Activity Guide
Introduction of Facilitators
This document sets out the structure of the workshop, how each section is designed to be run and what the results of each section should be.
Activity Guide : Introduction of Facilitators
Introduction of Facilitators
We found that before beginning the workshop, it was important to set out some ground rules for how the workshop runs, and make sure that participants did not have incorrect expectations.
We used two slides to convey the main points with the facilitators setting out the rationale behind the workshops.
Initially we presented a slide designed to encourage participants to share their views and experiences. It was important to highlight that we were aiming to create a non-judgemental atmosphere and that they could discuss their own experiences without fear of recrimination. This is vitally important to the workshop, as participants need to feel like they can talk about what they've actually experienced on the road, rather than keeping quiet or only voicing examples that they think the facilitators want to hear. As external facilitators, we never felt that the participants were holding back from voicing real examples.
A second slide showed information about the way that the workshop would run, and on it we highlighted that as well as sharing experiences, listening to other people was also important.
We also told participants what they could expect from us. We promised to run the workshop so that it did not overrun the three hours set aside for it (although we found that two and a half hours was the most typical duration) and that we would keep their responses confidential.
We did say that although individuals' comments were confidential, employers would be given a report about the workshop containing examples of situations that their employees found themselves in that might help their employers manage the risk better and make the participants' jobs safer, and also that some of the exercises result in them producing items that would be included in the report.
We also stressed that although comments are confidential, if a participant described an extremely dangerous practice, we would have an ethical duty to act on it appropriately. None of the pilots turned up a situation which would have warranted this response from the facilitators.
One thing which some participants were perhaps expecting was a practical driving element, and we found it important to establish that the workshop was solely about discussion of practical experiences.
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