Our Training Suite
5th June 2026
10am - 4pm
Online
Trauma, The Brain & Co-Regulation: Supporting Others Through Distress & Dysregulation
This interactive workshop explores what is happening beneath the surface when someone becomes overwhelmed, dysregulated and distressed, and how our responses as carers, pastoral workers or supporters can either escalate or help settle that distress.
During the session, you can expect to:
- Understand how trauma affects the brain and stress response
- Recognise how distress and dysregulation show up physically, emotionally, and psychologically
- Explore why connection and co-regulation are essential before reasoning or problem-solving
- Build a practical toolbox of strategies to support regulation in the moment and over time
Date TBC
Governing Growth: When Churches & Charities Scale Faster Than Their Structures
Growth is often seen as success. However, many charities struggle not because they grow, but because governance, structure and oversight fail to mature at the same pace. What once worked informally can, at scale, create fragility, risk and pressure on leaders and volunteers.
This session helps leaders understand growth through the lens of the Adizes organisational lifecycle model, enabling them to:
- Identify where their organisation currently sits within the growth lifecycle
- Distinguish between normal and abnormal problems of growth
- Recognise when governance has fallen behind operational complexity
- Stabilise growing pains through proportionate, mission-aligned solutions
Date TBC
Risk Management is an Act of Faith, Not a Lack of Faith: Mission-Led Risk Management
Risk management is often one of the most misunderstood aspects of governance within charities. In many mission-driven organisations, conversations about risk can feel uncomfortable — sometimes seen as overly cautious, overly corporate, or at odds with passion and purpose. As a result, risks go unnamed, concerns remain unspoken, and boards rely on goodwill where structured oversight and foresight are required.
This two-hour training reframes risk mitigation as an expression of good stewardship, accountability and responsible leadership. Participants will:
- Identify common cultural resistance to risk thinking within charities
- Understand why governance exists precisely because people and systems are fallible
- Distinguish between healthy risk-taking and unmanaged exposure
- Apply practical, proportionate risk identification and mitigation tools
- Strengthen board-level oversight without undermining mission or agility
Grounded in the realities charities face today, the session provides usable templates and risk management frameworks that trustees and leadership teams can implement immediately.
Date TBC
Beyond Safeguarding: Spiritual & Psychological Safety in Practice
Safeguarding policies are essential, but they do not, on their own, ensure that charities are safe places for people to work, volunteer, receive support, or lead.
Harm can occur even in technically compliant environments — particularly where power, vulnerability, culture and leadership behaviours are not consciously examined. This training moves beyond policy compliance to explore what psychological and organisational safety look like in practice.
Designed for trustees, senior leaders and those responsible for culture and care, the session enables participants to:
- Understand how culture, power dynamics and leadership behaviour shape safety
- Identify risks that arise even where safeguarding policies are technically compliant
- Recognise how harm or retraumatisation can occur unintentionally
- Apply trauma-informed principles within governance and organisational systems
- Strengthen board oversight of culture, conduct and wellbeing
Grounded in current governance expectations and recommended practice, the training provides practical insight to help charities create environments where people feel safe to contribute, raise concerns, and grow.
Date TBC
'Advancing Religion': Understanding the Church's Charitable Purpose, Objects & Public Benefit Requirement
Advancing religion” is a recognised charitable purpose, but it is also one of the most scrutinised and misunderstood areas of charity governance. For faith-based charities, the issue is not whether belief should be expressed, but how it is advanced responsibly, ethically and in line with public benefit requirements.
This training explores what advancing religion means in governance terms, drawing on Charity Commission guidance, recommended practice and lived governance experience. It equips trustees and leaders to:
- Understand the legal framework underpinning the advancement of religion
- Clarify public benefit expectations and regulatory boundaries
- Navigate tensions around influence, authority, consent and vulnerability
- Distinguish between legitimate faith expression and coercive practice
- Strengthen board oversight and accountability in faith-based activity
Date TBC
Realms of Responsibility: A Non-Hierarchical Approach to Leadership and Management Structures
Many charities struggle not because of a lack of vision or commitment, but because responsibility, authority and accountability are unclear or unevenly distributed. Traditional organisational models can default to hierarchy, personality-led leadership or informal influence, creating confusion, pressure and unintended risk.
This training introduces a mission-aligned leadership and governance framework based on clear realms of responsibility rather than positional power. It explores how authority can be exercised responsibly and how good governance can be embedded in ways that serve mission, protect people and sustain healthy culture.
Designed for trustees, senior leaders and those with oversight responsibilities, the session enables participants to:
- Clarify lines of responsibility, authority and accountability
- Identify risks created by informal or personality-led leadership models
- Strengthen governance without over-formalising culture
- Align leadership structure with mission and values
- Create clear, defensible decision-making frameworks
Date TBC
Oversight, Insight & Foresight: A Mission-Enabling Governance Framework
Good governance does not restrain mission — it protects, shapes and sustains it.
This training equips trustees and senior leaders to understand governance not simply as compliance, but as a strategic responsibility that enables safe and effective mission. Drawing together regulatory expectations, principled leadership and practical governance tools, the session explores how oversight, insight and foresight work together in healthy organisations.
By the end of the session, participants will be able to:
Oversight
- Understand how charitable purpose and objects provide the legal foundation for governance
- Assess whether activities and decision-making remain aligned with mission
Insight
- Recognise how structures, policies and everyday practice shape organisational culture
- Identify where governance either strengthens or weakens values in action
Foresight
- Apply a proportionate, mission-led approach to risk management
- Use horizon scanning tools to anticipate emerging risks and strategic pressures
Date TBC
Guarding the Platform: Good Governance for Speakers, Sermons & Public Messaging
This seminar equips trustees, senior leaders and ministry teams to govern speakers and public messaging with clarity and confidence. Grounded in UK charity law and regulatory expectations, the session explores how to balance freedom of expression with safety, equality, public trust and charitable purpose. Participants will examine real risk scenarios, understand the legal guardrails that apply to public messaging, and leave with practical tools to implement proportionate due diligence and oversight.
Whether engaging high-profile visiting speakers or shaping internal preaching and teaching, this training helps organisations protect their people, protect their mission, and evidence good governance.
By the end of this seminar, participants will be able to:
- Understand trustee responsibilities in relation to platforming speakers and public messaging.
- Identify and assess risks associated with speakers and sermons.
- Apply relevant UK legislation and regulatory guidance.
- Conduct proportionate due diligence using the '5 R’s Framework'.
- Implement practical governance controls.
- Respond appropriately to complaints or incidents
- Develop core governance tools, including:
- A structured Due Diligence Checklist
- A Speaker Agreement and Code of Conduct
- The key components of a robust Platform & Message Governance Policy
Participants will leave with practical, board-ready frameworks that can be implemented immediately within their own organisation.
Date TBC
Preparing Your Church for Charity Registration
With the excepted charity provisions ending in 2031, thousands of churches will need to consider registration with the Charity Commission. For some, this is a straightforward administrative step. For others, it exposes structural weaknesses, personal liability risks, and governance gaps that require careful attention.
This seminar provides trustees and leaders with clarity on what registration means, what it requires, and how to prepare wisely and proportionately.
What This Seminar Covers
- The legal position: charity status vs registration
- What changes in 2031
- Trustee duties under charity law
- Personal liability risks in unincorporated churches
- CIO vs CLG: which structure is appropriate?
- Asset locks and dissolution clauses explained
- Governance alignment: written constitution vs actual practice
- Risk areas commonly overlooked (property, safeguarding, commercial activity)
- A practical preparation roadmap
Outcomes
- By the end of this session, trustees will:
- Understand whether registration will be required
- Recognise the risks of remaining unincorporated
- Be able to assess whether structural change is needed
- Identify governance gaps before they become regulatory issues
- Have a clear, proportionate preparation plan