Carers in Hertfordshire - Motivational Interviewing Training

We provided a 2 day MI programme for a range of staff in the young carers team, carer support workers (adults and children’s) who work with adult carers to offer them support information and advice including encouraging them to self-care , development workers and their volunteer coordinator to support them with skills.

The 2 day programme covered the style and principles of MI, the core skills of using open questions, affirmations, reflective listening and summaries, stages of change and the most useful MI approaches in each stage. We also looked at how to extract DARN (desire, ability, reason and need to change) and CAT (commitment, activation and taking steps). The team considered planning and created their own team action plan to support them to embed approaches into practice.

Feedback included:

Interface were professional at all times, giving clear information about options and recommendations during the early stages of discussion. Patient when we needed to take time before making arrangements and very organised on the days of training. Adapted to the needs of the group well and gave additional information and ideas. 

This really made me think. I need to speak less, think more and listen more

This is so useful and will improve my ability to use different techniques to elicit responses for planning for carers for make a difference especially for carers distressed or overwhelmed.