Transforming Planning with Communities: Facilitation and Conflict Resolution Masterclass

Working Visions has partnered with Planning Partnerships to bring this three-day, intensive, practical master class to those working in change across Australia.

The Transforming Planning with Communities: Facilitation and Conflict Resolution Masterclass is a skills-based training course that will equip you with the key facilitation and conflict resolution skills needed to support your community group planning activities, multi-stakeholder partnerships, as well as any team or group work including, reference groups.

Facilitation skills are powerful tools both in the workplace, in collaborative processes and in engaging and working with communities and community members, as well as in working with group members and teams in planning.

Conflict is a normal and healthy aspect of everyday life. Through conflict, new ideas are generated. A skilled facilitator can assist communities to make more effective decisions by learning how to manage those conflicts, to work with divergent stakeholder groups and build positive outcomes.

Some of the biggest challenges we face as a society involve the need to tackle complex systems change including around socio-economic issues, early intervention in health and community sectors, challenges of an ageing population, digital disruption, management of environmental resources and climate change adaption.

As co-design, partnership working, collective impact and collaboration across sectors become more embedded in the way we work, it is increasingly important that facilitators, whether from government, the community, academia or business sectors have the essential skills needed to reach better decisions and outcomes through a supported process.

What you will learn

This Masterclass is designed for participants to achieve the following outcomes:

introduce the principles of Community Engagement linked to group planning
understand sustainable decision making in a collaborative environment
develop skills to manage the content and process of a group to improve participatory decision making.
ability to identify and manage group tensions
ability to carry out the role and function of group facilitator
develop active listening skills, effective intervention and assertiveness skills
ability to understand and analyse the different sources of conflict and to develop skills to manage conflict constructively.
develop skills needed in using task and maintenance interventions

Who should attend this Masterclass?

This masterclass is specifically designed for those working in community engagement, multi-stakeholder partnerships and/or co-design and in areas where there is potential for conflict. The course will be invaluable to you if you:

Work on complex problems, with multiple stakeholders and/or in a co-design or service-development role
Are in a public-sector-led area partnership, a place-based initiative or facilitating community conversations and stakeholder engagement
Are part of, or developing, a Collective Impact backbone initiative
Are new to community engagement, community consultation, collaboration, stakeholder engagement
Work for local council, government or not-for-profit and seek to improve the quality and impact of community planning
Are in natural resource management and wish to deepen community engagement and stakeholder collaboration
Work in strategic planning, consultancy, partnership development or change management where community/stakeholder engagement is a core aspect of your role.

How you will learn

All participants will gain new knowledge and skills that can be applied immediately to the work situation.
The three days are practical, immersive and practice based. People learn in different ways and there is a mix of theoretical input, discussion, participatory exercises and group work using case material related to work environments. Coaching, feedback and comprehensive study materials are provided.
Our delivery is culturally sensitive.
Some skills learnt align with the IAP2 approach to community engagement.
The course is tailored to small group delivery.

In-House Group Training

We can arrange in-house group training with applicable discounts available. We are committed to bringing the course to rural and regional locations so please contact us to discuss your organisations needs.

Download the in-house course flyer here.

Your Trainers

Tracey Wilson is the owner of Working Visions. She has over 25 years experience as a community engagement practitioner, trainer, facilitator and in working with complex systems change, organisational development, collaboration and collective impact. Tracey is a fully qualified trainer and assessor and is passionate about building capacity of participants during their professional development journey.

Jo Bentley-Davey works in conflict resolution, negotiation and mediation. She is an experienced teacher in vocational education, training and tertiary education. Jo has extensive community engagement experience particularly with local government and place-based community projects.