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This research explored the current demand-supply disjuncture for appropriately qualified and experienced staff for community services and addressed the question- how can a local service sector respond locally to this emerging issue? In 2006 the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare undertook a review of the available literature on the community services workforce and identified shortages of qualified staff and skills deficits among current staff as common themes (Vaughn 2006). The Australian Community Sector Survey (Queensland)(2006) also found that (58%) of respondents indicated that they experienced difficulties in attracting appropriately qualified staff in the previous year. While workforce development has emerged as an area of research interest within organisation studies there is little focus on third sector organization workforces which is a critical component of community services workforce development. Nonprofit organizations are major providers of government funded community services alongside some government provision in mainly statutory areas.

This book explores Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perceptions of their helping styles with their own people and the type of help they provide in the social welfare context. Through semi-structured depth interviews, the use of video as stimulus material and collaborative analysis with Aboriginal and Torres Islander participants, the book identifies the helping process within their own cultural communities and in particular the cultural aspects of their helping approach. In the course of this project active collaboration has occurred between indigenous and non-indigenous people in methodological and ethical processes that reflected as much as possible a political position of indigenous control of the project in relation to problem definition, choice of research methods, data analysis and use of findings. The intent of 'Murri Way' was to provide a 'springboard' for the development of Indigenous Best Practice Models. Readers attention is drawn to the recognition of the contribution of participant's wisdom and knowledge, page iv-vi; the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Terms of Reference, p.95; and details of the inception and aspiration of the project in Chapter 2.