The 'go to' organisation for Local Government improvement in Scotland

Trauma can affect anyone, and we are becoming increasingly aware that living through traumatic events is more common than previously realised. Evidence suggests that organisations that are trauma-informed and responsive to the impact of trauma can help reduce barriers to accessing universal and specialist support and ultimately deliver better outcomes for those of us affected by trauma.

Scotland has paved the way in creating a vision of a trauma-informed and responsive workforce and services that can recognise where people are affected by trauma and adversity, and that respond in ways that prevent further harm, support recovery, address inequalities and improve life chances. Central to achieving this is the National Trauma Transformation Programme (NTTP), which provides a wide range of learning resources, guidance and implementation support for all sectors of the workforce, including leaders, to up-skill staff to the appropriate level of trauma-informed and responsive practice and, critically, to embed and sustain this model of working.

In March 2024, the IS Research Team worked with the Scottish Government and partners to carry out a survey of the Scottish workforce. The goal of this survey, which received over 5,000 responses, was to understand how much the Scottish workforce knows about psychological trauma and trauma-informed practice. While workforce training is a key component of any organisation’s journey to becoming trauma-informed and responsive, the culture, environments and supportive ways of working in an organisation ultimately make a difference to all of us who are affected by trauma. The survey, therefore, explored not only access to training and NTTP resources, but also culture and structures within organisations. This was a follow-up to a similar survey issued in 2021, meaning we could track change over time.

We found that the workforce has a high level of confidence in understanding what trauma is and how it can impact on those of us who have experienced trauma, with over half of our respondents saying they were confident in these areas. The results showed slightly lower confidence and understanding of trauma-informed practice but results across the survey showed rising confidence levels when compared with the results from 2021.

The results also showed that confidence differed by sector and service area. For example, confidence was particularly high amongst those working in the third sector or in service areas with direct engagement with those who have experienced trauma, such as mental health or alcohol and drugs services. This is not particularly surprising but shows that developing a trauma-informed and responsive workforce will require continued engagement with policy areas and services where trauma-informed and responsive practice may not appear to be as directly relevant to day-to-day activities.

We also found that awareness of the NTTP has increased since the previous survey, and nearly half of respondents had completed some form of NTTP training, particularly among those working in sectors like alcohol and drugs, and violence against women.

What was also encouraging was that NTTP resources were shown to have a positive impact, with those who had completed at least one form of training reporting higher confidence across the survey. This suggests that access to NTTP resources can support the workforce to embed trauma-informed practice.

However, challenges remain, and respondents highlighted many barriers to working in a trauma-informed and responsive way. Barriers included limited resources and capacity within organisations, which hinder both training uptake and the ability to embed trauma-informed practice in the workplace. Others noted a lack of prioritisation that would create space to overcome these barriers. The barriers demonstrate that further efforts are needed to boost engagement and integration of trauma-informed practice across sectors. This will require buy-in and support from leadership to develop a whole-systems approach to trauma-informed practice across services, systems and the workforce.

Embedding a trauma-informed and responsive approach across services, systems and workforces is an important step in ensuring that we can address inequalities and improve life chances and outcomes for all. This survey demonstrated that we are making considerable steps towards developing a trauma-informed workforce and services across Scotland, but there is still work to be done to ensure that everyone has the confidence to identify and respond to trauma.

You can read the full report on the survey results here.

The IS offers a range of support to local authorities and community planning partners on trauma-informed practice to:

• raise awareness of the benefits of a trauma-informed approach across systems, services and the workforce
• develop tools and resources, and provide support to help strengthen the capacity and capability of councils and partners to implement a trauma-informed approach
• bring together local trauma champions and trauma leads to share learning and good practice.

The IS has developed this National Learning Report to share learning about the progress, emerging impact, opportunities, and barriers from work happening across local authority areas since the funding began. The aim of this learning report is to understand key learning, themes and priorities across Scotland in relation to advancing and embedding this work. The findings in this report represent important learning about what works, and what the barriers and enablers to embedding a trauma-informed approach across organisations, systems and workforces.

An Elected Member briefing note was also published by the IS on trauma-informed approaches.