Grievance Handling Training

18/09/2020

President’s Message

The New South Wales Bar Association is providing grievance handling training for those in chambers who have or will be appointed the ‘contact officers’ under the Bar Association’s Best Practice Guidelines or equivalent chambers policy.

We have engaged Dr Rebecca Michalak of PsychSafe to provide that training. Dr Michalak has a wealth of experience in this area and has carried out this training for the Office of the Legal Services Commissioner.

The training will take the form of a 4 hour webinar with a one hour break. There is a maximum of 12 attendees in each webinar. We have allowed for up to 60 participants and webinars will be scheduled over a two week period and the Bar Association will bear the costs of this standalone training.

The webinar will cover different approaches to grievance management, with a focus on prevention and early intervention strategies. It will consider the varying types of grievance-related conduct, barriers to reporting, and how chambers might encourage reporting using risk reduction practices and the application of trauma-centric principles which support the reporter’s wellbeing needs. The webinar will integrate specific requirements of the legal profession.

We still have places left in the webinars.

I would urge chambers to nominate one member of chambers to attend the training. That nominee should be a member who has agreed to be the ‘contact person’ who could be the clerk of chambers.

The webinars will be held between 10am to 3pm on the following dates:

• Monday 21 September

• Wednesday 23 September

• Friday 25 September

• Tuesday 29 September

• Thursday 1 October

It is necessary that the nominee be available and commit to one of the webinars. Nominees may enrol in one of the webinars at https://nswbar.eventsair.com/2020-grievance-handling-training/registration-portal

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