A4: From Trauma-Informed to Healing: How to Continue the Journey of Transformation in Your Organization

Creating a trauma-informed, healing-oriented organization is a complex process that requires more than just understanding trauma. Organizations must go beyond that and foster a culture of healing that enables communities to flourish. To create transformative, trauma-informed, and healing-oriented environments, organizations must not only train their workforce but also embed it into the culture, practices, and external partnerships. This is a challenging task, especially in the face of changes in the social sector, the aftermath of the pandemic, and the growing pressures on the workforce.

Successful organizations understand the importance of connecting trauma-informed transformation to equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives. They foster values and competencies that empower leadership at all levels and facilitate the healing process within the communities they serve. Rather than settling for a trauma-informed culture, they strive to make healing the core of their trauma-informed culture within the organization.

Creating a healing-oriented culture has many benefits, such as increased employee satisfaction, improved client outcomes, and better community engagement. However, organizations might face challenges when trying to create such a culture, such as resistance to change, lack of resources, or difficulty measuring progress.

Empowering your staff to take the lead in driving and maintaining the trauma-informed movement and ensuring its long-term viability is crucial. We will share our experience of implementing and sustaining this change for over five years, and provide you with the best practices we learned for keeping this transformation alive and dynamic. Our experience has shown that it is essential to connect trauma-informed transformation to equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives to create a healing-oriented culture.

Learning Objectives

• Various tools and strategies that can help motivate, support, and retain staff in a trauma-informed and healing oriented environment
• Children’s Bureau’s achievements and challenges over years of implementing and sustaining the trauma-informed transformation and linking it to equity, diversity, and inclusion practices
• How to empower staff to take the lead in driving and maintaining the trauma-informed movement and ensuring its long-term viability

Presenters

Corina Casco
Chief Program Officer
Children’s Bureau

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