Helping you create a culturally responsive and inclusive workforce
We live in a vibrant multicultural community, with one in four Australians born overseas.
SSI Diversity Training offers learning solutions that support organisations to work with culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities and create more culturally responsive and inclusive workplaces.
Developing a culturally responsive and inclusive workforce creates opportunities for:
- Enhancing service delivery
- Supporting the recruitment and retention of high performing staff from diverse backgrounds
- Nurturing innovative solutions through diverse perspectives
- Increasing reach to a diverse client base
- Making diversity a competitive advantage
- Achieving diversity goals and benchmarks
SSI Diversity Training is grounded in our experience as a leading provider of services to CALD communities.
Delivering these services across a broad range of contexts including settlement, out-of-home care, disability, youth and employment enables SSI Diversity Training to be relevant across industry.
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Our Services
We can:
- Come to you (in-house workshops)
- Customise training (flexible approaches to meet your needs)
- Provide speakers (promoting lived experience voices)
- Provide free cultural responsiveness training for disability service providers
In-house workshops
SSI Diversity Training has a number of workshops that can be delivered in-house. These workshops are designed in line with adult learning principles that are engaging and interactive.
The following are currently available:
This course is designed for organisations seeking to improve their workforce capability and become more culturally responsive and inclusive.
At the completion of our highly interactive one day workshop, participants will be able to:
- Identify and apply the five capabilities for culturally responsive practice
- Reflect on their own cultural identities, beliefs and values
- Demonstrate a complex understanding of culture
- Recognise the impact of migration and exile on individuals
- Utilise communication skills for effective cultural understanding Incorporate strategies that build rapport and engagement
Formats available: full day and half day workshops.
Target audience: Government and non-government service providers in housing, family support, settlement, employment, disability etc.
Supporting positive cultural identity for children and young people from migrant and refugee backgrounds in out-of-home care and adoption is easier said than done. This course aims to take participants past the basics of cultural exposure into more meaningful and practical ways to support a child’s development of positive cultural identity. At the end of this one day interactive workshop participants will be able to:
- Describe the key competencies for caring for children and young people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds (CALD)
- Reflect on their own culture, values and beliefs
- Understand the importance of cultural identity for children in care
- Identify strategies for dealing with racism and prejudice
- Develop an effective and child-focused cultural care plan
Target audience: Managers and caseworkers in out-of-home care.
Supporting positive cultural identity for children and young people from migrant and refugee backgrounds in out-of-home care and adoption is easier said than done. This course aims to support carers to find more meaningful and practical ways to support a child’s development of positive cultural identity.
At the end of this three hour workshop participants will be able to:
- Describe the influence of culture on the interaction between foster carers and children and young people in the foster care context
- Identify strategies to support ongoing and new cultural connections
- Identify strategies for supporting children to respond to racism and prejudice
Target audience: Foster carers and adoptive parents.
This practical half day workshop is considered a practice essential for anyone providing a service to people from diverse linguistic backgrounds. Ensuring services are accessible to people from diverse linguistic backgrounds is a strategic goal of all human service agencies.At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:
- Explain why and when to use language services
- Identify barriers to using language services
- Identify strategies to support the effective use of interpreters Reflect on the potential impact of refugee trauma when using language services
Target audience: Service providers working with linguistically diverse clients and/or customers.
This practical half day workshop will assist non clinical workers to respond to people in a trauma informed way. This workshop provides the opportunity to understand the impact of interpersonal trauma on behaviour and consider trauma informed strategies for their specific work context
At the end of this practical workshop participants will be able to:
- Identify the types of experiences that can result in trauma
- Recognise trauma reactions and the possible impact on interactions
- Incorporate strategies specific to their work context
Target audience: Service providers working with vulnerable communities.
This one day workshop assists participants to develop their capabilities to be culturally responsive in the disability context. It is highly interactive and at the completion of the workshop participants will be able to:
- Identify a model for culturally responsive practice
- Describe the importance of developing culturally responsive services and supports
- Reflect on the impact of their own cultural identity, beliefs and values on interactions with participants
- Incorporate a complex understanding of culture and disability to engage participants
- Plan for engaging and maintaining relationships with multicultural communities
Target group: This workshop is for managers and workers delivering services and supports in the disability context.
Customised training
Our experienced learning and development professionals are skilled in working with organisations to assess your learning requirements and can tailor solutions to meet your identified needs and context. This can include packaging a number of services to maximise outcomes, or developing something new for your organisational needs.
Please contact us to discuss your specific requirements.
Speakers available
SSI Diversity Training can provide lived experience educators through SSI's Our Voice program, which allows disability service providers to build their capacity in responding to the service access needs of people from CALD backgrounds. Our Lived Experience Educators will share their unique insights and expertise as structured learning activities, and can be booked as guest speakers at interagency meetings, seminars and disability focused events.
Contact us
To arrange a discussion with one of our team, email us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call us on 02 8799 6700.
Download our brochure.
Participant testimonials
- "Excellent and respectful facilitators who held trust and inspired cross cultural curiosity."
- "I can highly recommend this valuable training to any organisation that is committed to growing a work culture and work force that is culturally aware and responsive to CALD communities and persons from diverse backgrounds."
- "Through thoughtful and stimulating processes and activities led by skilled facilitators, participants can expect to become more aware of their own bias and mindful of reflective practices that promote a genuine curious enquiry and engagement with diversity issues that enables further understanding and inclusivity in the face of difference.
- "This training exceeded my expectations. Very insightful. I thought I had a good understanding of culture and disability, but this was great to challenge and expand my knowledge."
- "I feel more comfortable in being able to appropriately engage the multicultural community."
- "Everyone would benefit from this training."