A. Organisational culture statement — draft to approveTitle: How we work
Subtitle: What it means to work with CWM, join a workshop, or build a project with us
Status line: Living document, v0.1 — September 2026. We will update this as the practice is written down, not only as the copy improves.Opening
Culture is not a poster in the room. It is what people can count on when the work gets difficult: how decisions are made, how disagreement is handled, how young people are treated as authors of the work rather than decoration, and what happens after something goes wrong.This statement is for trainers, participants, partners, and anyone considering working with us. It describes the principles we hold ourselves to. Some of the internal mechanisms behind them are still being built. Where a practice is not yet in place, we say so.Who this is for

• People who join a workshop or training
• Trainers and artists who deliver with us
• Partners in Erasmus+, youth work, education, and human rights
• Organisations commissioning corporate or institutional work

Principles

1. Human rights are the frame, not a theme.
2. Inclusion, diversity, and participation are not a separate product line. They are how human rights education looks in a room: who can enter, who can speak, who can change the plan, and who is protected when harm happens.
3. Participation means the power to shape the work.
4. Being present is not the same as participating. Consultation after the agenda is fixed is not co-design. In our rooms we ask, as a matter of method: who defined the problem, who designed the activity, who can change the plan, whose knowledge counts, and what happens after people speak.
5. The body is part of the thinking.
6. Theatre, storytelling, and non-formal education are how we study power, not an icebreaker before the “real” session. People may work seated, standing, in silence, or in more than one language. Nobody is required to perform confidence.
7. Consent is practical.
8. People can pass, watch, sit out an exercise, or stop a retelling. Disclosure of private identity or trauma is never the price of belonging. “Safe space” is not a promise we can keep. We can build clearer choices, care, accountability, and repair.
9. Quality is visible in the design, not in the adjective.
10. We would rather name the method, the time, the group size, the debrief, and the risk than call the work excellent. If we cannot say how a session was designed, we are not ready to publish it as “our method.”
11. We record what did not work.
12. A workshop that went quietly wrong belongs in the learning log as much as a workshop that photographed well. If only successes are written down, the organisation starts performing itself.
13. Delivery and experiment are both protected.
14. Proven methods (Theatre of the Oppressed, Playback, Biographical Theatre, improvisation, embodied storytelling) are the core we can stand behind. New formats are tried in the open, marked as pilots, and only named as “CWM method” after review.

What participants can expect

• The purpose of the session, said plainly at the start
• A way to take part that does not depend on being the loudest person
• No requirement to share private history
• A debrief that treats meaning as something the group makes, not something the facilitator announces
• A named person to speak to if something felt harmful or unclear

What it means to work with us as a trainer or artist

• You are inducted into the human rights framing and the Quality Framework before you lead a CWM session
• Session designs are peer-reviewed, not only founder-approved in a hurry
• You have language for two modes: delivery (proven method, reliable standard) and lab (pilot, logged, not yet in the Framework)
• You can put your name on public method notes you actually authored
• Disagreement is expected. It is brought into the review, not around it

What partners can expect

• Named methods, named limits, named evidence
• Young people and communities credited as co-authors where they shaped the work
• No claim of a youth lobbying operation we do not yet run
• Advocacy described as what it is now: participant insight into policy notes, co-authorship where it exists, and a youth advisory mechanism we are building

DEI, said as practice
We do not sell “diversity training” as a feeling in the room. Diversity asks who arrived. Inclusion asks who can shape what happens. Accessibility is designed before people arrive: language, movement, sensory load, timing, money, and the right not to speak. Corporate work uses the same human rights frame as youth work. It is not a softer product with different values.What we will not do

• Use participants as proof in photographs or reports without consent
• Quote youth voice and leave the decision unchanged
• Call a pilot a finished method
• Promise transformation, healing, or safety we cannot guarantee

How this document will grow
v0.1 is principles plus public commitments. Next versions add: induction checklist, debrief template, harm-and-repair route, trainer pathway (associate → CWM trainer → mentor), and the monthly lab review. Those belong here once they exist on paper, not before.