Earlier this week, Benchmarks North Carolina hosted our annual meeting for executive leaders and membership to celebrate progress over the last year and visions for the year to come. In order to assist members in continuing to set the Benchmarks standard for years to come, each year innovative leaders from the fields of practice, policy, technology, and research are invited to present. This year, members had the fortunate experience of listening to this year’s speaker, Dr. Sandra Bloom, psychiatry specialist, author, and innovative thinker.
During her presentation, Dr. Bloom discussed how trauma can have multi-level impacts, including on the individuals we serve, our staff, and on us at a broader organizational level. In addition, Dr. Bloom offered solutions to dealing with chronic stress and trauma in the workplace so that organizations don’t end up mirroring the people they’re trying to help. Walking through and sharing specific strategies and tools leadership can use to manage conflict and initiate the cultural shifts necessary to become a trauma-responsive organization. All while managing the inherent stressors that accompany such dynamic changes.
Dr. Bloom is a psychiatrist by training and is perhaps best known for her development of the Sanctuary Model, a methodology for creating and changing organizational culture in order to more effectively provide a context within which we can address healing from trauma. It aims to provide individuals and organizations with the knowledge and skills necessary to create nonviolent lives and systems, and to continue exploring how to achieve well-being for all. Techniques from the Sanctuary Model are being successfully applied in schools, domestic violence shelters, homeless shelters, group homes, juvenile justice programs, and inpatient mental health programs, among others, both nationally and internationally. Dr. Bloom encourages us to “think global, act global,” and advocates for a shift in worldviews, which will subsequently alter our paradigms, mental models, attitudes, and behaviors.
—Julia Holcomb
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