Training

The aim of the advocacy training programme is to make it easier for people in Leeds to get advocacy when they need it. By training workers in a wide range of organisations to improve their advocacy and negotiation skills, we hope to make advocacy more widely available.

Workers or volunteers in organisations who could use advocacy and negotiating skills in their work. People coming on the courses should already be:

• Trained for their existing role in their own organisation.
• Familiar with the community they work in and the groups of people their organisation works with. Volunteers should have worked with their organisation for at least three months.
• Aware of and understand their own organisation’s policies and procedures, particularly where this may affect their ability to act independently on behalf of the people they are working with.

• Competent in communication skills and reasonably assertive. They should be willing to challenge people in positions of authority where appropriate.
• Good enough at basic reading, writing and English language to advocate and negotiate effectively.
• Aware of equal opportunities issues and the factors that make it difficult for the people they are working with to get their point of view heard. They should have completed any equal opportunities training required by their own organisation.