Community Health Volunteer's Training Manual - Population Council

Module 1 The CHPS Concept
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What does this statement mean? It means a team is made up of individual people who have
come together to form a group. They must work together to promote the development of
their community. Whoever they choose to lead them must also work with all of them to
develop the capacity of the team. The leaders must guide them to fulfil what they are set out
to do.
For example – your VHC wants every community member to boil their water so they do
not get infected with Guinea Worm and therefore get Bilharzia. What does each person in
the VHC have to do? What will the leader(s) do to achieve this? As the various committee
members learn and pass on the information to the community, they develop the knowledge
and skills of the team.
Team Characteristics
Some children look so much like their parents. As soon as you see them you know that this
is ‘so, so and so’ child. So also, all teams have certain things that make them look like a team.
They are called team characteristics.
The characteristics of most teams are:
1. Team development
2. Team’s work
3. Individual people or personalities
4. Communication and working together
5. Individual roles
Let’s explain each one:
Team development and team building
Team members have to be developed as a group. The individuals in the group work to build
the team so that they can work together. Through this process talents are discovered and
leaders emerge. Examples are workshops, training programmes, learning to organise events
together like durbars.
The Team’s work
Our teams must know their work or objectives for which they were set up. It helps them to set
the goals and objectives and work towards it. What work is the VHC and CHV set up to do?
Individual personalities
Each team is made up of independent people with their own personalities. Each of us is quite
different. Together individuals give the team a character of its own. What is the personality
of your team?