This two-day in-person workshop (21 & 22 Feb) will build practice understanding and skills for AOD practitioners to work safely and effectively with men who perpetrate DFV, and to become familiar with suitable pathways for specialist support.

It will explore key points and areas of the NADA practice resource - Engaging men who perpetrate domestic and family violence in the AOD treatment context, with an extended focus on preliminary engagement practices, overt and covert ways to obtain indicators of the seriousness of risk and on safety planning.

The workshop will provide practical foundations for recognising behaviours of men who perpetrate DFV and engaging them in non-collusive ways. 

Learning outcomes will include to:
• Increase the identification of service users who are causing DFV harm
• Improve understanding of the responsibilities, opportunities and parameters of AOD services and practitioners towards engaging and responding to service users who are causing DFV harm
• Enhance skills to invite service users into safe conversations about their DFV behaviour, towards motivating acceptance of a referral(s) for specialist assistance
• Reduce the risk of colluding with perpetrator narratives and belief systems that justify use of DFV
• Develop an introductory understanding of ‘risk assessment’ when engaging service users who are known or suspected to be causing DFV harm, including through an intersectional lens
• Develop an understanding of options for information sharing and collaborative practice when managing risk posed by service users who are causing DFV harm
• Increase perpetrator-facing safety planning and professional-facing risk management skills, towards reducing the risk posed by the user of violence in the immediate and short-term
• Strengthen approaches towards allying with victim-survivors, and keeping their needs and experiences in mind, through improved understandings of perpetrator belief systems, motives, patterns and tactics of coercive control and social entrapment.

Prerequisites for this training

1. DFV foundational knowledge and understanding, including of its gendered nature and of perpetrator choices to use DFV
2. Minimum of three years' experience in the AOD sector, including at least some provision of support for people who have been or are experiencing DFV. 

Please contact if you have any questions around the prerequisites for this training and your eligibility. 

About the trainer
Rodney Vlais is a dedicated, thoughtful and effective senior professional and community-based change agent with almost 20 years’ experience in work to address and prevent men’s violence against women and children. Held managerial and executive roles at No To Violence (NTV) from 2009 to 2016 and offers extensive experience developing and advocating for systemic change at the state and national levels. Since mid-2016 has been consulting to governments and/or NGOs in most states across Australia, assisting them to develop and enhance their family and domestic violence perpetrator intervention systems and practices. Is considered nation-wide to be a leading policy advocate, trainer, writer and researcher in the field.

To register, click here
Please feel free to contact Michelle Ridley at with any questions.