info@stress.org.uk
Taking Companies & Individuals
from distress to de-stress
Top Navigation
Left navigation
Body content
The Organisation: HMP Pentonville . The construction for HMP Pentonville was completed in 1842. Its design was and still is regarded as revolutionary in the way prisons were built. Since then Pentonville Prison has been a model for other prisons throughout England and at the time the British Empire. The prison is state owned and operated by Her Majesty’s Prison Service.
The Project: To help HMP Pentonville complete their Olympics programme through ensuring that all their first line managers have the competency to identify gaps in individual manager’s skills and knowledge base and to fill those gaps.
The Solution:The Stress Management Society catered the line-managers programme to coincide with the types of issues and problems that were faced everyday by the Line Managers and their employees inside HMP. A few of t topics covered in the programme included guidance on how to notice stress in others, how to manage employees dealing with stress and techniques on how to reduce stress.
I have recently developed a First Line Managers Programme for our junior managers at HMP Pentonville. These managers work in a high pressure environment, dealing with prisoners and staff with problems, as well as problematic prisoners and staff.
Although we have a well established staff care and welfare service, this service comes into play after critical incidents have taken place. It was apparent that our first line managers wanted a support mechanism in place that they could refer to on a day-to-day basis for dealing with the stresses and strains caused by normal prison life.
Therefore as part of the Programme we included Stress Management training delivered by The Stress Management Society. More than half of our first line managers attended our bespoke workshops, delivered by Neil Shah. Despite some initial trepidation and negativity, the sessions were universally acclaimed by those that attended. Indeed many of the most negative were some of the most enthusiastic afterwards. This had the added effect of motivating them to attend further sessions that are part of the First Line Managers Programme.
The Q1 forms (“Happy Sheets”) were so positive that when they were presented to the Governor he made the decision that the Senior Management Team should also attend the workshops. The feedback from them was just as impressive.
One of the main benefits from putting these workshops on was that it gave the attendees the feeling that the Governor and the SMT do care about them and are happy to spend money in times of austerity to protect and support their staff. I would unreservedly recommend that consideration is given to other establishments and other businesses invest in this very worthwhile event.
Alan Clarke
First Line Manager Project Co-ordinator, HMP Pentonville