Schedule Your 2026 Training Now: Building Safer Teams Through Early Planning

January has a particular feel to it. The pace begins to steady after winter pressures, teams regroup, and there is often a quiet moment of reflection about what the last year revealed. For many organisations, that reflection includes difficult conversations about safety, staff confidence, and how well teams were supported when situations escalated.

Across healthcare, education, care, and public-facing services, one pattern consistently emerges. The organisations that manage challenging behaviour most effectively are rarely reacting in the moment. They are the ones that planned ahead.

Scheduling training for 2026 may feel early, but in practice it is one of the most effective ways to protect staff, reduce disruption, and build confidence long before problems arise.

Too often, training is triggered by an incident or an urgent compliance requirement. When that happens, teams are already under strain, diaries are difficult to coordinate, and learning becomes something to get through rather than something to absorb. Early planning changes that dynamic. It allows training to fit around real operational pressures, gives teams time to reflect and practise, and supports consistency across departments and sites.

Nick Attard, General Manager at BR Specialists, reflects on this difference:

“When organisations plan training early, you can feel it in the room. People are more open, more engaged, and more honest about what they find difficult. That space simply doesn’t exist when training is rushed in response to an incident. Planning ahead gives people the chance to really learn, not just comply.”

The impact of early planning is particularly clear in higher-risk environments. In healthcare settings, staff are regularly exposed to distress, frustration, and unpredictable behaviour, often while balancing clinical responsibility and time pressure. In education for the healthcare industry, students and trainees can find themselves facing challenging behaviour early in their placements, sometimes without the confidence or experience to respond safely. In care environments, behaviour is frequently a form of communication linked to unmet needs, dementia, learning disabilities, or mental health, requiring calm, consistent responses rather than reactive ones. Public-facing industries face a different but growing challenge, with frontline staff increasingly expected to manage confrontation while maintaining professionalism and personal safety.

In each of these settings, the difference between reactive and planned training is stark.

Reactive approach	Planned approach
Training follows an incident	Training happens before problems escalate
Limited staff availability	Sessions scheduled around operational needs
Focus on immediate compliance	Focus on confidence and consistency
High stress, low reflection	Calm learning environment with space to practise

PMVA training is often misunderstood as being primarily about physical intervention. In reality, its greatest value lies much earlier. Effective PMVA training builds awareness of behaviour, early indicators of escalation, and practical de-escalation strategies, all grounded in lawful and proportionate decision-making. Physical skills sit within that framework, not at the centre of it.

When teams share a common understanding and language around behaviour, responses become calmer and more predictable. This not only reduces risk, but also supports staff wellbeing and confidence.

Train the Trainer programmes extend that impact even further. Alongside specialist safeguarding capability, Train the Trainer is a major focus for 2026. We are delivering programmes with two northern universities, supporting staff who will go on to deliver their own training to nurses, physiotherapists, and wider healthcare cohorts entering real-world practice.

This matters because healthcare education has a unique challenge. You are not only supporting staff in the room, you are shaping the confidence and competence of the workforce that will step into pressured environments for years to come.

By developing internal trainers, organisations reduce reliance on external delivery, maintain consistency despite staff turnover, and embed learning into everyday practice rather than isolated sessions.

Jake Attard, Trainer at BR Specialists, describes what he sees when this works well:

“The biggest shift isn’t technical, it’s personal. People stop second-guessing themselves and start trusting their judgement. When someone understands behaviour and feels confident in their response, situations often de-escalate before they reach a critical point.”

Workplace violence and aggression continues to feature in national conversation, and many of us have seen recent coverage highlighting the pressure frontline teams face. The important point is not that this is “in the news again”. It is that the underlying challenge has not gone away.

While much of our 2026 planning is rooted in healthcare and care environments, it is worth stating clearly that BR Specialists’ experience in managing violence and aggression is not limited to one setting. Historically, we have worked with train service providers, ferry operators, and retail chains, supporting public-facing teams who need practical de-escalation skills, confident decision-making, and a framework that protects staff wellbeing as well as public safety.

The goal is always the same, regardless of sector. Reduce escalation, increase confidence, and help staff respond in a way that is safe, lawful, and proportionate.

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Looking ahead to 2026, early training planning is not about filling calendars for the sake of it. It is about giving organisations the time and flexibility to design training that reflects their environment, their risks, and the people they support. It allows learning to be paced, relevant, and genuinely absorbed, rather than delivered under pressure.

At BR Specialists, we work across healthcare, education, care, and public-facing sectors to deliver training shaped by real-world experience and practical understanding. If you are reviewing your training needs for 2026, now is the right time to start that conversation.

Planning early does not just protect diaries. It protects people.