Lay Counselling : A Trainer's Manual

Social and humanitarian organisations provide support to people affected by crisis events all across the globe every day. They respond to human suffering in many different ways, assisting people affected by disasters or other critical events, people suffering from loss or serious illnesses, and people living in isolation or being stigmatised.

Lay counselling - psychosocial support provided by staff or volunteers who do not have a mental health background or formal degree in counselling

- is often used to assist people in need. Although lay counselling should never replace professional counselling, thousands of lay counsellors provide an important service to vulnerable people and to their organisations - and sometimes in areas and situations where no professional counselling is available. Therefore, it is important that lay counsellors are well prepared, well trained and effective.

The skills required of lay counsellors will differ depending on the setting in which they are working. For example, counselling on a phone line for people at risk of suicide will be different from helping in the immediate aftermath of a disaster, which will again differ from counselling people living with serious illnesses, such as cancer or HIV.

Trainers are encouraged to adapt or add modules to make the training specific to an organisation’s needs and the knowledge and skills required of lay counsellors in a particular context. Additional material accompanying this guide includes a set of PowerPoint slides and additional training activities.

These materials are available online at Lay Counselling: A Trainer´s Manual - MHPSS Hub

Lay Counselling: A Trainer’s Manual has

been developed by the Danish Cancer Society, the War Trauma Foundation in the Netherlands, the University of Innsbruck, Austria and the Reference Centre for Psychosocial Support of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, based in Copenhagen.

It is based on our own, evidence-informed practice over many decades in lay counselling and psychosocial work, and has been researched and field-tested before publication. We hope it will extend knowledge about best practice in lay counselling and will be useful to you and your organisation.

However, the organisations behind this manual believe that certain skills are generic and apply to all lay counsellors, whatever support they provide. Lay Counselling: A Trainer’s Manual sets out a two-day generic training workshop, with material applicable to all counselling contexts.