Abuse prevention through culture change and organisational development

Investigators

Lead by the Kooyoora Strategy and Quality team. Supported by Glasshouse Safeguarding (Ms Laura Lindsay) and ICPS (Professor Daryl Higgins and Ms Jacqui Stewart)

Funding

National Centre for Action on Child Sexual Abuse

Aims

• Examine and develop psychological safety principles
• Determine a means for assessing organisational capacity for psychosocial risk management against identified principles
• Establish a framework that can help organisations to develop a cultural and systemic improvement plan based on the assessment
• Create professional development resources to support organisational change

Background

Institutions can find the path to creating child safe cultures complex and daunting. Research indicates that the fundamental culture of an organisation, which encompasses its shared values, norms, beliefs, and behaviours, (often referred to as 'the way we do things around here'), can either foster conditions where abuse and harassment can occur or promote a positive safe environment. Currently there is also no comprehensive, guided approach to long-term culture change despite the many resources and standards that exist to support institutional safeguarding.

Project details

This project aims to support child safe cultures through organisational cultural change. It involves development of a framework. Organisations can use the framework to pinpoint the cultural factors that may increase the risk of abuse and harassment. The insights and information derived through the culture review process will be used to create strategies for cultural transformation that supports and aligns with the principles of psychological safety. It can also be used plan for organisational change that will enhance the prevention of, and responses to, abuse.

The Kooyoora team will lead development of the framework. Kooyoora will use desktop research and consultations with people with lived experience of institutional abuse to inform its development. They will seek to learn about effective approaches to abuse prevention and responses and culture change and organisational development strategies.

Kooyoora will also aim to create resources that organisations can use for professional development to support organisational change. These might be in the format of modules.

Professor Daryl Higgins is a member of the Project Advisory Committee. Jacqui Stewart is supporting Kooyoora to develop an evaluation plan for the framework.

Projected community impact

Organisations (i.e., the intended end-users) will be able to identify cultural barriers to timely identification of child sexual abuse and identify a plan for effecting organisational change that will lead to better protection of, and responses to, children, young people, and adults. Through cultural change, organisations will be better equipped to respond to allegations of abuse and prevent future abuse.

Links

National Centre for Action on Child Sexual Abuse

Organisational governance

The CEO of Kooyoora (Fiona Boyle) oversees the project with the Project Advisory Committee providing advice and expertise to the project.

Project timeline

July 2023 to September 2024

Contact

Get in touch with Jacqui Stewart for more information.