A two-day training "How to Communicate During War" for representatives of communities of the Kherson region was held on July 23-24, 2025, in the city of Uman. The event brought together participants of the Working Group on Public Safety and Recovery (WGPSR), representatives of military administrations, village and settlement councils, veteran spaces, and Administrative Services Centers of the Stanislav, Bilozerka, Chornobayivka, Kochubeyivka, Vysokopillia, and Novovorontsovka communities.
The training program aimed to develop practical communication skills, understanding of changes in society during the war, resolving conflicts, resisting manipulation and psychological pressure, and worrying about one's own resource status. For two days, participants and experienced trainers Zoia Zinovieva and Liudmyla Melnyk developed practical communication skills, learned to resolve conflicts, counteract manipulation, manage their emotional state, and cope with societal changes during the war.
Feedback from the participants made it clear that the knowledge gained would help in:
- Improving daily communication in the community.
- Preventing and resolving conflicts.
- Counteracting manipulation and psychological pressure.
- Emotional management and taking care of one’s own resource status.
- Implementing systemic communication.
- Supporting veterans, IDPs, and other vulnerable groups.
- Increasing the level of trust and involvement of residents.
Here are some thoughts from the training participants:
• “The training helped me pay attention to situations whereand respond to manipulation or conflicts I acted incorrectly or did not know what to do. Now I understand better how to prevent manipulation or conflicts and respond to them correctly.”
• “I will adopt your life hack — after the training, print out key phrases and hang them near the workplace. Then they are always in front of my eyes and are better remembered. This knowledge is useful at work and even in family life — it helps resolve various situations. I am sincerely grateful.”
• “To be honest, I was surprised — it turned out that such simple phrases as 'calm down' or 'don’t worry' are ineffective. I understood my mistakes and realized what to work on. I want to change approaches and apply the right methods so that our visitors remain satisfied and come back again. Thank you for having the courage to open this up.”
This training is not the first in our work. We have previously conducted online workshops on communication during wartime with Zoia Zinovieva and the Yak ty, brate? Foundation. But for the first time, we held such an event offline and saw that the need for such training events among communities remains exceptionally high. We plan to continue conducting similar training because communication skills, support, and dialogue help communities unite, persevere, and develop in difficult times.
The training took place within the framework of the initiative "Kherson region: public safety and recovery in conditions of change", implemented by the Union Foundation with the assistance of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP Ukraine) in Ukraine, with the financial support of the Government of Denmark.
