Fast Track intensive leadership program
About Fast Track
Fast Track intensive leadership program will help you advance your career by building your skills and confidence in leadership and management roles.
This free online professional development program is designed specifically for new and emerging leaders who want to excel in leadership roles responding to family violence or primary prevention of violence against women.
The response stream is designed for:
- Victorian specialist family violence managers and senior workers who are new to their roles and/or want to build their leadership and management capability.
- Experienced practitioners in the Victorian specialist family violence sector who are looking to move into a leadership role.
The prevention stream is designed for:
- Experienced practitioners in the Victorian primary prevention sector who are looking to move into a leadership role.
- Professionals with significant experience in family violence roles who are interested in moving into primary prevention in Victoria.
Designed by experienced practitioners, Fast Track incorporates the values of intersectional feminism that are the foundation of family violence and primary prevention work.
The 2021-22 Fast Track program undertook a rigorous evaluation that demonstrated the effectiveness of the program in building key leadership and management capabilities across the sector. The report outcomes show that participants’ increased capability, confidence and connections are directly contributing to their career development, both through progression to more senior roles and through extending their responsibilities.
Fast Track, and our partners at Reality Learning, won the Diamond award for Best Pandemic Response for the Shift-It-Online category at the LearnX Learning Design 2021 awards.
Enhanced learning experience
Fast Track is delivered using a range of methods that are designed to work together to reinforce the learning experience.
Workshops
Develop your technical skills through group discussion and problem solving led by an expert facilitator.
Guest presenters
Hear from sector experts who will share their knowledge and insights on a range of topics in the workshops.
Workplace project
Choose a project to work on during the program that will have a real impact in your workplace, while building your skills.
Expert project mentor
Access support and advice around your workplace project or your career development in three one-hour mentoring sessions.
Networking
Meet and connect with other emerging leaders in your sector throughout the program.
Forum
Put the skills you’ve gained into practice and celebrate, reflect and share what you’ve learned at the end of the program.
Hear from past participants
Current course information
RESPONSE
Who should apply
- Victorian specialist family violence managers and senior workers who are new to their roles and/or want to build their leadership and management capability.
- Experienced practitioners in the Victorian specialist family violence sector who are looking to move into a leadership role.
Program outline
- Applying theory, research and evidence
- Legislative, policy, and practice frameworks
- Intersectionality, practice and organisations
- Management across staff, teams and organisations
- Supporting healthy, safe and reflective organisations
- Using research and data to manage and improve planning, practice and organisations
- Partnerships, collaboration and service delivery
- Representing your organisation
- Advocacy for policy, systems and practice reform
Duration
10 weeks + end-of-program forum
Thursdays 9.30 am – 12.30 pm via Zoom
ROUND 2
27 July 2023 – 28 September 2023
End of Program Forum: Thursday, 5 October 2023 | 9.30am – 12.30pm
ROUND 3
1 February 2024 – 4 April 2024
End of Program Forum: Thursday, 11 April 2024 | 9.30am – 12.30pm
Commitment
- Online workshops: 3 hours per week
- Preparation: approximately an additional 2 hours per week to allow for mentoring, reading, and preparing your workplace project
- Additional networking opportunities: optional drop-in sessions will be available online as another opportunity to connect and collaborate with participants.
Applications for Round 2 are now closed. Please join the waitlist to be notified about Round 3.
PREVENTION
Who should apply
- Experienced practitioners in the Victorian primary prevention sector who are looking to move into a leadership role.
- Professionals with significant experience in family violence roles who are interested in moving into primary prevention in Victoria.
Program outline
- Using research, theory and evidence to support practice
- Intersectionality in practice
- Developing program logic frameworks
- Project planning and monitoring and evaluation
- Establishing and maintaining partnerships
- Prevention across different settings
- Working with men and boys
- Communications and managing resistance
- Advocating for change
Duration
10 weeks + end-of-program forum
Weeks 1-9: Thursdays, Week 10: Tuesday | 9.30 am – 12.30 pm via Zoom
ROUND 2
12 October 2023 – 12 December 2023
End of Program Forum: Thursday, 14 December 2023 | 9.30am – 12.30pm
Commitment
- Online workshops: 3 hours per week
- Preparation: approximately an additional 2 hours per week to allow for mentoring, readings, and preparing your workplace project
- Additional networking opportunities: optional drop-in sessions will be available online as another opportunity to connect and collaborate with participants.
Applications for Round 2 are now open and will close on Tuesday 19 September.
How to apply
Applications are open for the second round of Fast Track Prevention. Please submit your application below.
Learn more about our application process
You will need to provide your personal contact details and complete an application form about your current role and what you hope to achieve. You will also need to submit your resume, and a letter of support from your manager or employer.
If you are on the waitlist , when applications open , you’ll receive an email inviting you to apply. Click ‘apply now’ and you’ll be asked to review your personal details and will then be given access to the application.
To ensure the best possible outcome for all participants, we select applicants based on their suitability for the course and to ensure the group is diverse and can work cohesively. You may be contacted for a short interview as a part of the selection process. Please note this program is for participants in Victoria, Australia only.
Accessibility
If you’d like to discuss your accessibility requirements or need any further information about the accessibility standards of our online Learning Management System, email training@safeandequal.org.au
Enquiries
If you’d like more information about the Fast Track program, email training@safeandequal.org.au.
This program is free for all participants thanks to generous funding from Family Safety Victoria. We will be delivering two response and two prevention courses in 2023, and additional programs in 2024.
2021-22 Evaluation
Safe and Equal is proud to share the evaluation report for the 2021-2022 Fast Track program.
We undertook a rigorous evaluation that demonstrated the effectiveness of the program in building key leadership and management capabilities across the sector.
The report outcomes show that participants’ increased capability, confidence and connections are directly contributing to their career development, both through progression to more senior roles and through extending their responsibilities.
We would like to say a foremost thank you to all who have supported the Fast Track program, and to those who generously gave their time to provide feedback to support the evaluation.
“
[The program] helped me realise that actually I have a lot of experience that is valuable in this field. Not just family violence-specific skills, but partnerships, all other transferrable skills that we spoke about in Fast Track.
“
Kerry’s
Case Study
Attending Fast Track and talking with other participants and mentors also gave Kerry the confidence to apply for a new role. Read more about Kerry’s story, and how Fast Track has supported her career progression as a specialist family violence response practitioner.
“
[GenWest is] benefitting from Shweta’s new energy and drive, especially post-lockdowns. [As her manager] I have benefited from her doing that course so much, she’s so enthused and confident and capable.
“
Shweta’s
Case Study
Shweta’s manager Rosie highlights that Shweta’s enhanced confidence and capabilities after doing Fast Track are having a positive impact more widely at GenWest. Read more about Shweta’s story, and how Fast Track has supported her as a prevention practitioner.
FACILITATOR:
Sarah Johnson
Sarah Johnson is an independent consultant, facilitator and coach with extensive experience in stakeholder engagement, communications and multi-sector collaboration.
She brings a warm, collaborative and focussed approach, informed by more than 20 years of working across the community sector in service delivery, management and leadership roles in crisis counselling, youth mentoring and family violence.
For the eight years prior to establishing her consultancy business, Sarah was the Family Violence Principal Strategic Advisor for northern metropolitan Melbourne where she provided strategic leadership and advice, supported workforce development and capacity building.
As Fast Track facilitator, Sarah brings considerable sector knowledge and facilitation expertise.
RELATED
PAGES