Thanks to a generous $20,000 grant from the Tindall Foundation, over 125 people have successfully attended our intercultural awareness and communication training workshops, over the past two years.

Multicultural New Zealand (MNZ) delivered the eight training sessions, developed by the Victoria University Centre for Applied Cross-Cultural Research, specifically for NGOs and community organisations. An additional $9,000 was invested in the training from an operational grant MNZ received from the Lottery Grants Fund.

The day-long courses, run between October 2017 and May 2019, were held in Wiri (Auckland), Henderson (Auckland), Mt Wellington (Auckland), Napier, Invercargill and Wellington. Both Henderson and Wellington hosted two courses.

Overall the courses were very well evaluated, with a majority of participants marking them 4.2 out of 5 for overall satisfaction.

General comments summing up the overall evaluations from the courses were:

• Not what I expected – it was much better
• Enjoyed the material, perspectives and references shared. Has been a great way to look at my own effectiveness with people of other cultures and see how I can better my own understanding, non-verbal communication and practice.
• Excellently presented by highly-skilled presenters – knowledge and interactive skill. Pleasant, informative – special.
• I love the approach to get participants to recognise and better understand their own culture as a starting point to understand other cultures. There was a lot of opportunity for self-reflection.

MNZ is keen to roll out more of this training and will partner with Volunteer Wellington to run the next course in September.