Welfare & duty of care essentials

As part of the Your life at work strand, we're offering training aimed at sharing workplace best practice as well as how you and your teams can stay healthy, happy, and productive, both in work and when looking for your next opportunity.

This free to attend course is designed and delivered  by highly experienced psychotherapists who work both as mental health professionals and in the film and tv industry.

It will cover the essentials needed to support contributors and understand responsibilities around duty of care and welfare in Unscripted throughout the production timeline, from development, casting and through to post and broadcast. 

This course will look at the key issues and how best to safeguard all involved and support good mental health. It will be delivered using a blend of experiential learning and anonymous case studies from the course leaders current client base.

If you are passionate about creating a healthy and safe working environment and ensuring due care is taken over the welfare and dignity of participants then this course is for you.

This session is supported by the ScreenSkills Unscripted TV Skills Fund which invests in training for the unscripted workforce thanks to contributions from broadcasters, SVoDs and production companies.

Who it's for

The course is aimed at anyone working in unscripted TV who wishes to expand their knowledge of best practice when working with contributors and support and safeguard all those taking part in programmes.

We generally require applicants to have at least 3 credits (unless working in a traditionally uncredited role). If you strongly feel you would still benefit from the training, please email USF@screenskills.com

We are committed to ensuring all our courses are accessible to everyone. Please email the above address with any access requirements so that we can make the arrangements you need.

What it covers

Ofcom’s two new rules to ensure that participants in television and radio shows are properly looked after are :

• Due care must be taken over the welfare, wellbeing, and dignity of participants in programmes.
• Participants must not be caused unjustified distress or anxiety by taking part in programmes or by the broadcast of those programmes.

This course will look at processes involved in casting and producing to ensure this enhanced duty of care is met.

We will look at :

• Pre-production – Best practice for undertaking in-depth background and medical checks and thorough risk assessments, particularly in relation to mental health and wellbeing.
• Gaining consent and ongoing consent – why is this essential.
• Risk assessments - who should you use – what is the difference between a psychologist and a psychotherapist?
• Recognising the difference between support for the participants and support for the crew when working with vulnerable participants or traumatic material.
• During production – best practice for providing effective support and counselling, with participants able to privately raise their concerns.
• Post-production – how to best support individuals in what is often the most challenging time when public interest is heightened. 

By the end of this training course participants will have:

• An in depth understanding of best practice when working with contributors in unscripted.
• Shared their knowledge, experience and questions with colleagues and peers.
• Have the benefit of a peer support network.

Trainers

This programme will be delivered by a fully qualified psychotherapist and industry professionals - Rebecca Day MBACP / Sarah McCaffrey MBACP

Both trainers work professionally with productions, broadcasters and other creative organisations to advise on best practices with regard to meeting their duty of care and also offer therapeutic support to individuals working in the sector.

Rebecca Day - Film in Mind

Film In Mind advocates for better mental health in the film industry, providing consultation and therapy for the filmmaking community  blending years of experience working in independent documentaries with a tailored psychotherapeutic approach.
 
Sarah McCaffrey - Solas Mind 
 
Solas Mind is the go-to mental health company in the film and tv industry with a team of over 40 practitioners providing professional, bespoke, therapeutic support services to production companies, studios, crew, and creative freelancers both in the UK and Internationally.
Project consultation services include coaching or counselling support, on-site wellbeing practitioners, mental health risk assessments, wellbeing workshops, Mental Health and Suicide First Aid courses.

How to apply

This session will take place online via Zoom. Click ‘get ticket’ at the top of the page and follow the instructions to book your place; you must login or register before you are able to book your place.

Our courses are popular and often book up quickly. If you are no longer able to attend, we ask you to please use the “decline ticket” function on the right-hand side of the page so that we can release your place to someone on the waiting list.