This is an important factor to consider when developing physical skills training programmes. Coaching research illustrates a number of issues that should be taken into consideration when designing and developing physical skills programmes. One human factor that must be taken into consideration is the natural ability of staff and the other is the natural ability of those persons who may attack staff or who staff will be expected to restrain. For example, social care staff, who may have joined the organisation from a caring perspective, may not have the physical ability (or indeed the personal motivation) to undertake complex physical skills training, or indeed apply what they have learnt in situations of heightened pressure and distress. Therefore, the training needs analysis needs to reflect that in the type of skills that staff can achieve and which should be taught to achieve the desired outcome.

The training needs analysis however, is not done in isolation but in line with a risk assessment as training may not in itself be the best practical way of achieving the same control factor with less risk.

Our special competency is in physical skill training for which we (Mark and John Steadman) hold the award of Diploma of Senior Tutor Trainer confirming their status as National Coach Tutors, including the Diploma of Senior Tutor Trainer, for the delivery of all Occupational Intervention and Disengagement Skills Training and Train the Trainer Development Programmes.

This provides us with the specific skills and competency to develop, review, monitor, audit and correct and change physical skill techniques as part of a structured risk assessment process and provide documentation to support our findings.

The benefits to clients is that we can devise and modify physical skills to best suit the individual whilst taking into consideration all of the local compound factors such as environment, natural ability (or lack of), and third parties.

By providing active monitoring back into the organisations risk management system the facility is there to formally identify and address highlighted areas of risk and apply practical corrective measures that actually work as opposed to being reactive and responding to incidents that have or are happening and then applying control methods that are operationally impracticable.