Start Program

Psychological Health and Safety Training

Let’s START supportive conversations at work

Mental and emotional safety is critical to employee wellbeing, resilience and productivity.

The START Psychological Health and Safety Program gives leaders and employees confidence and tools to build a culture of care through supportive conversations at work.

It’s like first aid training for mental health: START’s core premise is that it is better by far to simply start a conversation about mental health than to say nothing at all.

Support partner

Navigate difficult conversations with confidence

Build a culture of emotional safety and care

Increase wellbeing and productivity

Incremental learning for maximum retention

Add-on mental health and wellness webinars

Customized to your context

Support at work

The START conversation framework

The START acronym describes the simple, adaptable framework that we use to foster supportive conversations that can save lives:

  • Safety: When to make a 911 call
  • Talk: Create conditions for people to talk openly
  • Acknowledge: Help people feel seen and heard
  • Resources: Whatever, whoever, or wherever feels safe
  • Team: Sustainability for the supporter
Book Your Training

The START program includes fully customizable materials including:

  • Leaders/Rollout Guide
  • Live, interactive, virtual training sessions with a certified, trauma-informed training expert
  • Participant workbooks featuring START questions/prompts
  • Customized practice scenarios and background stories to help leaders and team members understand how to apply these evidence-informed tools in their specific context to navigate future situations.
  • Series of Wellbeing Toolbox Tips and Resource Recommendations to complement each case study and add incremental learnings (on topics such as anxiety, depression, resilience, stress and more)
  • Printed wallet cards with the START model prompts on one side and resources on the other
  • Supplementary 60-minute webinars on a range of topics.

All program materials fully customized to your unique needs, goals and corporate branding

Topics include:

Anxiety, Trauma, Depression, Racism, Psychological Safety, 2SLGBTQIA inclusivity, Neuro-Diversity and More

We work with national and international organizations, including Fortune 500 companies, non-profit organizations, educational institutions, and Indigenous groups.

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Participants were 23% more confident safety planning with their clients after taking the workshop.

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100% of participants said the learnings from START will benefit the clients they work with, those in their personal lives, and themselves.

You don’t need a script to help someone who’s struggling. All you need is a place to START.

Book Your Training

START program Testimonials:

“Thank you for taking us through this. Timing of this training and resources is so critical as COVID has really impacted many people’s home lives and relationships.”
National corporation, virtual training
☆☆☆☆☆
“Thank you for taking us through this. Timing of this training and resources is so critical as COVID has really impacted many people’s home lives and relationships.”
National corporation
National corporation, virtual training
“I’ve used the START model twice with positive feedback from HR. I like these tools and it’s proving to be helpful. I’ve dealt with cases like this for years but having a model to follow now is a great tool.”
North American client, virtual START training
☆☆☆☆☆
“I’ve used the START model twice with positive feedback from HR. I like these tools and it’s proving to be helpful. I’ve dealt with cases like this for years but having a model to follow now is a great tool.”
North American client, virtual START training
North American client, virtual START training
“Shawna was so warm, welcoming and knowledgeable about suicide awareness. She delivered the START program in such an informative, understandable, and digestible way. She answered all our questions with ease. Shawna was able to paraphrase our comments/thoughts so well to tie them back into the program and how it related to the topic at hand. Shawna is a great example of a fantastic facilitator and showed great authenticity, enthusiasm, patience and active listening ”
Ka Nah Chi Hih treatment centre participant
☆☆☆☆☆
“Shawna was so warm, welcoming and knowledgeable about suicide awareness. She delivered the START program in such an informative, understandable, and digestible way. She answered all our questions with ease. Shawna was able to paraphrase our comments/thoughts so well to tie them back into the program and how it related to the topic at hand. Shawna is a great example of a fantastic facilitator and showed great authenticity, enthusiasm, patience and active listening”
Ka Nah Chi Hih treatment centre participant
Ka Nah Chi Hih treatment centre participant
“Shawna was mindful and engaging, very patient letting people talk and express themselves in a safe place.”
Indigenous organization START participant
☆☆☆☆☆
“Shawna was mindful and engaging, very patient letting people talk and express themselves in a safe place.”
Ka Na Chi Hih START participant 2
Indigenous organization START participant
“The workshop was so informative and helpful for me as a worker. A lot of the work I have been doing with clients previously seemed to click and resonated really deeply with me after this workshop.”
Ka Na Chi Hih START participant
☆☆☆☆☆
“The workshop was so informative and helpful for me as a worker. A lot of the work I have been doing with clients previously seemed to click and resonated really deeply with me after this workshop.”
Ka Na Chi Hih START participant
Ka Na Chi Hih START participant
“Informative, useful, and important.”
Non-profit in-person training
☆☆☆☆☆
“Informative, useful, and important.”
Non-profit in-person training
Non-profit in-person training
“Shawna is a very knowledgeable facilitator and it is clear she cares deeply about her work and in addition to this, she is very respectful and mindful of her audience.”
Mountain Plains Youth Centre participant
☆☆☆☆☆
“Shawna is a very knowledgeable facilitator and it is clear she cares deeply about her work and in addition to this, she is very respectful and mindful of her audience.”
Mountain Plains Youth Centre participant 3
Mountain Plains Youth Centre participant
“This workshop provided me with tools that I can use with my clients when safety planning with them. It helped/reminded me to view characteristics from various points of views.”
Mountain Plains Youth Centre participant
☆☆☆☆☆
“This workshop provided me with tools that I can use with my clients when safety planning with them. It helped/reminded me to view characteristics from various points of views.”
Mountain Plains Youth Centre participant 2
Mountain Plains Youth Centre participant
“Thank you for making this topic accessible. The ripple effect will be even more impactful than this workshop, which I found very valuable.”
Mountain Plains Youth Centre participant
☆☆☆☆☆
“Thank you for making this topic accessible. The ripple effect will be even more impactful than this workshop, which I found very valuable.”
Mountain Plains Youth Centre participant
Mountain Plains Youth Centre participant
“This was very applicable to our field of work as well as day to day life.”
Mountain Plains START participant
☆☆☆☆☆
“This was very applicable to our field of work as well as day to day life.”
Mountain Plains START participant 3
Mountain Plains START participant
“I really enjoyed this workshop, I loved pairing in groups and hearing from other peers as well as all the info Shawna had given us today.”
Mountain Plains START participant
☆☆☆☆☆
“I really enjoyed this workshop, I loved pairing in groups and hearing from other peers as well as all the info Shawna had given us today.”
Mountain Plains START participant 2
Mountain Plains START participant
“Very knowledgeable and had experience dealing with individuals who were thinking about self harm or suicide.”
Mountain Plains START participant
☆☆☆☆☆
“Very knowledgeable and had experience dealing with individuals who were thinking about self harm or suicide.”
Mountain Plains START participant
Mountain Plains START participant

Start training for life!
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