Relational Approaches Training and Consultancy

Who can benefit from this training?

This offer is designed for those working with people with complex emotional needs within the context of often highly complex systems. 

For more information, please read our brochure.

The full process

Please follow the steps below to begin the process:

1. Make an enquiry – please complete this Commissioner Enquiry Form detailing the nature of your work and the nature of your enquiry.

2. Initial engagement call – you will be invited to an initial half-an-hour engagement call with a Programme Director to discuss your needs and goals and agree on next steps.

3. Consultation – the relational approaches team will visit you in person to get to know you, your service, the people who access your service and the wider system within which your service operates. Discussion groups will take place with all those working in your system and service users. These conversations act like a ‘diagnostic’: a way for us to try to understand the dilemmas you and your team are currently facing.

4. Report and recommendation – a report will be sent within two weeks after the consultation which will include observations and key themes arising from the days. It will also set out proposed training development and delivery to address the themes identified and make recommendations for post-training support to further embed the learning.

5. Engagement call – if you decide to take up the proposal in the report an engagement call will take place to discuss the report and recommendations further and agree on a bespoke package specifically designed for your service.

6. Training development and delivery - an implementation of the training will take place, which will then be reviewed and developed further as required in response to the needs of different groups. All trainings will be delivered remotely online.

7. Post-training support – delivery of the post-training support package will take place as agreed e.g. dilemma focused sessions or shared learning events. These sessions will be delivered remotely online.

For more information, please see this brochure.

Cost and pricing information

Below is a guide to the costs for this service. A full quote will be provided after the initial engagement call for consultancy, and included in the report for any post-consultancy recommendations.

• Consultancy -

  • £3,000 for two in-person consultancy days and a consultation report.

• Training delivery -

  • The cost for co-facilitated training is £250 per day per delegate with a minimum requirement for 15 delegates.

• Post-training support -

  • Monthly peer consultation groups (for up to 10 in a group): charged at £700 for a half a day session.

  • Update training (half-day training sessions after one year to support ongoing development and reflection): charged at £125 per day per delegate with a minimum requirement for 15 delegates.

• Evaluation using People Outcomes Data (Pod) -

  • People Outcomes Data (Pod), our online, mental health outcomes software, can be used to evaluate the impact of the intervention and training provided. For more information about Pod, please visit our webpage.

• Evaluation of the intervention on service -

  • The Servicer User, Ward Atmosphere Measure can be used to measure perceived change in viewpoints about the service before and after intervention.

  • Cost: £500 for up to 200 respondents.

  • Key features include: standardised Ward Atmosphere Measure set up to run the schedule you decide, a notification email template available for personalisation to your service, as Data Controller, access to all individual results, export all raw data and utilise our standard reporting templating.

• Evaluation of training impact on trainees -

  • Standardised pre and post training feedback forms are completed by the Trainees, in Pod. The results are used to evaluate the delivery of the training (e.g. how well the content was received, suggestions for improvement) and track impact against competencies.

  • Cost: £350 for one staff login and up to 60 trainees*.

  • Key features include: standardised pre and post questionnaires set up to run the schedule you decide , notification email template available for personalisation to your service, as Data Controller, have access to all individual trainee results, export all raw data and utilise our standard reporting templating.

Our team

Vicky Baldwin

Vicky Baldwin is an Education Consultant and a registered Mental Health Nurse. She has worked clinically in community mental health settings and has over 20 years’ experience in education. Vicky has played a key role in developing and delivering local, regional, and national education services, including curriculum design and online learning.

She was the joint lead in developing the UK National Knowledge and Understanding Framework (KUF) for Personality Disorder - a three-level training programme commissioned by the Department of Health and the Ministry of Justice. Vicky served as Programme Director for all three levels of the framework, covering awareness, bachelor’s, and master’s degree programmes.

Vicky is a member of the KUF Strategic Oversight Group and provides consultancy input for the National Offender Personality Disorder Programme. She is passionate about coproduction in education and has worked closely with lived experience practitioners to develop and deliver national training programmes.

In addition to delivering both pre- and post-registration training within UK mental health nursing programmes, Vicky has also taught internationally through the University of Sydney Nursing School. She currently contributes to the Florence Nightingale Foundation, supporting nurses and midwives in exploring new ways to publish outcomes from their service development projects.

Julia Blazdell

Julia is an Educational Consultant and Lived Experience Practitioner. She began her career as an academic, teaching and conducting research in Critical Theory and Contemporary Literature at Queen Mary, University of London. Following her own experience of mental distress and time spent as a patient in psychiatric units and at the Cassel Therapeutic Hospital, she moved into the mental health field.

Julia initially worked with the Mental Health Foundation on the ground-breaking Strategies for Living project, and later joined Emergence, a service-user-led organisation focused on ‘personality disorder’ and complex emotional needs. She has been involved with the KUF for many years, co-authoring several foundation-level training programmes and teaching on the KUF MSc at the Institute of Mental Health in Nottingham.

Julia recently co-edited Working Effectively with ‘Personality Disorder’: Contemporary and Critical Approaches to Clinical and Organisational Practice (Ramsden, J., Prince, S., & Blazdell, J., 2020) and currently serves as Co-President of BIGSPD (the British and Irish Group for the Study of ‘Personality Disorder’).