How are you doing?

Signs of immediate danger

There are a few signs of extreme danger.  You should check this list regularly, especially when something has changed, like if the person causing harm has been confronted, or the person being harmed has left the relationship or has a new partner.  The most dangerous times are when the person causing harm feels like they are losing control of the relationship.

Signs of extreme danger:

• Threats to kill or suicide
• Using weapons, threatening to use weapons, or talking about using weapons (like guns, knives, a car, poisons)
• Choking (strangulation or putting hands around a person’s neck)
• Using intimidation and fear (like threatening violence, punching holes in a wall, shouting in a person’s face, sharpening knives, cleaning a gun)
• Intense, violent possessiveness—like owning a person, controlling who they talk to, where they go, jealousy
• Other controlling behaviour to cause fear (like controlling what a person wears, who they can see, where they can go, controlling their money, keeping them away from friends or whānau)
• Forced sex or sexual violence
• Stalking or surveillance (including in person, by phone or social media, checking a person’s phone, emails or social media)
• The violence is getting worse or more often
• The person harmed feels scared or in danger (if they aren’t scared that doesn’t mean they aren’t in danger—sometimes people cope with extreme, ongoing stress by denying it, even to themselves)
• Others are worried that the person harmed is in danger.

Take these signs seriously.  If one or more of these are true, get help and act now. 

Think about the best way to get safer.  If you don’t already have good support, think about what you can do—there are organisations you can call anytime to help you with that and to help with safety (see Resources).

If you have good support, the fastest, safest path might be using that support with tools on this website (there are tools and information in How do you stay safe for the person harmed, person causing harm and allies).  You might feel safer with the help of an organisation—there are organisations you can call anytime for help (see Resources [link to Resources: helplines]).

If you are the person harmed, who can help you work out how to get safer (see Who can help?)?  If you don’t know who to turn to, there are numbers you can call anytime for help (see Resources).  See How do you stay safe for tools and information about safety.

If you are an ally, can you safely tell the person who is being hurt that you will support them if they need help?  Are there other people you can safely talk to about what you see happening (see Who can help?)?  Think very carefully before confronting the person causing harm, especially if you haven’t talked with the person they are hurting and don’t have a safety plan.  You may make things worse.  See How do you stay safe for tools and information about safety.

If you are the person causing harm, stop.  Get help (see Who can help?).  Call or text 1737 anytime to talk to a trained counsellor, or see Resources for organisations that can help.  Take responsibility for lowering the danger—get rid of any weapons, get yourself away from the situation, find people who can support you to be safer.  See How do you take accountability for tools and information about taking responsibility for the harm you are causing.

How are you doing?  End of meeting Guiding Questions

These are good questions to ask at the end of a meeting.  They can help keep meetings on track and moving towards your goals.

1. Did we meet the goals of the meeting?
2. Did the meeting have a good feeling overall?
3. Were there disagreements or conflicts? What were they about? (different perspectives, different values, different ways of communicating, conflicting personalities?)
4. If there were disagreements or conflicts, were we able to move forward?
5. Was there anybody who was controlling, taking over or using up most of the time? Anyone that we didn’t hear from?  What can we do about it?
6. Did we meet any special needs of the person harmed, person doing harm or others?
7. Did the meeting move smoothly (which often means it was facilitated well)? Did it get bogged down, or we weren’t sure what we were doing (which usually means the facilitator needs support)? 
8. Does anything need to change? What?  What is our plan for change?
9. What were the achievements (including small ones)? Did we celebrate them?
10. Did we end up with clear next steps? What are they?

What are next steps Guiding Questions

You will have tasks from each meeting, phone call, email or discussion.  It helps to summarise these at the end to make sure that you remember the next steps, agree on the steps, and have a plan to tackle each one.

To organise the tasks, you can follow these questions:

Note who is involved and who is responsible for each task.

• Will you meet or talk again? When?  Where?
• Will you communicate before the next meeting?
  • What about?
  • How?
  • Who will get in touch with everyone?
  • By when?
• What other ‘homework’ or actions will happen before the next meeting?
  
  

Are you ready for the next steps Guiding Questions

To make sure you are prepared as you take the next step in your plan, ask yourself these questions:

1. Do we know what the next step is?
2. What are we about to do?
3. What concrete steps does it involve?
4. Who is going to do what?
5. Do we know why we are doing this?
6. Why are we taking this next step?
7. What do we hope to achieve?
8. What goal is this linked to?
9. Do we know how we want to do the next step?
10. How are we taking the next step?
11. Are there any clear ‘dos’ or ‘don’ts’ about how we take the next step?
12. Do we know who is responsible for the next step?
13. Who is responsible overall?
14. Who will get it started?
15. Who else is involved and what are their jobs?
16. Who is the back-up if someone can’t do their part?
17. Do we know when the next step should happen?
18. When are we starting the next step?
19. Are there stages to the next step? If so, when do they start?
20. Is there a time by that we want the next step completed by?
21. Do we know about risks and safety-planning (see How do you stay safe)?
22. Do we know about follow up after the next step?
23. When the next step is completed, what happens? Who is responsible?
24. When we complete the next step, what happens after that? What is the next step?
25. Is there anything else important?

How did you do? Thinking back on an action Guiding Questions

When an intervention takes action, it helps to look back at how it went, what you can learn from it, and what you should do in the future.

1. Was the action well-planned?
2. Was the plan specific enough?
3. Did the action involve the right people?
4. Did it involve the right number of people? Too many? Too few?
5. Did everyone work together well?
6. If so, what made it go well?
7. If not, why?
8. What can be improved?
9. Was the action right for its goal?
10. Were risks and safety planning part of the plan?
11. Did the action go as planned? If not:
12. Why not? How could you do better next time?
13. Were you able to correct for this?
14. Did the action do what it was supposed to do?
15. Yes, no, maybe?
16. How do you know?
17. Do you need more information? What?
18. What did you learn?
19. Positives
20. Negatives
21. Does anything need to change? If so, do you have a good plan for change?
22. Does the action change anything in other parts of the intervention? What?
23. What do you need to share with others? With who?
24. What are the next steps?

How are you doing?  Individual self-check Guiding Questions

Checking how you are going at each step is important.  The following is a list of guiding questions to ask yourself as individuals.

1. How is what we’re doing related to what is important to me?
2. What do I bring to this?
3. Things that I value or care about
4. Things or people that I know
5. Things I can offer, like transport, cooking, good listener, spaces to meet
6. Other?
7. What are some negatives I need to watch out for?
8. Attitudes (like negativity, impatience, gossip, I sometimes fight with or put people down, I often won’t speak up, I like to rescue people and take over)
9. Ways of communicating that put people off
10. Ways of being in a group that can get in the way, I often want to do it myself
11. This is about ending violence. Did I go through Basics about violence? How can I look through this thoroughly or have someone share it with me?
12. Do I know about the collective goals and action plan? If not, how can I ask for them?
13. This is a team or collective process. How is this for me?
14. What feels good and supportive?
15. What is hard?
16. How am I helping?
17. What am I doing to get in the way?
18. How can I make things better?
19. How have I contributed to the group or moving towards our goals?
20. What else can I do to contribute?
21. Is there anything I have a problem with or disagree with that I need to share with the group? Are there any secrets or things people don’t know that I need to share?
22. What is it?
23. Is it hard to share this? Why?
24. Does it need to be shared? If so, how can I do it in the best way?
25. Who can I go to for support?
26. Is there anything else that is important?

How are you doing?  Group self-check Guiding Questions

These are questions to ask along the way to help things go smoothly.

1. Do we have clear goals and bottom-lines? What are they?
2. Are we guided by clear values? What are they?
3. Do we all seem to be on the same page? If not, who is on the same page? Who is not?  What can we do to get us all on the same page?
4. Are we working through disagreements and conflicts in a good way?
5. Are we all getting enough support?
6. Are we offering enough support?
7. Are we staying connected with and supporting the person harmed?
8. Are we staying connected with and supporting the person doing harm?
9. Are we taking care of people who need our extra care? (like children and other dependents)
10. Are we doing regular risk assessment and safety planning?
11. Are we moving towards our goals? Do we have an action plan with the right people responsible for each part, job or expectations? Are our timelines reasonable?
12. Are we flexible enough to respond to new opportunities or unexpected roadblocks?
13. Are there things we need to change? What are they?
14. Do we have a good system or plan for change? If not, what changes need to be made?
15. What are the next steps?

How are you doing?  Closing an intervention Guiding Questions

Your intervention will end in some way, whether you achieved your goals or not.  It’s important to think back on what happened.

These are some questions to ask about the intervention as a whole.

1. How did the intervention go as a whole?
2. How did the group work together?
3. Have our group goals been met? If not all, which ones?
4. Have people’s individual goals been met? If not all, which ones?
5. Has the intervention been guided by the our group values and bottom-lines? Which were particularly followed? Which were not?
6. Did the team work well together?
7. Was there enough/good support?
8. How was the communication?
9. How was the decision-making?
10. Is the group sustainable or able to keep together for long enough to reach its goals?
11. What changes have happened for the group or community? What is good? What is unchanged?  What is bad?
12. How is the level of trust?
13. How is the sense of community affected?
14. How was the safety of the community affected? More safe? Less safe?
15. Would we be able to do this again if needed?
16. Are we able to share these lessons with others?
17. Anything else?
18. What changes have happened for the person harmed? What is good? What is unchanged?  What is bad?
19. How is the level of trust for others?
20. How did this affect how safe they feel?
21. How did this affect their health (physical, emotional, spiritual, etc)?
22. Did this lead to a feeling of repair from the harm?
23. Did they feel supported—a sense of community?
24. Are we able to share these lessons with others?
25. Anything else?
26. What changes have happened for the person doing harm? What is good? What is unchanged?  What is bad?
27. How is the level of trust for others? How much trust is there from others for the person doing harm?
28. How did this affect how safe they feel? How are they affecting the safety of others now?
29. How did this affect their health (physical, emotional, spiritual, etc)? How did this affect the health of people affected by the harm?
30. How do they now understand the harm they caused and its effects on others and themselves?
31. How did this change their harmful attitudes?
32. How did this change their harmful behaviours?
33. Did they receive support for these changes—a sense of community?
34. Are we able to share these lessons with others?
35. Anything else?
36. What changes have happened for others ______________________? What is good? What is unchanged?  What is bad? (repeat these question for as many people or groups as needed)
37. How is the level of trust for others?
38. How did this affect how safe they feel?
39. How did this affect their health (physical, emotional, spiritual, etc)?
40. Did this lead to a sense of repair from the harm?
41. Did people feel supported—feel a sense of community?
42. Are we able to share these lessons with others?
43. Anything else?
44. Do we consider this intervention a success?
45. What was successful?
46. What wasn’t successful?
47. Is it overall a success?

Congratulations!  Can you share your story (successes and what didn’t work) with others?  Think about sharing your story with us [link to contacts].  We would love to hear how your intervention went if you are able to share it, and we’d love to have more local examples on this website.

1. Read the Basics section

Interpersonal violence is complicated.  Many of us don’t really understand it or what to do about it.  Read the Basics about violence section for a clearer picture of what is going on.  The Basics about violence intervention section shares lessons Creative Interventions have learned from responding to violence.

Share this information with others who may be in a situation of violence and need resources to help them work out what to do.

2. As you take more actions, the tools in this topic can be used as ‘cheat sheets’ for quick reference

Even if you have good goals and processes, each action can have specific concerns, especially about safety.  These tools can be used as a quick check to make sure that you know what to do, what not to do and your emergency plans, along with the tools from How do you stay safe.

3. After taking action, look back to see how you did, what you learned and how you can improve

Plans hardly ever go exactly as you thought.  Looking back can help learning for future actions.

4. Celebrate your achievements

Interventions are hard.  They can be painful, slow-moving and frustrating.  Many don’t get to the goals set at the beginning.

This doesn’t mean there is nothing to celebrate.  There is!

Coming together at all is reason to celebrate.  Making a list of goals can be a reason to celebrate.  Staying safe for a day or a week is cause for celebration.  Stopping violence for one more month is worth celebrating. 

For some people celebrating is natural.  For others, it is unfamiliar.  Even if you don’t feel comfortable with celebration, try celebrating a little.  Try praising someone for what they achieved.  Praise yourself.  Clap.  Sing a song.  Dance.  Or simply say, “good job.”

Celebrating achievements helps you notice them.  It makes the work lighter, as well as keeping you on track and moving forward.