Our one-day professional development course for child protection workers, family support workers, and legal service professionals is coming to Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane. These face-to-face, full day workshops will be commencing in October at Liverpool, Sydney. Busy professionals can improve their skills and knowledge of how to master difficult conversations in one of three convenient metropolitan locations. Our course instructors Michael Hawton and Sue Foley are looking forward to meeting you there in person.
WHAT is Tough Conversations™ in Child Protection?
Tough Conversations™ in Child Protection is a one-day course designed for child protection professionals, legal service professionals, and family workers. This training equips you with the skills to effectively handle challenging conversations with parents, helping you to support the families you work with in achieving their goals. This course helps you to swiftly assess and prepare for tough conversations, ensuring that your message is clear and impactful, which is crucial for supporting vulnerable families.
In these training courses our experienced instructors will teach you:
Why people overreact.
What self-control factors adults and young people possess.
How ‘frustration tolerance’ develops in people.
What you need to let go and what needs your attention.
What people will do if you challenge them.
How to address a problem in a step-by-step process.
How to tame tigers and effectively deal with offensive behaviour.
“Relevant and well-presented course which provided useful training with practical application.” – Legal Aid
WHY is it important to master difficult conversations?
If you work in the child protection sector , you’re likely to have conversations with families about tough and emotionally charged topics. They can be difficult to address, heartbreaking for the people involved, or life-changing for a child and their family. These conversations are necessary to achieve safety, permanency, and wellbeing for a child.
The problem some professionals face is how to manage conflicts, reduce stress, and communicate in challenging situations. Build confidence, patience and empathy by learning the following skills with Tough Conversations™ in Child Protection:
Identify and clearly articulate the strengths and deficits in parents’ caring capacity so that parents have a clear future work plan.
Comprehensively gather information for holding a factual tough conversation so that as many facts (as can be reasonably gathered) can be brought to bear in conversations with parents.
Defuse antagonism during a tough conversation while holding a firm line.
Identify the important ‘dashboard’ markers for parents so that everyone has clarity about what is expected within a given timeframe.
WHO can benefit from participating in Tough Conversations™ in Child Protection?
With the expected learning outcomes of this course, you, your clients and their families will all benefit from a clear, calm and concise discussion.
The course is being delivered by specialist trainers with a wealth of knowledge and experience working with families in the child protection system and are eager to share their learnings with participants at the upcoming courses.
Sue Foley (BSoc, MA, MSW., MEd., MAASW) is a Clinical and Forensic Social Worker with nearly 50 years of experience as a social worker in various government and non-government services. Most recently she has been an Authorised Clinician and Director of the NSW Children’s Court Clinic. Sue is committed to capacity building for professionals, throughout their careers; to social justice, respect, and empowerment in all that helping professionals do.
Parentshop founder and course creator, Michael Hawton (MAPS, B.A., Grad. Dip. (App. Psych.), Dip. (Teaching), Grad. Cert. (Bus. Admin.) has over 30 years’ experience as a child & family specialist, including; working with the United Nations in Seychelles, and preparing child welfare reports for the Family Court. Most recently, Michael has created two comprehensive change projects to address child anxiety that are being rolled out in Australian schools.
"Presented by a psychologist with extensive industry experience. This enabled the theory to be backed by real life examples. Highly recommended. I have a lot of strategies to put in place." - Vinnies Youth Homeless Support
WHEN do I need to book?
No better time than now! Below are the links to secure your place in an upcoming session.
If you are unable to make it to one of these upcoming face to face sessions, we offer the training as an in-house course. We can send a professional trainer to train your team in your workplace. We also offer Tough Conversations™ in Child Protection via interactive webinar. You can find out more about these options HERE.
WHERE can I book my spot?
Secure your spot now for the Tough Conversations™ in Child Protection course this spring in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne HERE and benefit from:
Certificate of completion and workbook for the training course.
PD points for accreditation with your professional associations.
Knowledge and resources to introduce and implement Tough Conversations™ in Child Protection in your workplace.
While this course is only directed to child and family specialists, Parentshop does offer other tough conversations courses for parents or educators: Tough Conversations for Frontline Staff | Tough Conversations for School Leaders | Tough Conversations for Early Years Centre Directors | Tough Conversations With Youth