Person-Centric Strategies

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What is Person-Centric Strategies (PCS)?

Person-Centric Strategies is a virtual education program that addresses modern coaching and problem-solving practices for working with people who may present multiple service challenges.

Person-Centric Strategies is a Copyright (2020) of Labour Market Partners Inc. and Collaborative Strategies Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Let's Talk About Your Training Needs

Contact OMSSA's Director of Education, Christie Herrington, to learn how we can develop and deliver a training program tailored to your team's needs. 
Email Christie or call 647-385-9285 to get started.

Learn more about how this training can be customized for different sectors:

Program Objectives

  • Evidence-based strategies for working with people experiencing trauma, scarcity, poverty and social exclusion 
  • A comprehensive, updated examination of core competencies all staff require in working with service users, co-workers and communities
  • Modernized tools for applying these competencies in all staff roles in the workplace
  • A common knowledge and skills framework for ensuring quality service across organizations, programs and, teams 
  • A model for asset-based staff education and skills development
  • Resources for ongoing team building and staff learning and development
  • An opportunity to customize and brand the program for your organization
  • Resources for normalizing person-centric strategies in staff's day-to-day work
These objectives are achieved through respecting and employing adult learning principles and applying an asset-based approach which celebrates and builds upon staff knowledge, skills, experience and wisdom. 

Program Roadmap

Organizations may choose to deliver some or all of the following modules. The duration of each module can be adapted to the needs of the learning group.

Module 1: Understanding Behaviour

What Research Tells Us about Human Behaviour in Socially and Economically Stressful Circumstances

Duration: 4 hours

Learning Objectives

  1. Examine current research and theories that reflect on service user and staff behaviours

  2. Use this research to explore how to overcome systemic bias in working with the people we serve

Module 2: 3-D MicroCoaching Model™

Getting Results through Brief Interventions 

Duration: 4 hours

Learning Objectives

  1. Understand the importance of MicroCoaching as a foundation for a person-centric service, including support roles and short-contact situations

  2. Increase use of a common coaching language and terminology

  3. Enrich service user outcomes through the use of MicroCoaching

  4. Strengthen intra- and inter-organizational relationships for more effective service delivery

Module 3: MicroCoaching Competencies

Models for MicroCoaching Behaviour in the Workplace
 
Duration:  8 hours (delivered in two four-hour workshops, or alternatively according to the needs of the learning group)

Learning Objectives

  1. Identify and expand upon the key knowledge, skills and supporting behaviours (competencies) necessary for effective MicroCoaching

  2. Enrich service user outcomes through the application of these competencies

  3. Increase engagement of coachees in the coaching process

  4. Use these competencies to level power in the working relationship

  5. Apply the competency tools provided in this program to a case study in preparation for use in the workplace 

Module 4: Team Collaboration

Developing a Team Agreement for Group Success

Duration: 2 hours

Learning Objectives

  1. Increase team performance in your organization through the application of MicroCoaching competencies in the workplace. This Module is best applied in specific organizations following staff completion of Modules 1-3. 

Workplace Supports for PCS

There is an emphasis in PCS on applying in the workplace the theories, competencies, principles and practices found in the curriculum. Workplace implementation- the true measure of learning effectiveness- is supported through:

The PCS Learners Workbook

Each learner is provided with a workbook containing all of the learning material to support learners in their webinar participation. The workbook also serves as a post-learning event resource in the workplace.

The workbook also contains a detailed Learning Resource Guide, which is a bibliography of topically-relevant books, websites, videos and articles which were used to create the program and are organized according to the topics in the curriculum.  The Guide may be of interest to learners who seek to expand their knowledge of the topics covered in the program.  It also supports management in their role in normalizing person-centric practices and creating an ongoing learning culture in the workplace.

Learners are invited to share their own contributions, which allows the Guide to become a living document.

Pre- and Post-Learning Self-Assessment

Learners complete a self-assessment questionnaire before and after the program to record their self-assessed competencies in coaching and problem-solving, and track their progress and desire for further development in each of the topics covered in the curriculum. 

Workplace Tools

Learners receive modernized job aids which provide a ‘mind map’ or guide for using each person-centric competency effectively.  Each tool contains a summary of the competency and prompting questions that illustrate how the skill may be used in staff roles.

Skills Applications in the Workplace (SAW)

Skills Application in the Workplace is a document for learners to reflect on how they will use the competencies covered in the workshop within their individual workplace roles.

Program Authors and Facilitators

Marianne Seaton, President
Collaborative Strategies Inc.

John G. Howley, President
Labour Market Partners Inc.

John Howley and Marianne Seaton are the pre-eminent designers and deliverers of professional development curricula in Ontario Works and related social services programs and agencies throughout the province, and beyond. Marianne has been consulting in the social services sector as the principal of Collaborative Strategies Inc. since 2008 and John through his company, Labour Market Partners Inc., since 1997. Their work encompasses many Consolidated Municipal Service Managers and District Social Services Administration Boards, from the largest urban municipalities to the most rural and remote.

Following their careers as social assistance and employment program front-line workers and managers, each achieved subsequent success and recognition as a leader in program development and change. Marianne is the former Acting Executive Director and Director of Professional Development for the Ontario Municipal Social Services Association (OMSSA). John is the former Director of Employment and Training for the Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto, Social Services Division (now the City of Toronto).

Their work in helping multi-barriered Ontario Works clients achieve success in the world of work includes the design and delivery of SAIL for Clients, a competency-based program that they have delivered in various areas of the province, often in association with community colleges, including Sault College, Confederation College and St. Clair College. John and Marianne also collaborate on designing and delivering employment programs for social assistance clients in a range of other programs, including Movement to Employment (employability profiling); Movement to Improvement (life skills development), and Movement to Learning (literacy and skills training preparation).