Are your team trained in understanding mental health?
Having spent nearly 5 years as a Local Citizens Advice Chief Executive until earlier this year, I am acutely aware of the issues your teams come across day-in, day-out. But also that people in our teams struggle too.
Along with my lived experience of a personality disorder and ADHD, I was driven to find the right support to enable our teams to respond.
That’s why I started delivering Mental Health First Aid training – so far training just under 500 Citizens Advice colleagues as Mental Health First Aiders.
This course equips people with the knowledge, skills and confidence to have supportive conversations with others. But also, to recognise and articulate how they’re feeling and where to access the right support.
With many of you acting as safeguarding leads, you’ll know that suicide, self-harm and other issues are talked about with our colleagues regularly, and I am never failed to be surprised by how many people say they ‘wing it’, worried whether they said or did the right thing.
I provide a range of mental health courses and I’ll summarise them below:
Mental Health First Aid, two days – this is the most popular course, focussing on teaching people to listen, reassure and respond, even in a crisis – and potentially stopping a crisis from happening. Learning to recognise warning signs of mental ill health, and developing the skills and confidence to approach and support someone whilst keeping themselves safe.
This course costs £1,500 for 12 people and £2,000 for 16 people – at £125 per person (I charge £150 to non-CA organisations). The RRP by MHFA England is £325 per person, which would usually cost £5,200 for 16 people. If delivery is requested face-to-face and is more than one hour from my location, I will ask for expenses to be covered.
MHFA Champion, one day – this course focussed on understanding common mental health issues and is focussed on mental health in the workplace, so isn’t that helpful for people aiming to mainly use the role in client-facing roles. It is to help line managers and decision makers in organisations to think about mental health.
This course costs £1,200 for 12 people and £1,600 for 16 people – at £100 per person. The RPP by MHFA England is £200 per person, which would usually cost £2,400 for 12 people and £3,200 for 16 people. If delivery is requested face-to-face and is more than one hour from my location, I will ask for expenses to be covered
MHFA Refresher, 4 hours – this course is for people who have completed an MHFA course. MHFA England recommends that training be refreshed every 3 years. It is to renew skills, update knowledge and practice skills.
This course costs £75 per person (I charge £100 per person for non-CA) and the RRP by MHFA England is £150 per person.
Suicide Awareness Course (for Citizens Advice), 3 hours – this course was designed through the lens of the work of Citizens Advice colleagues, to support your frontline teams and supervisors with the highest risk mental health issue you come across – suicide. This 3 hour online session explores why people think about or act upon suicidal thoughts, myths and facts, warning signs, how to respond to someone who has mentioned suicide (explicitly or through warning signs), resources available to support the individual and your colleague. And an opportunity to ask me questions – having lived with suicidal thoughts since I was 11, and dealt with safeguarding concerns for 5 years and am a Safeguarding Level 4 practitioner, able to train in level 1, 2 and 3.
This course costs £300 per session, with up to 16 people able to attend from Citizens Advice services.
I am available to deliver group sessions of between 12 and 16 people, either online or face-to-face. The suicide awareness course is delivered online typically, but am happy to chat if you have particular requirements.
Individuals who train in the two-day MHFA course will get access to MHFA England’s support: By becoming an MHFAider® with us you’ll have access to continuous support – well beyond your initial certification – so you are confident, empowered and motivated to carry out your role. You will get three years’ access to MHFAider® support and benefits which includes 24/7 digital support through the MHFAider Support App®. From there, you will find exclusive resources, ongoing learning opportunities (such as webinars and recordings) and the benefit of joining England’s largest community of trained MHFAiders®.
So if you’re interested, just send me a message and we can take it from there.
Some recent feedback from learners include:
“Very informative, Jake was easy to listen to. He put all the course work across very well. He is patient and clearly takes time to listen we recognise as a charity we need to do more to support our staff and colleagues around mental health in order that we can ensure they can cope with the increasing demand, complexity and mental health issues being presented by our clients.The course was pitched just right to achieve this outcome. Jake is an excellent trainer but also understands the environment we are working in and so it was very relevant for all the attendees.”
“Thanks to Jake for leading this course – he gave so much content in an amazing way that wasn’t overwhelming and this course has left me feeling that I will be able to help so many people in various ways. Opened my eyes to things I weren’t aware of in language we use and how we use non judgement in our conversations. Really enjoyed these 2 days – Thanks Jake!”
“I highly recommend attending this course as it provided me lots of information and details about all aspects of the Mental Health issues , how to deal with it and how to support colleagues and clients who need support”
“Jake Morrison is an excellent instructor for this course as he knows first hand about not only the difficulties arising from advising clients with mental illness but also about what it’s like experiencing mental illness. Courses are unhelpful where the instructor has no idea what it’s like to be on the receiving end of advice during times of a mental health crisis.”
