- “The Ethics and Pragmatic Reality of Creating Healthy Organizations in Trauma-Exposed Environments,” a video series sponsored by the Southern Regional Child Advocacy Center and featuring Dr. Patricia Fisher. Leaders can watch this video with their managers or supervisors and discuss which recommendations from the video they can implement in their own agency.
- “What About You? A Workbook for Those Who Work with Others,” by Katherine T. Volk et al., and The National Cener on Family Homelessness, 2018.
- Take Your Organization’s Stress Temperature (p. 34). This activity helps to identify warning signs of organizational stress and describes how the organization looks when it is running smoothly versus when it is experiencing increasing levels of stress. It can be helpful to take your organization’s stress temperature every few months.
- Motivation vs. Frustration (p. 35). This activity asks leaders to consider what is helpful to staff and what is not helpful for each level on the organization’s stress thermometer. This can be especially helpful when stress levels are rising; supporting staff during stressful times can help prevent burnout and turnover.
- The Organizational Self-Care Checklist (pp. 36-37). The checklist is organized by domains, which include Training and Education, Support and Supervision, Employee Control and Input, Communication, and Work Environment. Leaders can use this checklist to identify areas of strength and those that need more focus and use the results to develop an action plan.
- Building Resiliency Together, from the Dakota Children’s Advocacy Center. This website includes information about vicarious trauma/STS, strategies to address vicarious trauma, and resources for leaders and organizations.
- “Toolkit: Trauma-Informed Workplaces” by W. Marris. Campaign for Trauma-Informed Policy and Practice, 2023.
- The Ultimate Guide to Employee Wellness Program. Springworks. Updated 2023.
- Compassion Resilience Toolkit for Health and Human Services, from WISE & Rogers Behavioral Health. This website includes a toolkit comprising 12 sections and appendixes. Compassion resilience is defined as “the ability to maintain our physical, emotional, and mental well-being while responding compassionately to people who are suffering.” This toolkit explores various factors that are essential to building and maintaining compassion resilience and includes information on each factor, activities, and resources.
Examples of Resilience-Building Models
- “The Resilience Alliance: Promoting Resilience and Reducing Secondary Trauma Among Child Welfare Staff—Training Manual” from The National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN), 2018.
- This 12-week curriculum is designed to mitigate secondary trauma symptoms experienced by child welfare staff and secondary trauma’s impact on unit and agency functioning. The training manual provides information and tools to help child welfare staff identify, better understand, and address the ways child welfare work affects them personally and professionally. The intervention has a strong focus on how secondary trauma influences organizational cohesion and functioning, which requires the participation of all levels of staff, including leadership.
- The Organizational Resiliency Model (ORM) was specifically developed for the child abuse field and focuses on self-knowledge and insight, sense of hope, healthy coping, strong relationships, and personal perspective and meaning.16 More information and examples of how this model has been implemented in CACs can be found in “A Gecko’s Guide to Building Resiliency in Child Abuse Staff and Volunteers.”
- “Resilience for Trauma-Informed Professionals (R-TIP),” a curriculum developed by Dr. Patricia Kerig introduces participants to techniques designed to promote resilience in the face of exposure to trauma-related material.17 Based on research related to risk and protective factors for STS, the model focuses on six core elements: appraisals, self-efficacy, emotional awareness, affect regulation, resilience, and prevention. The curriculum guides providers in how to implement these core elements in preparation before trauma exposure, in the presence of trauma, and in recovery after trauma exposure. For more information about R-TIP, contact Dr. Kerig at p.kerig@utah.edu.