Core training for setting up and facilitating perpetrator programmes

Everything you need to know about running a domestic violence perpetrator programme in one place

Having high-quality training is essential for the safety and effectiveness of perpetrator work. Given the complexity of working with perpetrators of domestic violence—which includes focusing on victim safety, holding perpetrators accountable while approaching them with respect and fostering their internal motivation for change, and addressing the multiple factors that contribute to their use of violence in intimate relationships—the training of professionals requires a comprehensive and thorough approach.

This 15-day training (120 training hours) brings together experiences from various models of working with perpetrators, integrating key elements of what has proven effective, and featuring some of the leading European experts in the field. Furthermore, the training is designed to enable and support participants in adapting the programme to their national and local contexts, recognizing how important it is to ensure that the approach reflects the specific needs and realities of the communities they work with. Training aligns with the provisions of the Istanbul Convention, Directive on Violence against women, and European standards for perpetrator programmes.

Learn how to

  • Set up perpetrator programme
  • Provide victim-safety oriented programme for male perpetrators of intimate partner violence
  • Assess and manage risks in partnership with professionals who are supporting victims
  • Assess men who use violence and their eligibility for the programme
  • Motivate men for change and address their minimization, denial and blaming
  • Run groups and manage group dynamic
  • Work with men on: Emotional regulation and behavioural change; Understanding violence; Coercive control; Masculinity; Empathy toward victims and consequences of violence; Fathering; Sexualised violence; Becoming accountable and managing self-talk; Non-violent communication and respectful relationships
  • Close the work with men who use violence and conduct follow-up
  • Write a report to the referring agencies
  • Apply culturally sensitive and trauma informed approach in your work
  • Adapt the programme to your local context

Training agenda

  • Gender equality, feminist approach, gender-based violence
  • Prevalence, impact and consequences of domestic violence
  • Characteristics and dynamics of GBV /DV.
  • Relevance, goal and key characteristics of victim-safety oriented perpetrator programmes
  • Referral paths into a perpetrator program
  • Different models of organizing partner contact and support 
  • Understanding perpetrators and their use of violence
  • Basic interviewing skills
  • Key elements of motivational interviewing in perpetrator work
  • Key elements of the theory of change
  • Fostering perpetrators’ motivation for change
  • Intake phase
  • Integrated working between perpetrator programme and partner contact and support
  • Concepts and models of risk assessment 
  • Risk assessment instruments 
  • Assessing and managing risks, risk management meetings
  • Group work
  • Facilitating groups and managing challenging group dynamics
  • Supporting men in their emotional regulation and behaviour change
  • Supporting perpetrators in understanding intimate partner violence
  • Supporting men in examining and changing their masculine identity and attitudes reflecting gender inequality
  • Supporting men in understanding and changing the coercive control patterns
  • Supporting men in understanding the impact of their violence and consequences on themselves and their (ex)partners and children
  • Supporting men in understanding long-lasting consequences of IPV on children, including mother’s parenting
  • Supporting men in developing child-centred parenting style
  • Explored own shame and positioning toward working on the topics of sex and sexual violence
  • Supporting men in understanding sexualized violence, concept of consent and its limitations in IPV relationships
  • Supporting men in building respectful intimacy
  • Supporting men in building skills for non-violent conflict resolution
  • Fostering the accountability of perpetrators
  • Supporting men who use violence to recognize the relations of self-talk, anger and violence
  • Supporting men in applying non-violent conflict resolution styles
  • Sustaining change through the closing and follow-up phase
  • Trauma and trauma informed approach
  • Vicarious trauma
  • Culturally sensitive approach and working with perpetrators from additionally vulnerable backgrounds
  • Fostering diversity and equity
  • Addressing digital dimension of violence
  • Documenting the work
  • Key principles and critical aspects when writing reports
  • Methodological basis for evaluating your work
  • Designing your programme
  • Final exam

The trainers

KATH ALBISTON

Kath has worked in the UK for over 20 years in roles dealing directly or indirectly with domestic violence.  As a consultant and trainer she specialises in the areas of risk management and safeguarding as well as providing supervision to staff working in perpetrator programmes and victim services, and designing and implementing domestic violence and safeguarding risk assessments, policies and procedures. Kath further specialises as a Chairperson and author of Domestic Homicide and Serious Case Reviews, and undertakes expert assessments for family and civil courts.

SANDRA JOVANOVIĆ BELOTIĆ

Sandra is a Training and Capacity Building Manager at the European Network for the Work with Perpetrators of Domestic Violence. She is supporting programmes for perpetrators of domestic violence in Europe through the development of the trainings, mentoring, European Standards for Perpetrator Programmes, and the European Accreditation for Perpetrator Programmes. Sandra is a psychologist with more than 10 years of experience in the domestic violence field. She has provided psychological support for women and children exposed to violence, ran the first Serbian perpetrator group and founded the National Network for the Work with Perpetrators of Violence Serbia (OPNA).

DEAN AJDUKOVIC

Dean is a Professor of Psychology at the Department of Psychology, University of Zagreb, Croatia. His research interests include recovery from trauma, post-conflict community social reconstruction, development and evaluation of psychosocial interventions, prevention of violence in adolescent relationships, treatment of perpetrators of gender based violence. Over the past 18 years, he led the development of Croatia’s first perpetrator program, provided individual and group treatment to perpetrators and victims, helped design the training program for providers who work with perpetrators and delivered trainings across Croatia, Bosnia Herzegovina and Macedonia. He consulted national lawmakers regarding the inclusion of work with perpetrator into Croatian laws, contributed to writing several national strategies to combat GBV with emphasis on work with perpetrators, and authored the national standards for work with perpetrators. He was a member of the interim board of the newly founded WWP EN and helped develop the organization’s statutes and other documents. Currently, he is president of the Croatian Society for Traumatic Stress (CSTS). In 2011, he received the European award Walter de Loos for Excellence in European Trauma Work.

ELENA GAJOTTO

Elena has been working as a project manager and designer, with a primary focus on the social inclusion of migrants and gender-based violence. Elena has a degree in translation and interpreting, and is also a certified cultural mediator, specialized in working with migrant victims of violence. She holds expertise in culturally sensitive work in the field of domestic violence, and expertise in the area of gender-based cyberviolence. She is part of the WWP EN projects team.

CHRIS NEWMAN

Chris is director of Partner Abuse Interventions, an independent organisation offering structured assessments of domestic violence risk and vulnerability in cases where domestic violence is a child protection concern. Chris is a practice supervisor and consultant to organisations working with perpetrators of domestic violence, including work within a multidisciplinary team at the  Portman Clinic in London. He worked as a research psychologist before moving on to specialise in risk assessment, violence prevention and parenting work with those who have used violence in the family. Together with Kate Iwi, Chris also runs a training company called Partner Abuse Consultancy and Training.

KATE IWI

Kate has 30 years experience working in this field and has also worked for a large aid organisation, developing child protection policies in international settings. Kate wrote her first domestic violence perpetrator programme back in 2000 and has since developed programmes in other parts of Europe and Lebanon. In 2011, she co-authored "Picking up the Pieces After Domestic Violence: A Practical Resource for Supporting Parenting Skills" (Jessica Kingsley; April 2011). A further book in the series, "Engaging with Perpetrators of Domestic Violence: A Handbook for Early Intervention", was published in January 2015. In 2017 she co-authored the "Reprovide programme", which forms the basis of the UK's first large scale RCT into domestic abuse perpetrator programmes, and in 2018 she wrote the Drive "Behaviour Change Toolkit" for work with high risk/ high harm perpetrators. She currently runs a Domestic Abuse Perpetrator Programme (DAPP) within the child protection system in the UK.

GILL MCKENNA

Gill is the Head of the Caledonian System National Team in Scotland, UK.  The Caledonian System is an integrated approach to address men’s use of abusive behaviour towards female partners. It consists of a court mandated men’s behaviour change programme with integrated women’s and children’s services and is accredited by the Scottish Advisory Panel for Offender Rehabilitation.  With academic background in Social Work and a Master’s degree in Psychological Trauma Studies, she has extensive experience working within Scotland’s justice system and has spent the majority of her front line social work career specialising in the delivery of the Caledonian System. Gill has a commitment to trauma informed practice and to the continued growth and development of the Caledonian System.

The OCRI assessment, as well as the development of a Child Protection Policy for the agency were particularly useful take-aways from this training.

Anonymous