Need help with workplace vaccination mandates?

Kia ora  from Jess,

Most days now a request pops into my in-box from a concerned principal, employer or board of trustee member about how to talk with their staff about vaccinations. These emails always come from a place of care and concern for everyone involved. 

People have asked, "I have a staff member who I am so concerned about losing her job, how can I talk her through this?" and "I'm on a school board, how can we make sure that teachers and staff have the best information to answer all their concerns?" 

How we can help you

At The Workshop we have developed various tools to help you and your place of work. Especially relevant now are:

1. Our guide to encouraging vaccination in the workplace

2. Our guide to talking with whānau and friends (and colleagues) about vaccinations. 

3. We have also made the flow chart available as a stand alone image and quick reference guide to share (see below).

It is hard mahi. To continue to hold care for all the different people you have responsibility for: those who need others to be vaccinated, those who are not vaccinated. 

This pandemic is challenging us all in so many unexpected ways. We hope that we can offer some support in this important work.

And remember to be kind to yourself.

Flowchart: Three vaccination conversation pathways: tautoko, kōrerorero and awhi


For more guidance on narratives around topics such as transport, climate change,  justice reform,  and more, visit our website - we have freely available message guides.

If this email was forwarded to you, you can get future emails like this by signing up here. 

Get in touch with operations@theworkshop.org.nz if you would like to talk to us about how we can help you with specific advice or do training for your team.

The team at The Workshop - Marianne, Jess, Sharon, Gidion, Jordan, Carolyn, Ellen and Nicky

It's here: a flowchart to navigate tricky vaccination conversations

Kia ora from Jess and Jordan

Between us we have had some tricky personal conversations about vaccination lately with people we care about. As we have experienced, hard conversations need preparation, and some scripts even. There are a lot of thoughts and ideas out there about how to talk to friends and whānau (too many perhaps!). As the two of us have been deep in this vaccination research for some time, we thought we could help with some practical tips. 

So we have put together a new guide to support your conversations with friends and whānau about COVID-19 vaccination.

In the new guide you will find:

• key principles

• a handy flow chart with three pathways to follow depending on where people sit on the vaccination continuum 

  • pathway 1. tautoko (already vaccinated) 

  • pathway 2. kōrerorero (not there yet)

  • pathway 3. awhi (the firmly opposed).

• some tips and scripts to try when tricky questions come up

• we also have some ideas on how to manage conversations about meeting up with people who are not vaccinated.

All of it is based on research.

We all want for our whānau and friends to be well. Connecting and hearing their concerns is a fundamental part of supporting the people we love over the vaccination line, particularly as these conversations become increasingly difficult to navigate. We hope this guide helps

Jess and Jordan and all the team at The Workshop

More of our resources on COVID-19 vaccination communication

P.S. We will be having a live Q&A session on the contents of the guide soon, we will send an email with the details.

Covid-19 Vaccination Guide Resources

To accompany the release of our guide “How to Talk about COVID-19 Vaccinations”, these resources have been created for you to use and share. Simply click on the images below to download. This work is in collaboration with The Workshop, Dr Amanda Kvalsvig and Daylight Creative. See our publications here