The effects of an educational training workshop for community leaders on self-efficacy of program planning skills and partnerships.

Aim: This aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of a 6-month educational workshop for community leaders designed to improve their confidence in health promotion programmes and to develop partnerships among the participants.

Background: It is important for public health nurses to work with community leaders to provide community-orientated services. However, only a few existing studies have reported the content and effects of training programmes aimed at enhancing the capabilities of community leaders.

Methods: A participatory action research design with pre- and post-test methods was applied in this study. Fifteen community leaders completed a 6-month educational workshop that was held in Tamsui, Taipei and Taiwan. It was designed to enable community leaders to improve their confidence in planning health programmes and developing group partnerships. Data were collected from April 2009 to October 2009, and descriptive statistics and Wilcoxon signed-rank test analyses were carried out.

Results: Participants demonstrated improvements in their self-efficacies of planning health programmes by completing a structured questionnaire after attending a 6-month educational workshop (Z =-2·90, P = 0·004). Their confidence in data collection, needs assessment and diagnosis, programme planning, and programme evaluation were significantly improved (Z = -3·1, P = 0·002; Z = -2·42, P = 0·016, Z = -2·84, P = 0·004, and Z = -2·68, P = 0·007, respectively).

Conclusions: Providing training workshops for community leaders is a useful strategy for increasing their capabilities and confidence in planning health programmes. Nurses have a responsibility to advocate and provide training programmes for community leaders.