Conference 2005

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ACW Conference 2005 – Feedback

Conference review

Nicola Barden (Deputy Chair BACP) and Gilly White from the BACP Press Office attended the ACW Trauma Conference. Below they describe their experience and highlight areas of particular interest.

Click here to read their review of the conference

On Friday 11 March 235 people attended the ACW Conference on Trauma and Crisis Management.

There were 3 main components to the conference. The keynote speakers Jo Rick, Mark Brayne and Lisa Potts covered different aspects of trauma in the workplace. There were speakers from 4 major organisations outlining the steps their employers had taken to manage trauma within their particular environments. Finally there was a themed discussion with a panel of experts exploring the key issues facing organisations in terms of trauma support

A major success

Without question the conference was a great success. 94% of the evaluation responses concluded that it was value for money and only 3% said it was not. (3% didn't respond) The responses to the keynote speakers were excellent with the 3 speakers averaging 4.5 on a scale of 1-5. The organisational presentations were almost as well received with an average score of 4.3

Themed discussion

The evaluation offered participants the opportunity to provide more detailed feedback on this part of the conference. The majority of participants felt the session was interesting and worthwhile, though a significant minority (31%), expressed reservations about its success.

Characteristic comments were as follows:

Positive
Good mix of panel members, stimulating, challenging.
Brought out that people use the term debriefing to mean different things
Balanced. A good way to learn.

Negative
Too long. Repetitive. Inconclusive
I didn't extend my knowledge
Too weighted toward a medical model of research.
Too many white men on the panel.

Other feedback

From the evaluations we learnt much else that was useful about the audience for this event. For many (62%), it was the first ACW event they had attended. Most (68%), were paid for by their employer to attend. We found that though the major appeal of the conference lay in its theme, 13% came partly in order to make contact with others and 20% felt it was because it was valuable in terms of their CPD.

A new audience

Historically ACW conferences have been attended mainly by counsellors. The evaluations reveal that in this instance almost a third of those who attended came from professions other than counselling. This welcome development meant that whilst counsellors were well represented, other professions also attended in numbers. Amongst those present were paramedics. occupational health specialists, managers and health & safety officers. This appears to bear out the view of the executive that well targeted ACW events can reach a much wider audience, without losing their relevance to our key constituency.

Future Conferences

We also gained useful ideas for future conferences and events. Participants were very forthcoming with their ideas and the ACW Executive now has much useful material to inform future conference planning. Organisational Culture, In-house v external provision, Relationships in the workplace, Bullying and Harassment and Multi-cultural counselling were just a few of the helpful suggestions

In coming weeks we hope to include further material about the conference onto the website, including reviews from some of those who attended.

All in all, the ACW Executive is very pleased that so many people attended and found the event worthwhile. Now our challenge is to ensure that future events match this in terms of quality and breadth of appeal.

Paul Barrett
20 April 2005