, I’m also delighted that we’ve continued to expand our work in the field of safeguarding. Whether for children or adults, it’s crucial work that I’m proud to be associated with. It’s exciting times. I’ll keep you posted on what comes next.

If you’d like to know more about how we change attitudes and behaviours in the workplace, please drop me a line.

 

Drama-based Safeguarding Training

This entry was posted in Updates and tagged crucial conversations Drama Based Training Safeguarding Unconscious Bias on by

When we were approached by British Gymnastics to deliver a workshop on safeguarding at their annual conference for Regional Welfare Officers earlier this year, it’s fair to say we jumped at the chance.

We’ve been steadily developing our work in this crucial area for several years and have witnessed first-hand just how impactful our highly interactive, experiential approach is for bringing the challenges of safeguarding practices and procedures to life.

We were sure that this would prove yet another opportunity to demonstrate the strengths of our participant-centred, drama-based approach over conventional, trainer-centred, ‘death by PowerPoint’ training.

The Goal

As well as our trademark high levels of interaction and engagement, British Gymnastics wanted us to bring our experience and know-how to bear in 3 ways. They wanted a session in which delegates could:

  • Experience for themselves how personal bias may influence the safeguarding referrals they make
  • Explore the challenges of making referrals
  • Develop the practical skills needed to have crucial conversations

Bias

It’s fascinating how much our bias, or unconscious bias, impacts the decisions we make. Using innovative digital content our British Gymnastics delegates experienced the risks from bias when making assumptions about parents, carers and their child within a safeguarding scenario. We then helped them understand the brain science behind just why it happens, before giving them some tips on how to guard against it.

  • 86% of delegates said that the session increased their understanding of how personal bias may influence referrals

Referrals

Working on realistic safeguarding issues in small groups, delegates got to explore the potential challenges they might face when making referrals. Best practice examples were shared to highlight what should be done to adhere to the correct referral process and achieve the best outcome for person at risk.

  • 91% of delegates said the session increased their confidence to overcome potential challenges when making referrals

Crucial Conversations

Everyone knows how difficult it can be to go up against your peers, let alone challenge the assumptions and attitudes of more senior members of staff. Using our electronic voting system, 9 out of 10 delegates acknowledged that, on at least one occasion, they had been in just such a position and avoided having a difficult conversation. The risks for safeguarding are obvious.

In order to overcome this in the future, we engaged delegates in some skills-based training. We wanted to provide them with tools and techniques that would increase their confidence to take on any crucial conversations needed around safeguarding.

  • 86% of delegates said they now felt more confident to engage in difficult conversations

Making a Difference

As well as achieving excellent results for each aspect of the training, delegates rated the session as a whole very highly:

  • 100% found it worthwhile
  • 100% rated it ‘Excellent’

And here’s some of what they said in their own words:

Totally unique presentation.

Style v. good, content v. good, delivery v. good, overall v. good.

Thank you for challenging my beliefs.

A breath of fresh air.

Excellent, thoroughly enjoyed the concept.

Immense!!!

If you’d like to find out more about our safeguarding training, we’re running a taster on 25th January in Birmingham. We encourage you to come and check it out for yourself. Seeing is believing.