The recent un/covering of unmarked graves and murders of Indigenous children forced to attend residential schools calls Canadians and the world to re-examine histories of the colonization, genocide and enslavement by the British Empire. This call requires awareness of how current privileges are built on Colonialist forces across the world to accumulate wealth, enforce cultural dominance, and exploit indentured labour.  How can we use our understandings to meet the demand for reparation, remembrance, recognition and reconsideration from Indigenous peoples, refugees and black, white and brown bodies with different histories, experiences and identities living on colonized lands in Canada and in many parts of the world?

How do we make collective sense of ourselves as colonizer and colonized? How do we use language to express these differences of power and history within society and to describe their impact on our bodies and daily lives? What helps us name and address oppressive power relations under capitalism?   What opens up our tendency to rigidity in how we see and understand one another by ignoring the complexity of multiple identities that exist within each of us?

How can we explore and reconfigure our (un)conscious understandings of ourselves and our relationships through exploring our internalized constructions of authority and authorization, to undo, redo and explore our thoughts and feelings in the hope that something different might emerge that moves us towards holding a curious regard for one another, resisting oppression and seeking reconciliation and reparation?

This experiential learning workshop draws on the group relations tradition (www.tavinstitute.org) and will include large and small study groups; storytelling, review and application groups, and movement to uncover our projections, our defenses and the forms our resistance takes.

Who this Conference is for: leaders, activists, community organizers, staff and managers wanting an opportunity to learn through immediate and direct experience about difference, conscious and unconscious group dynamics, and authority in addressing difference.  No background or experience is necessary to participate.

●    What organizational priorities and decisions need to be reconsidered?
●    What changes might contribute to greater equity?
●    How does work flow and role expectations need to change?
●    How do we plan to return to work and work from home?
●    What mental health concerns have emerged?
●    What shifts in our work are required?
●    How might our environmental impact be reduced?
●    What are our assumptions about our organizational capacity? How do they need to change?

Barbara has been consulting to organizations in Canada, Central and South America, India and Africa that are faced with violent and repressive resistance to their work, the loss of leaders through the Covid pandemic and calls for assistance for immediate human survival. Barbara will present her thinking and research on how organizations are rethinking their work to respond to trauma, grief and overwhelming demands.

The next four sessions the on-going conversation with Executive Directors, senior managers and front-line staff will continue through separate break out groups.
Participants will have an opportunity to talk with their peers and to think about and rethink the frameworks and assumptions that guide their decision making about the unprecedented work load, support for staff, and decision making.

An exciting virtual event co-sponsored by the International Society for the Psychoanalytic Study of Organizations (ISPSO) and the Society of Consulting Psychology, Division 13 of the American Psychological Association (SCP):

A panel discussion featuring:

Presenters:

Mark Ziska and Ramon Batista, authors of the book Do No Harm: 5 Steps to Align Police Actions with Community Values describing Mark’s consultation to Ramon as chief of police in a large American city

Discussants:

From ISPSO: Barbara Williams (Director of Bureau Kensington and Founder of Insight for Community Impact)
From SCP: Tamara Lyn (Warden of the Low Security Correctional Institution at the Federal Correctional Complex at Butner, North Carolina and Principal of High Ready Coaching and Consulting)With ample opportunity for interactions in breakout groups and with the panelists.Free, and available exclusively to members of ISPSO and SCP.APA-approved CE credits will be available.

For more information: https://www.societyofconsultingpsychology.org/webinar-consulting-to-police-in-polarized-times

The NY Center and Group Relations International are pleased to present a weekly series of four online learning sessions called Group Relations Foundations with Dr. Sarah Rosenbaum (AKRI Fellow, GRI Co-Creator, and Clinical Psychologist).

Mondays this October (October 4th, 11th, 18th, and 25th) from 6:30-8:30 pm ET.  Please see here for more information and how to register.

In each session, Dr. Rosenbaum will discuss and expand on the fundamentals of group relations theory, based on assigned readings from foundational texts in GR theory and practice.  Some brief experiential exercises and other media may be used to illustrate concepts.

This series may be particularly useful for those who have not had formal teaching on GR theory in school or professional training, those who do not have a background in psychology or a related field, and for those who wish to deepen their understanding of GR theory. Registration is limited to 20 participants to ensure ample opportunity for discussion and interaction.