Trauma-Informed Leadership and Workplace Culture Insights

One way to embrace paradox is by adopting a "Yes, and" approach—an intentional shift that fosters complexity, understanding, and innovation.

A clear trauma-informed guide to fight, flight, freeze, and fawn—workplace signs, what helps, what makes it worse, and how leaders can respond skillfully.

May is foster care awareness month, and this year, I'd like to increase awareness about the foster care system and how it ties into other social issues we hope to heal from. Foster Care Awareness Month is traditionally a time dedicated to highlighting the needs and challenges within the foster care system. This year at Chefalo Consulting, we're going to do something a little different. My goal is to broaden the conversation. In this article, we'll explore how the foster care

Understanding attachment theory helps us make the important first step of the trauma-informed paradigm shift. Once we make the shift, we can set our sights on healing in our relationships. Whether you’re here because you have an insecure attachment style or you want to know how you can support someone with an insecure attachment style, you’ve come to the right place. These practical tips for building secure relationships can help you and those you care about—whether they’re y

Attachment styles can help us understand how our trauma impacts our relationships—and what we can do about it. I work with many...

Whether you’re considering your romantic, platonic, or professional relationships, knowing these 7 characteristics of a healthy...

Use these 9 ready-to-say phrases to build trust and psychological safety at work—plus when to use each one and what to avoid so it lands well.

Of all the trauma-informed phrases I use, “yes, AND” might be the most common. “Yes, AND” represents a way of thinking that is essential...

This blog discusses self-harm and suicide, which can be sensitive topics to many readers. Please establish your safety before reading, including your mental, psychological, emotional, and safety. Self-harm is a topic that's often discussed in hushed tones, if at all. When we talk about this common warning sign for crisis (which often goes hand in hand with passive or active suicidal ideation), many people’s minds immediately jump to the more extreme forms of self-destructive

Safety is a crucial topic for trauma-informed systems, and understanding how your community defines safety is no small task. If I asked...

No matter what model you use, SAMHSA or Sanctuary, safety is a core value of trauma-informed care. Safety is arguably one of the most important pillars (if not THE most important pillar) of shifting towards a trauma informed approach. Here’s why. This isn’t the first time we’ve talked about the importance of safety at work , and it won’t be the last! Trauma-informed change is centered on the concept of trauma healing, and safety is crucial to healing. Actually, that might be

Creating lasting change is no small task. Still, it’s frustrating when most organizations fail to create the sort of lasting change that is the hallmark of effective social justice and DEI work—and the reason why is complex. If we were to boil it down to the simplest answer possible, it would be that organizations hyper-fixate on the technical while leaving the cultural unaddressed. What does that mean, exactly? Let’s use a relevant example to unravel this phenomenon. One of