Cultural competency has been defined as “a set of congruent behaviours, attitudes and policies that come together in a system, agency, or among professionals that enable effective interactions in cross-cultural situations” (Cross, Bazron, Dennis & Isaacs, 1989).

The Organisational Cultural Competency tool (see link on right) has been made available on the AOD Collaborative’s website so that services can use it to measure their cultural competency and re-measure after making changes.  The tool was initially developed by the AOD Provider Collaborativ in 2014-15. It is available in both print and online versions. We have also developed Guidelines for the use of the tool that also explain how to access teh online version of the tool.

During 2015-16 an organisational psychologist supported five member organisations to implement the tool, analyse the data, and develop plans to enhance each organisation's cultural competency.  

The resulting report Strategies for developing organisational cultural competency includes findings and recommendations based on the experiences of the five pilot organisations (see link to this report on the right of this page).