Why?  Attribution of Meaning and Its Role in Resiliency After Tragedy

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Let’s go deep. The case has been convincingly made supporting clinical and business rationale for crisis response services to the workplace. Both are certainly worthy reasons to come along side people following potentially traumatic experiences. This presentation will challenge participants to become a bit more reflective and ask an additional and deeper “Why?” Besides philosophical/existential reasons, research indicates that how people attribute meaning to tragic events is a significant indicator regarding their subsequent recovery from them. Both those impacted and those charged with facilitating recovery will struggle with questions such as “Why do bad things happen?”, “Why me?”, “Why am I struggling with this when others are not?”, “Who/What can I trust?”, or “Why should I go out of my way to help people bounce back from this?”

Victim? Survivor? “SurThrivor?” In effort to link clinical researchers/thought leaders with service delivery to the business community, this presentation will review findings regarding individual and organizational victimhood, resiliency, and post-traumatic growth as tied to how those impacted make sense out of critical incidents and their response to them. Participants will be encouraged to focus upon impact rather than incident as they planfully deliver psychological first aid. Leadership strategies and crisis communication processes will be proposed that support growth trajectories. The critical incident responder will be challenged to explore and evaluate her/his own deeper questions and answers as they apply to involvement in this important work.

Learning Objectives:

Identify critical attributional questions facing those impacted by tragedy

·         Focus upon impact; not incident

·         Listing of common why questions such as “Why me?”, “Why do bad things happen to good people?”, “Does this mean I’m a bad person?”, “Did the perpetrator select me because I was the easiest mark?”, “Why am I struggling while others are bouncing back?”, “Who/What can I trust?”, “Where was God?”

·         Explain how the impact of traumatic stress impacts thinking processes and how people are at risk for toxic attribution

·         Identify how tragedy can lead to subsequent tragedies.

Understand the crucial role attribution of meaning plays in resiliency/recovery trajectories

·         Review decision trees and outcomes tied to identified attributional questions

·         Review research findings (Bonanno, Galea, Brewin, Hobfoil, Ray, et al) regarding related content

·         Describe service delivery case studies from corporate and insurance perspectives as related to Return-To-Work and workers compensation claims metrics

Learn crisis communication processes that support individual and organizational resilience

·         Identify crisis leadership positioning that supports positive attribution of meaning

·         List and describe phase-sensitive, multi-component crisis response

·         Outline the ACT crisis communication process to acknowledge, communicate, and transition toward resilience

This presentation will include an interactive session during which audience members can interact with the speakers and one another on the topic of the audio conference.

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Featured Presenter:

Bob VandePol

President

Crisis Care Network

Bob VandePol, MSW serves as President of Crisis Care Network, the largest provider of Critical Incident Response Services to the workplace. Crisis Care Network responds 1,000 times per month following workplace tragedies to facilitate employee/organizational return to productivity. He consults with corporations, insurers, EAPs, and behavioral health professionals regarding how to manage the behavioral risks inherent in workplace tragedies. Active as a keynote speaker, Mr. VandePol has published and been quoted in many business and clinical journals, co-authored book chapters addressing workplace security and response to tragedy, and has been featured in multiple video training series. He managed CCN’s Command Center in Manhattan after the 2001 terrorist attacks and led numerous leadership summits following Hurricane Katrina and the Virginia Tech tragedy regarding how employers could lead organizational recovery during crises. Mr. VandePol is a member of the Employee Assistance Professional Association’s Workplace Disaster Preparedness Panel of Experts and the National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention.

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