If you lead a team in human rights, migration, gender equality, GBV, or education, you are often much closer to trauma than most leaders in other sectors. You hear difficult stories, witness people’s fear and anger, and carry responsibility in fragile systems with too few resources. Many leaders feel that their team is „not okay” – but they are unsure what exactly is their role and where it should end.
Terms like „trauma‑informed” or „trauma‑aware leadership” are appearing more and more, but they can easily sound abstract or intimidating. What does it actually mean in an NGO or social‑impact context – and where is the line between being a trauma‑aware leader and trying to be a therapist for your team?
A quick look at MHPSS – the wider frame
Before we go into leadership, it helps to name one key concept: MHPSS – Mental Health and Psychosocial Support.
MHPSS is an umbrella term used in humanitarian and development work for any type of local or outside support that aims to protect or promote psychosocial wellbeing and/or prevent or treat mental health problems. It recognises that mental health is influenced not only by what is happening inside a person, but also by relationships, community, work conditions, and broader systems.
In an NGO context, MHPSS can mean many things:
- safe and supportive work environments
- access to supervision or counselling
- trauma‑aware project design
- ethical communication about violence and GBV
- and yes, sometimes clinical services – but not always.
Trauma‑aware leadership sits inside this wider MHPSS landscape. It is not therapy. It is about how leaders shape language, structures, and relationships so that people can do hard work without breaking.
What trauma‑aware leadership is NOT
Let’s start with some relief: what you don’t have to do.
Trauma‑aware leadership is not:
- diagnosing or treating your team’s mental health problems
- being available 24/7 as emotional first responder
- holding everyone’s pain alone
- turning every meeting into a therapy session
- avoiding difficult topics „so no one gets triggered”
Leaders are not therapists. Trying to be one – without training, boundaries, or mandate – is unfair to you and to your team. It can blur roles, create dependency, and leave you personally exhausted.
The question is not „How do I fix everyone’s trauma?” The question is: „How can I lead in ways that respect the impact of trauma and stress, and create safer conditions for people and work?”
What trauma‑aware leadership IS – in practice
Here are four dimensions I focus on when I work with leaders in NGOs and social‑impact organisations.
1. Language that normalises impact, not pathologises people
Trauma‑aware leadership starts with how we talk about what we see.
Instead of:
- „You’re too sensitive.”
- „You just need to be more resilient.”
- „In this work you have to be tough.”
A trauma‑aware leader might say:
- „The stories and situations we deal with are heavy. It makes sense that they affect us.”
- „Burnout and distress are not personal failures – they are often responses to ongoing exposure to crisis and injustice.”
This simple shift in language changes shame into legitimacy. It invites people to talk about the impact of the work without feeling defective.
2. Boundaries as part of care – not the opposite of it
In many NGOs, „commitment” has been quietly equated with self‑sacrifice. Leaders are often the first to override their own limits. Trauma‑aware leadership does the opposite: it treats boundaries as a core element of care.
That can look like:
- clear working hours and agreed „off” times
- no expectation of answering messages late at night or during holidays
- naming that „no” can be a responsible answer when capacity is full
- leaders modelling rest, not just pushing through
When leaders say „I can’t take on more right now” or „I need a break after this case”, they give others permission to do the same. Boundaries become part of safety, not selfishness.
3. Responding with Psychological First Aid (PFA), not therapy
Sometimes a team member is clearly not okay: they cry after a call, they withdraw, they become unusually irritable, or they share that something in the work has triggered old wounds.
In those moments, many leaders freeze because they don’t want to say the wrong thing. Trauma‑aware leadership doesn’t mean „be a therapist”; it means offering something closer to Psychological First Aid (PFA) – simple, humane responses used globally in crises.
Basic PFA‑informed leadership responses include:
- Notice: „I see that this was really intense for you.”
- Listen: allowing the person to speak, without rushing to fix or minimise.
- Protect: making sure they are not left alone immediately after a very difficult situation.
- Support: asking what they need in the short term (time, space, company) and what kind of follow‑up might help.
- Refer: knowing when it goes beyond your role and helping connect them to supervision, counselling, or therapy.
The key is role clarity: you can be a caring, trauma‑aware leader and still not be your team’s therapist. You are one link in a support chain, not the whole system.
4. Small, protective structures in everyday work
Trauma‑aware leadership is also practical. It shows up in the structures and rituals you put in place.
Examples:
- Regular check‑ins and checkouts that include not only tasks, but also capacity („What do you have space for this week?”).
- Agreements about how to work with difficult stories: who reads case files, how long, how often, and with what debriefing.
- Clear crisis protocols: who is called, who takes over, what is the maximum any one person should hold at once.
- Time built into schedules for reflection, not just delivery – especially after intense events or peaks in work.
You don’t need a perfect system. Even small, consistent structures can significantly reduce the risk that people silently accumulate more than they can handle.
How this connects to Within–With–World
In my 3W framework, trauma‑aware leadership touches all three levels:
- Within: your own awareness, regulation, and self‑leadership – knowing your patterns (e.g. „rescuer”, „always available”), your triggers, and your limits.
- With: how you shape communication, boundaries, and support in your team – the culture you co‑create.
- World: how your organisation designs programmes, communicates about violence and injustice, and integrates MHPSS into its work with communities.
You don’t have to transform all three at once. Often, trauma‑aware leadership begins with small shifts at the Within level that slowly ripple outwards.
How I support leaders in this work
In my practice at corelab, I offer trauma‑aware leadership coaching for people who hold responsibility in NGOs, education, and other social‑impact contexts. This work is:
- MHPSS‑informed: grounded in psychosocial and PFA principles.
- Feminist and intercultural: attentive to power, gender, and migration dynamics in how distress and responsibility are distributed.
- Rooted in lived NGO experience: I know the realities of project cycles, funding pressures, and emotional labour from the inside, not just from theory.
In sessions, we might explore:
- your relationship to boundaries and responsibility
- how to talk about stress and impact with your team
- concrete next steps to bring more trauma‑awareness into meetings, structures, and everyday leadership
- how to stay connected to yourself and your values in the midst of crisis
The aim is not to make you „perfectly trauma‑informed”, but to help you lead in a way that feels more grounded, ethical, and sustainable – for you and for the people you work with.
If you recognise yourself in this description and would like to explore what trauma‑aware leadership could look like in your context, you are welcome to reach out.
