‘EXTREMELY VALUABLE’ – HMPPS SENIOR MANAGERS FEED BACK ON ATTENDING THE DIALOGUE AND LEADERSHIP OF CHANGE COURSE
As part of Prison Dialogue’s objective of promulgating the wider use of Dialogue throughout the Criminal Justice System, the charity recently awarded bursaries to five senior managers from Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) to support their attendance on the Dialogue and Leadership of Change course offered by Dialogue Associates, one of the organisations with which the charity is closely connected and which brings deep experience in the field. This was the second year in which Prison Dialogue has made these bursaries available, and brings to ten the total number of HMPPS leaders who have now attended the course.
Prison Dialogue interviewed the five managers who have recently completed the course to hear their perspectives on it, and on Dialogue more broadly in the context of the UK Criminal Justice System. This is what they had to say.
Everyone who attended believed that they had got value from the course. This seemed to come from 3 main respects:- By exposing them to some of the key aspects of Dialogue, which they could see had clear practical application in the context of their own situation, and which they could start employing quickly and relatively easily
- ‘I’ve started using the Check-in and Check-out in my meetings’
- ‘The Dialogue Practices were helpful, and understanding when to use them – Listening, Respect and so on – and understanding peoples’ roles, contributions, intent in different situations’
- ‘It helped me think about the dynamic of our Senior Management Team meeting – people were waiting for me to speak; I’m stepping back, listening and bystanding more’
- ‘Thinking about the Leading Energies made me appreciate the difference between me and others, it helped me understand better where they’re coming from’
- ‘The unique aspect of the Implicate Change model is that if you talk about somebody who isn’t represented in the room being impacted, you’ve got a problem’
- By providing them with an opportunity to reflect on some of the major challenges facing them in their day-to-day roles, and to apply what they were learning to these challenges
- ‘the Coaching Exercise, where we took it in turns to use Dialogue to share a current problem, act as Coach by listening to the problem, trying to understand it, and helping think about possible solutions, and ‘Bystand’ to provide a view of the discussion taking place was very helpful for me in thinking through restructuring of my management team’
- ‘the Coaching Exercise helped me address an issue with a particular member of my staff’
- ‘There’s more buy-in to the changes we’re making because people feel more involved’
- ‘It provided a bit of headspace – it’ll help me later when things settle down’
- ‘After all the pressure of the day job, it was good to have the space to think differently - it felt like therapy’
- Linked to this, all of the attendees felt that the mixture of other organisations and people on the course, including some from the private sector and from academia was very helpful in broadening their perspectives and outlook
-‘When you’re trying to explain something about prisons to someone from outside, using Dialogue, you have to think hard about how you do it – this was a very useful exercise’
-‘It was reassuring to know that the other participants are dealing with lots of the same challenges around change, people, relationships, silos – and to hear what they were doing’
There was a general consensus that the way the course was delivered was well suited to the preferred learning styles of the attendees / -‘I liked the way it wasn’t academic – there wasn’t lots of reading and writing’
-‘It wasn’t a 2 or 3 year degree – it was a manageable commitment, not a ‘Time Burglar’’
-‘The pace was good – it wasn’t rushed, we went at the pace of the group, the days were used fully’
-‘At times it felt a bit slow compared with the day job’
There were a variety of thoughts on how best to extend Dialogue further into their organisations and more widely across HMPPS / -‘I’ve started using aspects of Dialogue in my daily routine’ (everyone said this)
-‘Some people in my management team would benefit from attending the course – I’m not sure everyone would though’ (more than one person said this)
- ‘I’m going to start sharing some of the techniques with my management team’
-‘We’re piloting a one week ‘Orientation’ programme, and Dialogue is part of this; it’ll be mixed groups of staff from across the prison, ops and non-ops, established and newer staff – we’ve run one session and the Dialogue piece was very well received - although given the pressures on the system and the other mandatory training requirements, it is difficult to take everyone out for a week’
-‘We’re going to frame some of the posters that were used during the course and put them up around the place’
-‘We’re launching a piece of research [also part funded by Prison Dialogue] using Dialogue to bring a different perspective to bear on the problem of absconsions’
-‘It would be useful to know more about the work in Virginia, and how Dialogue has been rolled out more widely across the Department of Corrections’
-‘We need to obtain senior sponsorship to take this further’
-‘We should invite everyone who’s attended the course so far to participate in the Criminal Justice practitioner circle of the new Academy of Professional Dialogue’
And, finally by way of a ‘Check-out’ / -‘Thankyou for the bursary’
-‘Everyone is very busy, so it’s easy to think that there were better things to be doing – but I never felt it wasn’t a good use of my time’
-‘I learnt a lot and enjoyed it a lot’
-‘Oxford is a terrible location to get to, and the parking is extortionate’ (more than one person said this)
If you are interested in discussing any aspect of Dialogue in the context of the Criminal Justice System further, please contact