Introduction:

The following Professional Development Series of modules form part of a suite of competencies and capabilities that have been recognised nationally and internationally as a necessary part of professional development and on going education.

In order for the Mental Health workforce to engage in best practice methodologies in the service provision to consumers and their support people, an understanding around these and their inherent characteristics is vital.

This program is not designed to replace any formal units of learning participants have undertaken as part of a recognised educational and professional qualification, instead, it is considered to be a complimentary component of that learning and as such is designed to enhance the knowledge base of individuals and in particular, in a manner that is responsive to the needs of Maori.

Who can apply:

If you currently work in the Mental Health sector, you are eligible to attend and participate in this Professional Development Program. In fact, you are urged to attend, given that the need to keep abreast of current trends and to improve your practice is vital to improving health outcomes for all.

Following attendance at any of the seminars, you will be issued with a Statement of Attendance. This should be kept in your Portfolio as proof of having undertaken a Professional Development program of learning.

How to apply:

You can apply directly on-line by filling out the form provided or you can contact your nearest education co-coordinator to book a place on the program.

All you need to do is select any-one of the modules (outlined below) and book a place now.
Please Note: You can book more than one session at a time. If at any time following....

Module Name: Challenging Inequality

Module Overview: Challenging inequality is all about addressing the causes and consequences of stigma, discrimination, social inequality and exclusion on service users, carers and mental health services. Recognising that these have a potentially devastating effect on the recovery process thereby making it difficult for service users to achieve their potential or take their rightful place in society is paramount. Creating, developing or maintaining valued social roles for people in the communities they come from will go a long way to breaking down these barriers, if the differential between equality and inequality is to be closed.
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Module Name: Identifying People's Needs and Strengths

Module Overview: Working in partnership to gather information to agree health and social care needs in the context of the preferred lifestyle and aspirations of service users their families, carers and friends is critical. By helping service users and those involved with them to describe their experiences in such a way as to identify their strengths and formulate their needs requires a whole systems approach if the desired outcomes are to be meaningful in every aspect of the person's life.
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Module Name: Promoting Recovery

Module Overview: Working in partnership to provide care and treatment that enables service users and carers to tackle mental health problems with hope and optimism and to work towards a valued life-style within and beyond the limits of any mental health problem is critical. Part of that process is about recovery, recovering what was lost such as rights, roles, responsibilities, decision making capacity, potential and mental well-being. Recovery is what people experience themselves as they become empowered to achieve a meaningful life and a positive sense of belonging in the community.
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Module Name: Respecting Diversity

Module Overview: Working in partnership with service users, carers, families and colleagues to provide care and interventions that not only make a positive difference but do so in ways that respect and value diversity including age, race, culture, disability, gender, spirituality and sexuality is vital. Further, in order for partnership working to be a reality then any therapeutic interventions need to be set within a framework that acknowledges and respects that diversity. While it is acknowledged that discriminatory practices exist in many services, it is also acknowledged that education and training programmes need to be developed to provide learning environments where these existing prejudices can be examined and challenged. It therefore behoves organisations to ensure that this becomes a work place reality, if respecting diversity is to be translated into responsible, responsive healthcare delivery.
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Module Name: Working in Partnership

Module Overview: Working in Partnership is not a new concept. People from all walks of life and for all manner of reasons have engaged in partnership agreements since time began. What has changed however is the recognition that partnership now requires a level of commitment to develop and maintain constructive working relationships with service users, carers, families, colleagues and the wider community networks. Learning to work positively with any tensions that may be created by conflicts of interest or aspiration that may arise between partners in care is vital. Engagement at both the micro and macro level is essential to elevating all parties in accepting responsibility and accountability for any actions and activities undertaken in the name of that partnership.
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Module Name: Making a Difference

Module Overview: Facilitating access to and delivering the best quality, evidence-based, values-based health and social care interventions to meet the needs and aspirations of service users and their families and carers is critical. It is essential that people are able to utilise services that value them and those that support them, if indeed the desire is to make a positive difference.
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Module Name: Practising Ethically

Module Overview: Practising ethically recognises the rights and aspirations of service users and their families, by acknowledging power differentials and minimising them whenever possible. It also means providing treatment and care that is accountable to service users and carers within the boundaries prescribed by national (professional), legal and local codes of ethical practice.
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Module Name: Promoting Safety and Positive Risk Taking

Module Overview: Empowering the person to decide the level of risk they are prepared to take with their health and safety is critical. This includes working with the tension between promoting safety and positive risk taking, including assessing and dealing with possible risks for service users, carers, family members, and the wider public. By focusing on the issues of risk to the individual and society and how this can best be addressed in a manner that values all those concerned is the challenge, if indeed, the person at most risk is to be empowered to make the appropriate decision.
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Module Name: Providing Service User Centred Care

Module Overview: Negotiating achievable and meaningful goals primarily from the perspective of service users and their families is critical. Influencing and seeking the means to achieve these goals and clarifying the responsibilities of the people who will provide any help that is needed, including systematically evaluating outcomes and achievements is paramount. This capability is concerned with helping the service user to set goals that are realistic, achievable and meaningful, so that the service user and others involved in the person's care will be able to recognise when a particular goal has been achieved.
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Module Name: Personal Development and Learning

Module Overview: Personal Development and Learning is all about keeping up to date with changes in practice and participating in life long learning, personal and professional development for one's self and colleagues through supervision, appraisal and reflective practice. The focus here is on the need for all mental health workers and carers to take an active role in their own personal and professional development. In the same way that service users should be viewed as active partners in their care, not passive recipients, likewise mental health workers and carers should be active participants in their own development.
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Module Name: Responsiveness to Maori

Module Overview: Responsiveness to Maori is concerned with identifying those issues which have impacted upon Maori creating barriers to effective health care planning and delivery. Managing these in a way that recognises Maori uniqueness and/or their worldview is absolutely critical to effective health outcomes. The focus here is on the need for all mental health workers and carers to take cognisance of the unique underlying issues that affect Maori, from an organisational, clinical, spiritual and social perspective. The responsibility to minimise the negative impact that these may have upon the well-being of individuals and their whanau cannot be underestimated. By taking an active role in the totality of the Maori experience, which includes such things as; ensuring Maori participation at all levels, providing the infrastructure that supports Maori endeavor, supporting the use of kaupapa hauora frameworks, ensuring funding and resourcing is appropriate for the task at hand and providing the necessary educational and clinical professional development is paramount.
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Module Name: Working Well Workplaces

Module Overview: In order for people to reach and maintain their maximum work potential the workplace must first and foremost demonstrate a deep and abiding concern and consideration for every employee, irrespective of the designated station of each. Workplaces which place a high value on the contribution of every employee remain convinced that a healthy organisation with a thoughtful, supportive and comprehensive workplace culture will in turn produce successful outcomes that will assist any organisation to remain buoyant and vital in any given field. The key to understanding this is to recognise the characteristics of an unhealthy workplace in order to build a healthy one. The focus here is on the need for all health care organisations to take an active role in the health and well-being of its employees by ensuring that organisational culture is all about enhancing, protecting, promoting and producing the best outcomes for all, and, in a manner that respects and values all people, across all sectors, all of the time.
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