In-house training for Staff Supporters

Just as I finished training Staff Supporters for a large transport organisation the threat level in the UK was raised to ‘critical’ due to a series of car bombs.

I had intended to write something about the training, but it seems it is now more relevant than ever.

The Staff Supporter training originated as a way of providing a human aspect of care for traumatic incidents in the public sector, mainly assaults and suicides. While still attending to these aspects, the trainings we now facilitate, pay attention to strategies for in-house support in the event of a critical incident as well.

When a major incident happens many people come forward to help in all sorts of ways, offering their time and skills to those affected. Staff Supporters volounteer to do just this, however, they are trained to understand the effect of trauma on people, to support and normalise and to link with organisational resources and liase with managers and staff. This approach was undoubtably very successful after the Edgeware Road bombings and our approach to this work is outlined in the link to an article at the bottom of this page.

The outcome of these interventions were that managers were able to take up the mammoth task of reinstating operations while knowing that their staff supporters (called TSGs in the case of London Underground) were looking after people with regular phone calls, daily liaison meetings and updates with managers, contact with the counselling department and encouragement to attend the Rebuilding Resilience groups.

Some trainings facilitated for another aspect of the transport business, have evolved over time to train more people while at the same time increasing the profile of the scheme with staff and managers.

The aim is to give people who face potential intimidation and violence on a daily basis some support that is human, informed and not primarily manager focused.

During the training Supporters learn:

to assess their own resilience
to understand and make sense of the neuro-physiology of trauma
to develop listening skills and appropriate responses
to normalise trauma symptoms and encourage behavior that supports recovery
to give information about company resources. i.e.counselling services
to liase with managers in order to support return to work
to refer for professional help when necessary
to understand the need for their own supervision

While we are clear that this intervention does not in any way take the place of professional counselling it does fit with the research that shows appropriate support and care can minimise the effect of a trauma. It also fits with our belief that not all traumatised people need professional help and with the appropriate support can draw on their own resilience to aid the process of recovery.

Finally it never ceases to touch us when people with busy lives and many responsibilities put themselves forward to help colleagues in this and so many other ways. In the midst of the threats and chaos it is an important reminder of the ‘basic goodness’ of human beings.

Our approach is described in an article which is free to download. recovery-from-disaster-article.pdf

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