Work Life by Design: Recent Episodes
Melissa Marsden
Work Life by Design will inspire you with stories of transformation, explore everything from organisational psychology to brand and identify opportunities that exist in your workplace environment to inspire human potential.
As a passionate entrepreneur with a desire to create places where both people and business thrive my desire is to inspire you to find your place at work and in life.
Whether you are an entrepreneur, an executive leader or passionate about people and their experience of work, this podcast will give you a dose of inspiration on how you can shake up your 9 to 5.
When was the last time you really listened to your body?
So often, we’ve been conditioned to push through — to ignore the subtle whispers of discomfort, fatigue, or restlessness. We convince ourselves we’ll slow down after the next deadline, once the project’s done, or when things feel less busy.
But our bodies are wise. And when we ignore the whispers for too long, they eventually start to shout.
That was my reality for a long time. I thought I was doing all the “right” things — balancing work, life, and everything in between — until my body started telling me otherwise. It wasn’t until my body forced me to listen that I realised just how disconnected I’d become from myself.
Amongst all this, Keri Krieger, a beautiful soul and gifted Acupuncturist and Chinese Medicine Practitioner, began weaving her way through my life. Keri teaches us to tune back in — to understand the signals our bodies are sending , and to see that they aren't breaking down, they are simply trying to communicate.
In this week’s podcast episode, I sit down with Keri for a heartfelt conversation about how we can learn to reconnect with our bodies, honour their innate wisdom, and navigate life’s transitions with more grace and ease.
Keri shares her philosophy around health and wellbeing through the lens of Chinese Medicine — offering such a refreshing and grounded approach to what it means to truly be well. She brings calm, compassion, and deep insight into how we can create balance not just in our bodies, but in our lives.
And I’m beyond thrilled that Keri will also be joining us at Exhale the Retreat in just over three weeks, 23rd-26th October. During the retreat, she’ll be guiding us through deep conversations and beautiful experiences that help us tune into our own inner knowing, reconnect with our energy, and move through transitions with clarity and confidence.
In our chat, we also explore the belief that taking time for ourselves is indulgent — a luxury reserved for “when we have time.” But as Keri so gently reminds us, it’s in these moments of rest and reflection that we fill our own cup. Because if we don’t, our capacity to show up for others becomes depleted, and resentment can quietly creep in.
If you’ve been feeling stretched thin, stuck in survival mode, or simply craving more connection with yourself — this episode is your invitation to pause. To breathe. To listen.
In this conversation, we explore: ✨ The importance of tuning into your body’s innate wisdom ✨ What Chinese Medicine can teach us about balance and self-awareness ✨ How to move through change and transition with grace ✨ Why rest and reflection are not indulgent, but essential ✨ What to expect from Keri’s sessions at Exhale the Retreat
It’s time to listen — because your body has been speaking all along.
✨ Learn more and secure your place to Exhale HERE. I can't wait to see you there!
So often we’re chasing goals, ticking off to-do lists, and striving for that next milestone without stopping to ask—are these dreams really mine?
The truth is, without a deep connection to our bodies and our hearts, it’s hard to know if the life we’re building is truly aligned with who we are, our own authenticity.
In my latest podcast episode, I sit down with Courtney Tyssen, one half of @heart.resonance, who will be joining us at Exhale The Retreat this October to guide a personalised sound healing journey.
Courtney shares how sound isn’t just music—it’s a medicine for the mind, body, and soul. By quietening the mental chatter and soothing the nervous system, sound creates the spaciousness we need to reconnect with ourselves.
It’s in this rest-and-digest state that real healing, clarity, and alignment can begin.
In our conversation, Courtney also shares: ✨ how the various instruments invoke different responses within the body and connect us to the elements ✨ the journey that we’ll be guided on at Exhale and how it will be personalised to the women in the room ✨ how the deep healing that comes from the vibration of sound moving through our bodies, impacts our nervous systems and unlocks hidden capacity ✨ the clarity that comes enabling you to connect to your own authenticity and for you to live the life, and create the business, you dream of
This isn’t just theory — it’s a glimpse into the powerful experience awaiting the women who’ll be joining us at Exhale.
Imagine lying back, allowing the vibration of sound to move through your body, feeling tension melt away as your nervous system drops into deep rest. The result?A calm mind, a grounded body, and a renewed sense of connection with yourself. (Not to mention, the most incredible sleep afterwards 🥰).
Exhale is more than a retreat—it’s an invitation to step away from the noise of everyday life and rediscover what’s truly yours. Through movement, reflection, connection, and experiences like sound healing, you’ll leave feeling lighter, clearer, and more aligned with the life you’re here to create.
I cannot wait to share this with the beautiful women who’ll be joining us.
✨ Learn more and secure your place to Exhale HERE. I can't wait to see you there!
Creating a retreat doesn’t happen without the incredible support of so many people behind the scenes. One of those people is the talented Shae Giles.
If you’ve followed me for a while, you’ve no doubt seen Shae’s stunning photography scattered across my socials. She’s not only been my creative eye behind the lens for years, but also a loyal cheerleader and friend.
But there’s another side to Shae’s story. Like so many women, she’s walked the heavy path of burnout — a reality that too often goes unseen until it’s too late. The emotional toll of pushing through, of constantly showing up without pause, is something she knows all too well.
That’s why Shae will be joining us at Exhale the Retreat — both as a guest experiencing the healing journey for herself, and as a sponsor capturing the powerful moments we’ll create together.
In this episode we talk about burnout, healing, and the transformation that retreats like Exhale can unlock.
We explore:
- the often hidden emotional toll of burnout and why so many women are unknowingly on a path to it
- what you can expect from your retreat experience
- the impact that the holistic healing practices you’ll experience will have on you, your life and your business
This is more than just a chat — it’s a reminder that the way we’ve been taught to live, work, and push through isn’t sustainable.
Retreats like Exhale are designed to give you tools, practices, and awareness that we wish we had known earlier. Tools that can quite literally change the trajectory of your life and business.
I can't wait to see you there! Save you spot at Exhale the Retreat.
Have you ever had that gut feeling about a decision in your business… but second-guessed yourself, over-analysed it, or went searching for someone else’s advice?
I know I have. For me, the turning point wasn’t about strategy or experience—it was about reconnecting with myself and learning to trust my own intuition.
In this episode, I’m joined by Filly Bellette—functional medicine practitioner, trauma therapist, and co-creator of the Ending Body Burnout Method. Filly was a huge part of my own healing journey, helping me uncover what was truly keeping me stuck: nervous system dysregulation, unhelpful belief systems, and the constant pressure to do more, be more, hold more.
We dive deep into: ✨ What body burnout really looks like (and why it’s more than just feeling tired) ✨ How your wellbeing directly impacts your ability to lead a business that fuels you ✨ The paradox of holding more without doing more through nervous system regulation ✨ The transformative experiences you can expect at the Exhale Retreat ✨ Why retreats are powerful for reconnecting and resetting—without guilt
I’m deeply grateful to Filly—not just for her role in my personal journey, but also for joining me at Exhale. It’s an honour to share this space with her, and I can’t wait for you to experience the retreat too.
Exhale isn’t a holiday—it’s a strategic reset for your business and life. A chance to exhale, realign, and step back into your business with clarity, energy, and conviction.
Burnout can creep up on even the most high-performing women — sometimes we don’t even realise we’re on the edge until our bodies start screaming at us.
In this episode, I’m joined by the incredible Heidi Lampard — Yoga Practitioner, Holistic Wellness Mentor, Tea Ceremony Facilitator, Retreat Leader, and mother of two. Heidi will also be joining us as a facilitator at the upcoming Exhale Retreat in October, sharing her wisdom, practices, and tools with attendees.
We dive deep into the challenges of burnout, particularly for high-performing female leaders and entrepreneurs who are conditioned to “push through” — often at the cost of their health, energy, and creativity. I share my own journey through burnout and adrenal fatigue, and Heidi opens up about her personal experience with anxiety, panic attacks, and adrenal fatigue while balancing corporate work, family life, and daily responsibilities.
She shares how discovering yoga, meditation, breathwork, and holistic wellness practices helped her heal, regulate her nervous system, and create a sustainable, balanced life — both professionally and personally.
In this episode, we explore:
- How to expand your capacity and resilience through simple, daily practices
- The importance of slowing down and creating space to hear your inner wisdom
- How mindful practices ripple into your relationships, decision-making, and overall well-being
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Practical tools you can start using immediately:
- Short, adaptable pranayama (breathwork) exercises to reset your nervous system
- Techniques to expand resilience and capacity, helping you manage life’s demands without spiralling
- Ways to cultivate presence, clarity, and calm in your work, relationships, and home
- How consistent mindfulness practices can create a ripple effect of calm with your loved ones
We also give an inside look at what attendees can expect from Heidi’s sessions at the Exhale Retreat:
- Daily morning yoga and meditation practices
- Pranayama (breathwork) sessions
- Sound journeys and yoga asana
This episode is a heartfelt reminder that retreats are not a luxury — they’re a necessity for high-performing women to reconnect with themselves, restore balance, and gain clarity in their lives and careers. Slowing down, pausing, and incorporating mindful practices can empower you to thrive without burning out.
For more information and to secure your spot, visit Exhale | The Retreat.
This is one weekend you don't want to miss!
This retreat has been born out of my own experience and journey from body burnout to thriving.
For years, I thought the only way I could find the peace I craved was to burn it all down, close my business, walk away from everything, and start fresh.
I know I’m not alone in this. So many ambitious women I work with are exhausted from constantly being on. Leading a business, showing up for clients, being there for family... and silently wondering: is this just what success is meant to feel like?
What I’ve learned... you don’t have to choose between leading a thriving business and having the space, stillness, and energy you crave.
That’s why I created Exhale.
A 3 day retreat for women who are ready to step out of survival mode, reconnect with themselves, and reignite the creativity and clarity that fuels not just their life, but their business too.
In this episode, I’m sharing: 💫 The story of how Exhale was born (and the moment I realised I couldn’t keep living in fight-or-flight). 💫 Why rest and nervous system regulation aren’t just nice-to-haves, but the secret weapon for sustainable success. 💫 What you’ll experience on retreat — yoga, meditation, sound healing, breathwork, conversations about women’s health, cycles, and seasons, plus plenty of time in nature. 💫 The tangible outcomes you can expect — more energy, clarity on your next steps, presence as a leader, and inspiration that ripples through every area of your life and business.
This retreat is about more than taking a weekend off. It’s about remembering who you are underneath the noise, and learning how to lead and live from that place of grounded power.
If your body is whispering (or shouting) that it’s time to pause, to breathe, to reclaim your spark — this is your invitation to join me.
🎧 Tune in now, and make sure you follow along over the next few weeks as I go live on Instagram diving deeper into these themes.
Save your space HERE. https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/exhale-2025
Season 7 has been one of the most personal yet—an honest reflection of a year filled with growth, insight, and powerful conversations. In this wrap-up episode, I’m sharing the key themes and lessons that emerged across the season:
- How personal transformation fuels professional fulfilment
- Why mastery isn’t perfection, but a commitment to growth
- The connection between workspaces, well-being, and culture
- The impact of neurodiversity and designing for inclusion
- The wisdom of nature, rest, and healing
From solo reflections to rich guest conversations, this season was about designing a work life that actually works for you.
💫 Whether you're craving inspiration or seeking real change, this episode offers a powerful close to a transformational season—and a beautiful springboard for what’s next.
🎧 Tune in now and let’s keep evolving, together.
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
EXHALE | THE RETREAT
Come join me for 4 days immersed in nature as we reconnect to our body, heart and soul, reigniting your fire within!
TELL ME MORE!
NEW WHITEPAPER DOWNLOAD | Leveraging Place - The importance of building community - not just culture - at work.
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
When was the last time you let yourself be swept away by the sheer beauty of the world around you?
Maybe it’s the sun sinking into a golden horizon or the way light dances through trees. These moments remind us of the profound joy that’s available — if we pause long enough to notice.
In this special conversation, Dr. Meg Hooper and I explore the concept of awe, inspired by Julia Baird’s remarkable book Phosphorescence — a guide to finding light and wonder even in life’s darkest times.
In this episode, we explore: 🌿 How reconnecting with nature can heal and ground us 🌿 The powerful impact of designing greener cities and communities 🌿 How to nurture your own internal light through small, meaningful practices 🌿 Why wonder and awe are essential acts of self-care
This conversation is an invitation to seek out the extraordinary hiding in the everyday — and to rediscover the vibrant, luminous energy within yourself.
BOOK MENTIONED:
Phosphorescence
Connect with Meg Website | LinkedIn
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
DATE ANNOUNCED - BUSINESS PLANNING DAY
Step out of the day to day, create goals with soul and design a business that lights you up!
Gain clarity on how you, as the leader of your business and life, want to FEEL this new financial year. Create your own sustainability plan to enable you to FEEL this way the whole year through.
Tuesday 17th June, 9am - The Calile Hotel, Fortitude Valley
SAVE YOUR SEAT!
EXHALE | THE RETREAT
Come join me for 4 days immersed in nature as we reconnect to our body, heart and soul, reigniting your fire within!
TELL ME MORE!
NEW WHITEPAPER DOWNLOAD | Leveraging Place - The importance of building community - not just culture - at work.
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
In a world where distractions rule and our attention is constantly hijacked—how do we reclaim our focus and find clarity?
In this powerful and practical episode, I sit down with Angela Lockwood, occupational therapist, author, speaker, and the brilliant mind behind The Focus Formula. With a career dedicated to helping people tune out the noise and tune into what truly matters, Angela shares the tools, mindset shifts, and daily habits that can help you own your attention and thrive—especially in leadership and business.
From a life-altering accident that changed the course of her teenage years to becoming a sought-after voice in attention mastery, Angela’s story is both inspiring and relatable. Whether you’re drowning in to-do lists or feel like your mind never stops racing, this conversation will give you the clarity and calm you’ve been searching for.
🎧 What We Cover: ✨The real reason we feel so mentally drained (hint: it’s not just your phone)
✨Angela’s personal story of resilience and how it led to her life’s work
✨The Focus Formula (AIM: Awareness, Intention, Mastery) and how to apply it today
✨Why energy management matters more than time management
✨Simple ways to soften the noise and find stillness in your day
✨The underrated power of intuition in business and life
If you're ready to reclaim your attention and reconnect with what matters—this episode is for you.
Connect with Angela; Website | Insta | LinkedIn
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
BUSINESS REFLECTION & PLANNING
If you'd like to do your own reflection and intentionally design your next moves, grab a copy of my reflection workbook.
This is the workbook I shared with the attendees at my Business Planning Day earlier this year, to support them in learning from the year that's been so they can create a joyful & soul aligned year ahead!
And when you download your copy you'll be added to the waitlist for the next Planning Day in June 2025.
DOWNLOAD HERE
EXHALE | THE RETREAT
Come join me for 4 days immersed in nature as we reconnect to our body, heart and soul, reigniting your fire within!
TELL ME MORE!
NEW WHITEPAPER DOWNLOAD | Leveraging Place - The importance of building community - not just culture - at work.
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
What if your next office move wasn’t just about real estate, but a radical reset for your entire business culture?
In this episode, I sit down with my client Stephen Fryer, Greater Sydney Leader at Northrop Consulting Engineers, to explore how a lease expiry sparked a workplace transformation that redefined leadership, engagement, and innovation. From flexible work models to culture-led design, discover how Northrop turned relocation into reinvention, and how the team at COMUNiTI supported him to make it happen.
🎧 We talk:
- Turning a lease expiry into a growth opportunity
- Building a workplace people want to come to – no mandates necessary!
- Engaging teams through clever mascots
- The power of inclusive leadership, at every level, during change
- Lessons for any business navigating transformation
This episode is a must-listen for leaders ready to think bigger about space, culture, and the future of work. You’ll learn how you can truly maximise your next workplace to transform your culture and optimise your employee experience.
Read more about our work with Northrop by accessing the Case Study HERE
📩 Want to go deeper? Join me at the Exhale Retreat Learn More HERE —a space to pause, reset, and realign with what matters most.
Want to join us at the next Planning Day? Jump on the Waitlist HERE
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
#WorkLifeByDesign #Podcast #BurnoutRecovery #IntentionalLiving #Neurodiversity #Rituals #Mastery #SustainableSuccess
In today’s episode, we explore something deeply human yet often overlooked in business: community. When we shift focus from the bottom line to the broader picture—our people, our values, and our environment—we open the door to more meaningful success.
I’ve welcomed Amber Hawken, a thought leader in this space, to explore how leadership, mindfulness, and nature can help reshape workplace culture.
What You’ll Learn: ✔ The first steps businesses can take to foster a deeper connection with their communities. ✔ Why leadership must drive the change from the top down. ✔ How small rituals, like mindful breathing, can shift workplace energy. ✔ The powerful role nature plays in building sustainable and harmonious work environments. ✔ Practical ways to integrate these principles into daily operations.
Amber shares her expertise on how businesses can go beyond profits and create a meaningful impact—one that enriches both their teams and the communities they serve.
Learn more and join Amber? iSoma Meditation Practitioner Training
📩 Want to go deeper? Join me at the Exhale Retreat Learn More HERE —a space to pause, reset, and realign with what matters most.
Want to join us at the next Planning Day? Jump on the Waitlist HERE
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
#WorkLifeByDesign #Podcast #BurnoutRecovery #IntentionalLiving #Neurodiversity #Rituals #Mastery #SustainableSuccess
Burnout isn’t just feeling tired—it’s your body waving a red flag. I know because I’ve been there, pushing through exhaustion until my body forced me to stop.
That’s when I found Filipa Bellette, and everything changed. As co-founder of Chris and Filipa Functional Medicine, she’s helped thousands heal beyond just “managing” burnout.
In this episode, we uncover:
💡 What body burnout really is—and why it’s often overlooked
💡 Why traditional medicine misses the root cause
💡 How deep-seated beliefs and stress patterns keep us stuck
💡 What real healing looks like
If you’re constantly drained or struggling with stress-related health issues, this episode is for you. Your body isn’t broken—it’s speaking to you. It’s time to listen.
Let’s stop surviving and start thriving.
Want to learn more and/or work with Filly? Head to this link: Ending Body Burnout
📩 Want to go deeper? Join me at the Exhale Retreat Learn More HERE —a space to pause, reset, and realign with what matters most.
Want to join us at the next Planning Day? Jump on the Waitlist HERE
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
#WorkLifeByDesign #Podcast #BurnoutRecovery #IntentionalLiving #Neurodiversity #Rituals #Mastery #SustainableSuccess
The past year could be described as the ultimate paradox. A year that was both deeply challenging and incredibly transformative. It reminded me that there cannot be light without darkness.
In this episode, I’m sharing 7 key lessons I’ve learned in business and leadership—insights that have shaped not only my work but also how I show up in life. From redefining success and trusting my own intuition to embracing rhythm over hustle, these lessons have shifted everything.
🎯 Bigger Isn’t Always Better – A lean, high-performing team can drive more impact than a large, complex one.
🎯 Define Success on Your Terms – Stop chasing someone else’s vision and build a business that fits your life.
🎯 Work to Your Own Rhythm – Productivity isn’t about clocking hours—it’s about finding your flow.
🎯 If It’s Not a Hell Yes, It’s a No – Learn to say no to what drains you and yes to what truly matters.
🎯 Trust Yourself – You already have the answers—tap into your intuition and lead with confidence.
🎯 Work Is What You Do, Not Who You Are – Detach your identity from your business for a healthier mindset.
🎯 Blaze Your Own Trail – There’s no single formula for success—create a path that works for you.
I also reflect on three highlights that truly lit up my year—the experiences that brought the most joy, and fulfillment—and how I’m intentionally creating more of that energy into 2025.
Reflection in your business and life is a powerful tool that ensures that no matter where you are at in your journey, looking back will always impart you with knowledge on how best to move forward.
📩 Want to go deeper? Join me at the Exhale Retreat Learn More HERE —a space to pause, reset, and realign with what matters most.
Want to join us at the next Planning Day? Jump on the Waitlist HERE
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
#WorkLifeByDesign #Podcast #BurnoutRecovery #IntentionalLiving #Neurodiversity #Rituals #Mastery #SustainableSuccess
Creating a workplace that celebrates neurodiversity isn’t just the right thing to do – it’s the smartest business move you can make.
In my latest episode, I sit down with Mariane Power, a clinical psychologist and neurodiversity specialist, to discuss how businesses can better support neurodivergent employees, and why fostering an inclusive environment benefits the entire organisation.
We explore:
- What is Neurodiversity? Understanding the natural diversity in human brains and why it’s so important for businesses to embrace it.
- Universal Design Principles: How simple, inclusive design choices can cater to the diverse needs of employees and make workplaces more accessible without being resource-heavy.
- The Power of Flexibility: Moving beyond assigned desks to flexible workspaces that allow employees to choose environments that support their needs—whether it’s a quiet space for deep focus or a collaborative area for brainstorming.
- Open Communication: The importance of listening to employees and fostering an open dialogue to ensure that their needs are met, and how that leads to smoother transitions and happier teams.
- Designing for the Future: Why making neurodivergent-friendly changes not only supports your current employees, but also boosts creativity, engagement, and innovation for the long-term success of your business.
As more companies recognise the potential of neurodiverse teams, the steps they take to be inclusive can help propel their success. Whether through creating flexible workspaces, enhancing leadership training, or tapping into government resources, it’s time to make these changes happen.
Every step toward inclusion makes a real difference in creating a workplace where everyone feels valued, empowered, and able to contribute their best. If you’re ready to make your organization more neurodiverse-friendly, let’s explore how we can help!
Connect with Mariane;
Email | Blog | Website | LinkedIn
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
📩 Want to go deeper? Join me at the Exhale Retreat Learn More HERE —a space to pause, reset, and realign with what matters most.
Want to join us at the next Planning Day? Jump on the Waitlist HERE
#WorkLifeByDesign #Podcast #BurnoutRecovery #IntentionalLiving #Neurodiversity #Rituals #Mastery #SustainableSuccess
The content within this podcast interview with Mariane is provided for general information and educational purposes only, and is not suitable for clinical care needs. The material is not intended to replace professional help and should not be relied upon as a substitute for formal advice from a medical practitioner or mental health professional. Resources are provided for convenience only and do not constitute an endorsement of information on related websites or references.
If you or anyone you know requires specific mental health support, please contact your local GP or registered mental health provider for advice and assistance.
The following services also provide resources and support: Mental Health Access Line - 1800 011 511, Beyond Blue - beyondblue.org.au, LifeLine - lifeline.org.au 11 13 14, Headspace - headspace.com.au, Reach Out - reachout.org.au
I’m pulling back the curtain on something deeply personal in this week’s podcast episode - my journey through burnout, adrenal fatigue, and the hard-won lessons that led me back to myself.
For too long, I ignored the exhaustion, the brain fog, the emotional overwhelm, until my body finally said, ENOUGH!
What followed was a wake-up call that changed everything: a deep dive into my health, my beliefs, and the way I was living my life.
In this episode, I share: 🔥 The warning signs of burnout (that I continued to ignore!) 🧠 How my body was screaming for change (even when doctors said I was “fine”) 🌿 The radical shifts that helped me heal—physically, emotionally, and mentally 💡 The surprising connection between people-pleasing, boundaries, and burnout
And most importantly, how this journey led me to create Exhale Retreat—a space for women like you (and me) to pause, reset, and reconnect.
If you’ve ever felt like you’re running on empty, this episode is for you.
📩 Want to go deeper? Join me at the Exhale Retreat Learn More HERE —a space to pause, reset, and realign with what matters most.
Want to join us at the next Planning Day? Jump on the Waitlist HERE
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
#WorkLifeByDesign #Podcast #BurnoutRecovery #IntentionalLiving #Neurodiversity #Rituals #Mastery #SustainableSuccess
This season of Work Life by Design is deeply personal.
Inspired by Brené Brown’s reflections on "what’s on my heart and mind," I’m bringing you honest, unfiltered conversations about the challenges, insights, and lessons that have shaped both me and the work we’re doing at COMUNiTI over the past year.
Over the last 12 months, I’ve faced my own health challenges—burnout, adrenal fatigue, and gut issues that left me completely exhausted. This experience has reshaped how I approach 2025, and this season is all about sharing that journey with you. It’s real, it’s raw, and it’s exactly what’s on my heart and mind.
In this seventh season of the podcast you can expect thought-provoking discussions on: ✨ Body burnout—what causes it and how to truly heal ✨ Neurodiversity in the workplace—creating inclusive spaces that embrace our brain-based differences ✨ The power of community—what we can learn by looking back, embracing rituals, and reclaiming rites of passage ✨ Lesson in business—what I’ve learned about building a successful business ✨ …and so much more!
I can’t wait to dive into these conversations with you. I hope they inspire, challenge, and support you as much as they have for me.
But in today’s episode we’re going to dive into how I came to my word for the year – MASTERY.
For the past 10 years, I’ve started each year with an intentional planning session—a ritual that’s helped me realign, refine, and design a life I love. What once felt like a complete reset is now about softening into more of what I love and making small, meaningful tweaks.
This January, I also guided a group of ambitious businesswomen through this process at my Business Planning Day, helping them get clear on what they want from life so they can build a business that truly supports it. I focus on intentions over goals—because intentions shape who you want to become, not just another task on your to-do list.
From this, my word for 2025 emerged: MASTERY—not about perfection, but about continuous growth, refinement, and deepening my craft in both life and business.
So I invite you to reflect on your intention for the year?
📩 Want to go deeper? Join me at the Exhale Retreat Learn More HERE —a space to pause, reset, and realign with what matters most.
Want to join us at the next Planning Day? Jump on the Waitlist HERE
#WorkLifeByDesign #Podcast #BurnoutRecovery #IntentionalLiving #Neurodiversity #Rituals #Mastery #SustainableSuccess
The role that our workplaces play in encouraging and enabling our relationships at work, was largely taken for granted, until they were taken away from us.
A silver lining of the pandemic, we realised the impact of our workplaces and the role they play in our establishing and supporting the social & support networks in our lives.
And social connection is a foundation for building any community.
Today’s guest ARC Laureate Fellow Sharon K. Parker. I was first introduced to Sharon and her work through my friend and Colleague Dr Meg Hooper of Carousel Consulting, and her S.M.A.R.T Work Design Model, to develop meaningful and motivating work. This piece of work has been instrumental in underpinning our approach to work design and workplace design, a difference that Sharon will elaborate on in today’s podcast.
Meg has been following Sharon’s work for a very long time, and such I’ve invited her along to co-host today’s episode!
ARC Laureate Fellow Sharon K. Parker is a John Curtin Distinguished Professor, Director of the Centre for Transformative Work Design at Curtain University, a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Social Sciences and Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Organisational Psychology.
Sharon has published more than 250 internationally refereed articles on topics such as work design, proactive behaviour, mental health, and job performance, has over 46,500 citations, and is ranked in the top .15% of global scholars in her field.
She is the founder of the S.M.A.R.T model, cofounder of the Thrive at Work Initiative, and has contributed to policy on work design in Australia and internationally.
With the breadth of research that Sharon has done, this podcast could go in any direction, but as we are focused on the role of community in the workplace this season, we’ve narrowed in on this topic and explored how the work she does overlaps with this ability to build community.
So today, we are exploring;
- Her view on the relationship that exists between our workplaces and the role they play in building community
- Her S.M.A.R.T work design model and what the important factors are to consider in building community and where organisations could be letting themselves down
- The role of autonomy in buffering the effects of poor workplace design
- The definition of work design and the overlap to workplace design
- Some of the key consideration that designer, Culture Leaders and property managers/specialists should be looking at when it comes to workplace design
Sharon’s perspective on this is fascinating and Meg & I were loving this conversation - we honestly could have chatted for hours. So, I hope you love listening to this episode as much as we loved recording it!
Using Place to connect to the Hearts, Bodies and Minds of your People
Often when we look at our workplaces, we think of them as property. As real estate. And sadly, often as a balance sheet liability. But they have the potential to be so much more than that!
Your work place is an underutilised asset in attracting and connecting to your people.
Often spoken about in the terms of “People, Place & Technology” our workplaces should not be devoid of our humanity.
They are created for our people. That means that they need to Personal. Human.
And when you take a human centred approach to creating a workplace, what you are really doing is connecting to the hearts, bodies & minds of your people.
❤️ When I say heart, I'm talking about the collective emotion of a space. Otherwise known as the culture of an organisation. The brand and story of a company and the emotional connection it creates and ripples outwards. 🧘🏽 When I say body, I'm talking about the physical environment and like a body, is it put together for agility and performance or is it slow rigid and fixed? 🧠 And when I say mind, I'm talking about the technology that makes it all possible. The ability to plug our culture into our place and connectivity to one another.
LINKS
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel;
Email Melissa@melissamarsden.com.au
Website melissamarsden.com.au
Website comuniti.com.au
Instagram @melmar
Whitepaper – The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel https://calendly.com/melissa-marsden/30min
How can we create workplaces where our people are empowered? Where they are given autonomy and choice?
It all starts with culture.
Now that might sound overly simply, but at the grassroots of this, it’s the everyday actions that leaders take that shift and create culture in their teams and organisations. And it really is the simple things that make the difference.
And today’s guest, Meredith Wilson has written the book, on how you too can you use GRASS in your workplace to shift your culture.
Meredith makes culture simple and actionable. Working with executives, CEOs and leadership teams to shape, shift, strengthen and lead cultures. Having led culture at the Executive and Board level for more than 15 years, with ASX10 and global teams, Meredith is a published Author and recognised Culture Expert. Meredith works as a Culture Strategist, Speaker, and Mentor, building cultures that work.
In today’s episode Meredith shares with us;
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Her G.R.A.S.S model and the simple ways that we can start to rethink culture and how we can then take action everyday
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The impact of Hope & Safety and how this is foundational in building any culture
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The 4 things that you need to build a culture worth belonging too
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The importance of symbols and rituals and how these show up in your workplace
Meredith and I have a shared passion for building communities and thriving cultures, with much of our work and language overlapping in various area’s of workplace design and organisational leadership and culture, so it was an absolute privilege to have the opportunity to explore our ideas of what works more deeply in this episode.
LINKS
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Meredith;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn|Website |
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
Over centuries work has evolved from a labour some, back breaking manual task to what today some of us refer to as a "cushy office job"!
And we have the invention of machines and technology, a few key players and a pandemic to thank, as the catalysts for this change.
However, some things have very much stayed the same, even though the world we are living and working in today, is very different to the world in which these things were created for.
In today's episode I'm winding back the clock just over 100 years as we start to look at;
- The impact of machines and technology on how we work
- How and why, we work 8hrs and 5 days a week
- How technology drove our need for workplaces and their design
- The research on what our workplaces really need to do now and into the future.
This is one of my favourite conversations and I'm so excited to be sharing it with you here today!
LINKS
JOIN NOW! Workplace Dynamics Blueprint Program
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
Curating a community is not a passive activity. It takes conscious effort, care, and a respect for the people that you are embracing in this community.
But when you bringing together a community with no traditional “place” how can you engage with a place temporarily and make it your own?
This is exactly the work that today’s guest, Imelda Miller, does in her role as the Curator of First Nations Cultures at Queensland Museum Kurilpa. A third generation Vanuatu woman, Imelda is a proud South Sea Islander and responsible for bringing together communities of origin through her work with the museum. Working with material culture an archival collections, Imelda’s collaboration, and curatorial approach, combines cultural practice, community engagement and community lead research and development into her projects.
Hosting exhibitions, running workshops and leading teams in these activities, Imelda is consciously curating places for communities to come together to share their stories and create new ones.
Today’s conversation is one of possibility and Imelda shares so many of her secrets in how she fosters this sense of community, to establish belonging, a sense of connection and storytelling that can be directly applied back to our building our own communities in our workplaces.
In today’s conversation Imelda shares with us;
- How she uses place to create community, even when there is no ownership or relationship to place
- How objects enable people to connect, share stories and develop memory in place
- The fundamentals of curating a community atmosphere are
- The healing power that connection and community can create
Throughout this conversation I hear direct correlations to how I think about fostering community in our workplaces and the role that place plays. Establishing connection, creating belonging, and sharing stories, by communicating social contracts and norms and engaging in routine and ritual.
Imelda is a warm-hearted woman with much wisdom to share on how we can take even a little bit of this approach back to our workplaces.
Mel
LINKS
Join the Waitlist for the Workplace Dynamics Blueprint Program
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with the Imelda;
You can engage with Imelda’s work here;
https://www.slq.qld.gov.au/discover/exhibitions/plantation-voices
https://www.museum.qld.gov.au/collections-and-research/projects/australian-south-sea-islander-lived-identities
Connect with Mel;
Email Melissa@melissamarsden.com.au
Website melissamarsden.com.au
Website comuniti.com.au
Instagram @melmar
Linkedin Melissa Marsden
Whitepaper – The Road Map to Employee Experience
To listen to more of my episodes, head to my website !!!
Hey!
Have you read Priya Parkers book, The Art of Gathering? If you haven't yet, I highly recommend you do, it's a good read!
In her book Priya shares:
"gatherings in our lives are often vague & unproductive"
And I would argue that our workplaces are in fact a place where we gather, rather than places we "go to" to "work", and if we want people to come to the workplace, we need to be offering them an experience. It needs to be a purposeful, and productive contribution to their lives.
In today's episode I'm expanding on the framework that I share with you in Eps. 139, It's not about mandates, it's about Fostering Community, to dive deeper into the final layer of the framework, Placemaking.
Because the art of placemaking is a complex task, that requires its own framework to fully optimise the creation of a plan that builds community. Plus, I share with you some tangible examples of how place has been used for centuries as a central hub, an anchos, a container for holding and creating community.
If you're ready to learn more about creating your community in your workplace, you can either;
- Grab a copy of my book "The Next Workplace"
- Join me in the "Workplace Dynamics Blueprint | The Program" Waitlist now OPEN!
- Or book a complimentary discovery call with me to chat more!
Until next time, Mel x
USEFUL LINKS:
Workplace Dynamics Blueprint | The Program - DOORS OPEN! Are your ready to learn the Art & Science of creating your next Workplace?!?!
Creating your next workplace is a complex task! It requires the input of multiple players within your organisation and the expert guidance of specialist consultants.
BUT it also presents an incredible opportunity for your organisation! Typically, businesses only refresh their space every 10 years. That's a long time in today's fast paced world. So many changes, from technology, to operational delivery, organisational structures, ways of working and more.
Optimising this unique opportunity requires a plan. In this self-paced program, you will learn about the five pillars that underpin the dynamics in your organisation, how to leverage them against your organisations strategic objectives and gain the confidence you need to embark on this journey armed with the knowledge and know how to optimise your next workplace.
Enabling you to inspire the human potential in your organisation.
Join the waitlist and be the first to know when doors open!
Join the waitlist here - https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/blueprint
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel;
Email Melissa@melissamarsden.com.au
Website melissamarsden.com.au
Website comuniti.com.au
Instagram @melmar
Whitepaper – The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel https://calendly.com/melissa-marsden/30min
"When work starts to work again, it becomes a place where people want to be"
Creating a thriving workplace where people want to be, voluntarily, requires us to take a different perspective to the "productivity" approach that our workplaces once swore by.
Today's guest is Sharon Darmody. With a background in Occupational Therapy, Sharon is an Organisational Consultant, Mediator and the Founding Director of Strive Occupational Rehabilitation.
With over 25 years consulting to organisations, she identified a recurring theme, leading her to develop her M.A.G.I.C model to help businesses, teams and individuals rediscover what makes work, work for them.
In today's conversation Sharon and I delve into;
- The foundations of what she's observed to foster community within organisations
- We explore her M.A.G.I.C model and how you can explore aspects of this within your business
- The challenges and opportunities that organisations have to fostering community
- How simple Ground Rules, can support individuals, teams and organisations to thrive
- Plus, Sharon shares a personal story of how humanising a workplace and building an authentic community puts people first and the ripple effect of this on individuals, families and their surrounding communities, changing lives.
If you're looking for ways to re-engage and ignite your teams, you're going to enjoy this episode!
If we’re still talking about getting people back to the office, we’re having the wrong conversation”.
I don’t know about you but I’m getting frustrated with all this RTO talk! I think those that are stuck in this vortex, are completely missing the point!
What we should be talking about, is what makes a workplace a COMMUNITY.
In the work that I do, creating a workplace where people WANT to be is key, BUT while the physical environment plays a large part, it’s not the whole story.
“For centuries our communities have centred around sharing an imagined reality crafted out of words, which has enabled large numbers of strangers to come together to coordinate effectively”
Yuval Harari, Author of Sapiens.
At COMUNiTI, we use our Workplace Dynamics Blueprintä to dive deep with our clients to understand the purpose of place and the fundamentals that needs of a place. By using our five pillars we can identify the opportunities and the gaps across the organisation to co-create a space that lays the foundations to building a community.
In today’s episode, I’m sharing with you the framework that I’ve developed to building community in organisations, from the foundations up!
LINKS
Doors to our Workplae Dynamics Blueprint program opening soon - join the watilist here!
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel https://calendly.com/melissa-marsden/30min
🎉🎉🎉 Welcome back for SEASON 6!!! 🎉🎉🎉
As I hit record for this episode, #138, I had a nostalgic moment as I reflected on how much the world has changed since I first started the podcast back in July 2020.
We were all living in limbo, as we were very much still in the midst of adjusting to the impacts of the pandemic, in and out of lockdowns.
Four years on and SOOOOO much has changed;
· The way we THINK about work has changed
· HOW we work has changed
· WHERE we work has changed
· And as such WORKPLACES have changed!
And one of the greatest revelations that I believe that come for us all from the pandemic, was the way our mindsets shifted to thinking about our workplaces as COMMUNITIES.
This is a way of thinking that we here at COMUNiTI have acknowledged for some time. It’s our namesake! As a team of workplace dynamic strategists, design advisors and change leaders, we support organisations to get clear on the strategic goals, understand their people and align their workplace to enable them to achieve and thrive.
At the heart of this sits our purpose; to foster the creation of communities where people feel connected.
So in this season of the Work Life by Design podcast, you can expect to hear more about how you can celebrate community within your organisation. What it takes to create community, with guests from Thought leaders, Academics and Curators of community to share their experiences.
I’m excited to share this season with you, it’s going to be a good one!
LINKS
Doors to our Workplae Dynamics Blueprint program opening soon - join the watilist here!
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel https://calendly.com/melissa-marsden/30min
Well, that’s it for another season!
After kicking off season 5 back in November last year, I think it’s well and truly time to switch off the mic for a while!
This season has definitely taken on a life of its own and it really snuck up on me that we’ve been going straight for 48 episodes, almost a whole year! I’ve had the pleasure of engaging some incredibly intelligent, wise, and generous guests in conversation over this time which has what has kept me wanting to do “just one more!” episode.
But here at COMUNiTI we are heading into our busiest season of the year in the final sprint to Christmas so it’s time to take a breath and make the space needed to ensure we finish the year strong.
So, in this episode I’m sharing with you the highlights of 48 episodes, marking some incredible milestones including;
- 📕🥂 The release of my book “The Next Workplace” and the conversations from the book launch
- 🎉 Hitting a 100 episodes of the podcast
- 🥳 Celebrating COMUNiTI’s 10th Birthday
- Plus a recap on some of the impactful conversations that I’ve had over the course of the season that have influenced my own thinking on work and the workplace
So, while I take a break there are 136 other episodes for you to dive back into. Thank you for joining me here each and every week and I look forward to being back in your ears with some fresh content very soon!
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
The art of focus in our modern worlds has become just that. An art.
With books like Johan Hari’s Stolen Focus and past guest Dr Kristy Goodwin's, Dear Digital we need to talk, the constant disruption, distraction mulit-tasking and task switching that we are all succumbing to is impacting our ability to truly focus.
Add to this all the pressures and competing demands of daily life and we are quickly looking at fatigue, exhaustion and burnout.
And whilst the rise of flexible working has given us more freedom to design our days and work lives, it’s a bit of a double edged sword. As many of us have relied on the routine, ritual and structure that our daily to commute has given to us to support our cognitive function and the daily need to “do our job”.
We now need to develop a new skill. The ability to distinguish what is worth our attention, to do this intentionally and then to be able to focus.
And that’s what today’s guest is here to share with us.
Angela Lockwood is on a mission. To empower individuals to thrive amidst the distraction of modern life.
As an Occupational Therapist with a wealth of real-world experience working alongside both children and adults, she has developed a unique approach to unlocking the power of our thinking and actions in ever-changing environments.
After sustaining a life-changing head injury she became obsessed with learning how we can use our time and energy to thrive and has focused her career on helping others do the same.
She is the author of two business self-help books, "The Power of Conscious Choice" and “Switch Off and Find Calm” and the engaging host of "A Kid's Life" Podcast.
She’s been featured on Channel 9 Today EXTRA, The Australian Financial Review, Good Health magazine, Huffington Post, Mamamia, Radio 2UE and numerous parenting and lifestyle publications. She also has a regular segment on The Luke and Susie Show which is syndicated across Australia.
Angela has an infectious energy and she’s highly relatable.
So in today’s episode Ange and I are going to look at;
- Why the conversation about focus has become such a prevalent one
- Intentional Focus – what it means and how to manage it
- The importance of switching off
- The difference between time management and energy management
- Plus she’s also sharing with us some tools to get us started
A great conversation on how to focus your attention on the things that really matter so that you have more energy for life!
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Angela;
LinkedIn | Insta | Website
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience Book a 30min Complimentary Discovery Call with Mel
One of the biggest misconceptions about “a new office” is that it is simply that. A new place for us to conduct our business from. A design and construction project.
This could not be further from the truth. “A new office” is a whole of business opportunity and at its core it is actually a “cultural transformation project”.
Everything about the way the new office looks, feels, operates is all new. It’s in a new location, with a new commute and with that comes a whole new set of routines and rituals.
Now while some of your team might be excited by the change, there are going to be a lot of your team who will not be. And regardless of where they sit on the continuum of change experience, they are going to bring their own perceptions to the process, until they are guided, communicated to, informed, and educated about what the new workplace will entail.
Because, in the absence of information it is human nature to Make. It. Up!
So, in today’s episode I’m sharing with you why it's important to support your people through change, and what you can do to prepare you and your business to make the most of this unique opportunity.
Remember, creating a new workplace for your business is typically a once in 10 year event, and just think about the ripple effect that doing an outstanding job of supporting your people through this change will have on the next 10 years of your business.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Is the workplace really just a ‘task’ place?
This is one of the thought-provoking questions that today’s guest poses, for us to ponder about our reality of work and the workplace.
Dr Agustin Chevez is the author of The Pilgrim’s Guide to the Workplace. It was after reading a book on the diversity of Iguana’s in the Galapagos Islands, that Gus set off on a pilgrimage from Melbourne to Sydney, to explore the impact that isolation has on the diversity of our idea’s.
Fast forward a few years and Gus is sharing his insights as 34 signposts from this exploration in his book, inviting us to reimagine our workplaces.
As an Architect and researcher, Gus has dedicated his career to understanding the notion of work and uncovering environments that best support our working lives. His interest in the relationship between people, space and technology saw him pursue a PhD on the evolution of workplace architecture as a consequence of technology development.
His work has been presented at various international forums and publications. As a sought-after speaker, Agustin has delivered international keynotes and is a TEDx speaker. He has also contributed to workplace strategies in Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore.
Gus is the Workplace Futures Lead at the Centre for the New Workforce at Swinburne University and an Honorary Fellow at the School of Management and Marketing at the University of Melbourne.
In this episode we are going to find out
- How Gus took this idea that he had to explore diversity of thinking to actually, walking from Melbourne to Sydney
- What the distinction is between a Pilgrimage and a Walk and how this applies to the workplace
- How the introduction of absurdity to the workplace enables us to bring more human traits to our experience of work
- Why removing friction from our environments can impact our ability to be innovative and its impact on our personal resilience as we overcome adversity
- How the conversation and questions we’re asking when approaching the design of workplaces need to change in order to create an enhanced environment for work
A fascinating conversation with someone who has incredible mind to explore ideas in a new way to challenge biases and see new opportunity.
You are going to love this conversation with Dr Gus Chevez.
LINKS
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Gus;
LinkedIn | Website / Book The Pilgrim’s Guide to the Workplace
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
One of the reasons that I first started exploring this idea of Workplace Strategy was because I am fascinated by how businesses tick.
What makes one business a roaring success and another flounder?
And one thing that continues to fascinate me is the gap that I see emerge in almost every engagement. And it’s a gap that I feel like I automatically step into fill without a second thought.
But this gap is one that differentiates what we do at COMUNiTI apart.
When clients approach us, they are likely to be seeking a Design Solution. They don’t go to the design team looking for a business solution.
And that is the difference. Often as the opportunity is misunderstood, or it wasn’t even on the radar to begin with.
So many times, I have been told by clients, “We didn’t even know that what you do is a thing!”.
So today we’re diving into the opportunity to transform your business that you likely didn’t even know what a possibility, as I’ve been reminded that what I thought everyone knew, they likely don’t, and that is a huge, missed opportunity for every business.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
With more of us embracing the opportunity to work from home, it’s leaving our workplaces underutilised as occupancy levels in the workplace drop. The impacts of this vary from workplace ot workplace depending on the design style and approach ranging from limited variety in the spaces available for employees to perform their work through to a lack of energy and “buzz’ that comes from bringing people together in the space.
As someone who engages with organisations daily in this delicate dance of who gets to own their desk and who doesn’t, weighing up the commercial realities of leasing costs vs underutilised floor area and the opportunity to provide variety and choice to employees in where and how they work within the workplace, this is a topic of conversation that I am keen to explore.
So, when today’s guest Dr Jenna Mikus shared an article written by BBC on LinkedIn, questioning if the hybrid office will ever feel like home, with her view of the impact of this approach I was keen to engage her in a friendly debate on the pros and cons of the “to own a desk or not to own a desk”.
Jenna shared;
While this sounds ideal in theory, this Choose Your Adventure approach to daily working could backfire, as it introduces the risk of proving exhausting and therefore off-putting to workers often already overwhelmed with work obligations. Not everyone embraces change, let alone adventure...especially on a daily basis.
As an advocate of creating workplaces that respond to the unique and individual needs of organisations, their teams and their people, my view is that by relinquishing individual ownership of our workpoints, we can inturn optimise our work environments to cater to a greater variety of work styles and activities, further enhancing our experience of work.
Dr Jenna Mikus is the Founder and Managing Partner of the Eudae Group, which advises clients on organizational and spatial (both physical and digital) transformational change relating to built environments curated for health and wellbeing. Her clients have included commercial office owners, operators, and tenants as well as military, government, healthcare, higher education, aged care, and more on a global scale, with particular emphasis on the US, Canada, the UK, and Australia.
As an advocate for bridging industry practice with academic theory/research, Jenna is also a Visiting Fellow with QUT's Centre for Decent Work & Industry, an Honorary Fellow with the Centre for Conscious Design, a former Health Equity and current Research Advisor for the International WELL Building Institute, and a contributor to Harvard University's Human Flourishing Program's Flourishing at Work Interest Group.
Jenna leverages her education across engineering, architecture, and design with her depth and breadth of work experience relating to strategy, change management, and design thinking to encourage multidisciplinary cross-pollination in theory and practice and to guide the creation/curation of intelligent, sustainable, and flourishing environments for all.
Jenna is well versed in supporting organisations to create environments that support us all in flourishing at work, having worked in organsiational change and recently completing her PhD focused on flourishing health and wellbeing, so I was pleased when she agreed to engage in this conversation, so that we could explore it from a few angles and see where we land.
This is an interesting conversation exploring the role of workplace design on the individuals that occupy them.
LINKS
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Jenna;
LinkedIn | Website
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
The end of financial year is a great time to check in and see how we are tracking against our goals. As someone who loves to set myself up at the beginning of each year with a number of intentions and an overarching word to keep me on track, it’s a great opportunity for me to check and readjust for the next 6 months.
This year my word was Flow.
And its been interesting to see how this word has shown up, the shape its taken and the way in which it has realigned my thoughts and actions throughout the year to date.
To mark this EOFY I took myself off to a fancy “lunch for one” and what ensued was something that I have since reflected on as quite magical.
This simple act of creating time and space, allowed my mind the capacity to truly get into flow. Creating a stream of consciousness that resulted in a manifesto for COMUNiTI and for me.
But whilst I didn’t intentionally design this, it certainly didn’t happen by accident.
So, in today’s episode I’m sharing with you the ingredients that enabled this magic to happen plus some serendipitous learnings that I’ve had of late and the culmination of these in forming my philosophy on why mindwander, flow and spaciousness, are the key to innovation and creativity.
Take this as a friendly reminder that creating time and space to smell the roses can have a profound impact on the trajectory of your career and your business.
LINKS
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel;
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience
Establishing a strong and purposeful employee experience in your organisation can take an incredible amount of time, dedication, and invested energy. So, if you could find all the People tools and resources that you needed packaged up in one platform, backed by science and data, how much easier would that make your life as a leader and give you the confidence to know that you were giving your organisation the best possible advantage?
Well, today’s guest is here to tell us that this is possible. Damon Klotz, who has what could be described as one of the coolest titles, is a Work Culture Evangelist at Culture Amp, a market-leading employee experience platform.
I first discovered Damon and his podcast Culture First, in the midst of the pandemic tuning into his episode with Jen Sauer-Klein, an experience designer in the States. This singular episode gave me a new perspective on the role of our environments in how we influence experiences consciously through design, adding another tool to my tool kit.
Jen is among a number of incredible guests that Damon has had the opportunity to engage in conversation on his podcast, so I was incredibly happy when he agreed to join me here to learn more on what have been some of the most impactful conversations that he has had.
What I also learnt through this episode is the diverse career that Damon has had that led him to his current role as Work Culture Evangelist. As you’ll hear Damon is quite the overachiever, prior to Culture Amp he was leading community HR groups, through to being the Global Manager of Digital Strategy for Ramsay Health Care, a keynote speaker on the future of work, and the Co-Founder of Spur Projects, a social enterprise dedicated to reducing the suicide rate of men in Australia.
And he shares how a desire to be a sports manager and leverage the community of teams has found its way through to the work he and the team at Culture Amp do.
You’ll also learn more about
- Culture Amp and the wealth of data that they have accumulated from supporting the employee experience across numerous countries since launching in 2009,
- How the platform supports organisations to leverage this “data lake” to continue to enhance the employee, manager and team experience
- And how taking a community focused approach to building Culture Amp has been a key foundation in its success, growing the company from 100 to 6500 customers, and the role that Damon played in establishing it
- Plus what Damon has learned about communication, transparency and trust from his conversations about People & Culture throughout the pandemic
So many interesting highlights in this episode, along with some great additional listening recommendations over on the Culture First podcast.
Damon also leaves us with some insights into how he has consciously continued to grow with the organisation from start up to now and its various iterations, all great self-reflection points for us to consider in our own growth mindset and experience of comfort.
LINKS
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No doubt throughout the course of your career, you’ve experienced moments where you’ve questioned yourself and your ability to lead not only your team through the next transition, but also leading yourself.
Stepping up into a new role, guiding your team through a new project or perhaps you’ve just been swallowed up by the overwhelming wave of pressure of work.
I can empathise with you at each of these points, because I’ve been there too.
I also know, from the work that we’ve been doing at COMUNiTI across organisations, that many managers and leaders are also facing similar challenges. With our need to manage our teams in new ways due to remote and hybrid work practices, one of the key challenges we consistently identify that requires greater support, is leadership capability.
And it's an area that today’s guest, Rebecca Christianson specialises in.
Rebecca is an Executive Coach, Facilitator, Speaker and the Founder of Thriving People.
Throughout her career, she has partnered with Executive Teams globally to build leadership capability and implement organisational change.
One of her many superpowers is stretching leaders to the edge of their thinking to support mindset shifts, with a view to increase self awareness, influence, effectiveness, focus and wellbeing.
With her purpose to support senior leaders to love life at the top of business.
Having been an executive leader herself, Rebecca brings her lived experience to her work, having walked in the shoes that she now supports.
In today’s episode, you’ll hear some of the common challenges that Rebecca observes in the leader she supports along with the one thing that we can all do to start building our own leadership capability, so that we can each build our toolkit to navigating the uncertainty of the world we work in with more confidence and ease.
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LinkedIn | Thriving People
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Reimagining your next workplace is the perfect opportunity to take a step back and take a fresh look at your whole business.
One of the ways that I encourage leaders to do this, is by embracing “Shoshin”.
Shoshin is a Buddhist concept meaning “beginners mind”. It is about approaching a situation as if you are seeing it for the first time. When we come with curiosity, openness, eagerness, and no preconceptions, our mind is open to new possibilities.
And this is especially valuable when you are reimagining the experience that you want your people to have of work.
In today’s episode we explore 4 ways that you can redesign work with empathy, using an employee empathy map.
An empathy map is a useful tool to visualise yourself in the shoes of someone else and how you would like to curate their experience.
What they See, Think & Feel, Do & Hear.
And this is especially valuable as you embark on your journey to creating your next workplace and how you can positively influence the experience that your people have of work and place.
It’s also a great tool to reset patterns of behaviour in your organisation as we embark on a new world of work.
Tune in to learn more!
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In last weeks episode I spoke about wellbeing rhythms in the workplace and the need for us all to be building in moments of self-care.
I then read an article in the Harvard Business Review by author Greg McKeown, who’s written two of my favourite books and are recommended reading at COMUNiTI; Essentialism & Effortless. In this article Greg says that for organisations to build top performing teams, they should only be asking for 85% effort. The premise that when we consistently perform at 100% we burn out.
Prior to this Dr Meg Hooper and I discussed the recent legislative changes around psychosocial hazards in the workplace.
I see a theme emerging… the conversation as to the health and wellbeing of our people is being elevated in our workplaces and is at the core of all business performance.
So, this week I’ve invited Dr Ali Young to join me, to better understand what is that we can be doing to support ourselves individually, and what we can be doing as teams and organisations to practically support the health and wellbeing of our people.
Dr Ali Young is a health strategist, who works with mums owning and operating health practices. After recovering from burnout in 2019 and writing a book about it, she has become passionate about supporting other health practitioners, particularly mums, to navigate the same stressors with a different outcome.
In this episode Ali shares with us not only the science that backs up why we should be taking better care of our health, but if we are not giving ourselves the permission to pause, no amount of sleep, trips to the gym or healthy eating is likely to change our perception of stress and impact our wellbeing.
We discuss how a simple conversation with your team can uncover opportunities to support everyone’s wellbeing and the simple changes in schedule that have led to increased performance in her own practice.
She also shares with us her three tips to ensuring maximum wellbeing in our work week.
So, why not take a walk, tune in and use this 30mins as your permission to pause.
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As we cross the halfway mark of the year, this is the perfect time to look back, check in with your intentions for the year and adjust the sails ready for the second half.
One of the tweaks that I’ll be making as I set myself up for the home stretch is to recalibrate my selfcare regime. As a busy mum, navigating the ebb and flow of our project load, this is usually the stuff that I forgo from my calendar to accommodate the other demands on my time.
But here’s the catch <>, as knowledge workers, our most valuable asset is the quality of our thoughts. We are literally paid to think!
The quality of that thinking is significantly impacted by the quality of our sleep, nutrition, movement, and relaxation [aka self-care!] all the good things that help us maintain our stress and anxiety levels and improve our cognitive function. Our ideas!
So, when organisations begin to question, why employee wellbeing should be their concern, the simplest answer is that, when your employees are well, they are more productive, which is good for business.
In today’s episode we discuss.
- How our workplaces can create connection and support socialisation at work – a key factor in employee wellbeing
- How our workplaces can enhance our experience of work
- How changing work rhythms require a change in work environment
- The impacts of schedule flexibility and employee loyalty to those businesses committed to wellbeing
- Plus we take a look at Entain, and the impact that their 9 day fortnight and meeting free Wednesday is having on their organisation, aside from employee productivity and engagement
What small tweak of your sails can you maketo support you in entering the second half in your best form to see you through to the finish line?
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In April this year, the Managing the risk of Psychosocial Hazards at work Code of Practice 2022 came into effect.
As someone who runs a business and employs people, naturally I was interested to learn more about what this means for me and for the projects that I work on.
To help me understand the code further, I invited my colleague and friend Dr Meg Hooper to join me to discuss it.
Meg is the CEO and Principal Consultant at Carousel Consulting, the experts in organisational change and building resilient teams. So, with Meg’s background in supporting many an organisation, she was the obvious choice to talk me through it.
In this episode we discuss;
- What is a psychosocial hazard in the workplace
- How is a psychosocial hazard different from psychological safety
- Who is impacted by the code?
- What do businesses need to do?
Plus, we explore a few of the hazards that we encounter in the work that we do and what organisations can do to mitigate their risk.
An interesting and highly relevant conversation that left me with a much broader understanding of the code and in many ways, how the work that we are both already doing is setting organisations up for success.
Communicationcations Kit for Small Business - Managing the Risk of Psychosocial Hazards at Work - Code of Practice
Managing the Risk of Psychosocial Hazards at Work - Code of Pratice 2022
Managing the risk of psychosocial hazards at work Code of Practice 2022
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On the 1st July 2023, my business COMUNiTI celebrates its 10th year of business.
Reaching this milestone in business does not come without both its highs and lows and I could not think of a more fitting way to celebrate this milestone than accepting the offer of my friend and colleague Dr Meg Hooper to turn the tables and interview me.
Meg and I have enjoyed both a personal and professional relationship, having partnered on several projects together. She has witnessed both my growth and that of the business through some of the most challenging years.
Meg is the CEO and Principal Psychologist at Carousel Consulting, the experts in organisational change and building resilient teams.
As could only be expected of a psychologist, I felt this was more like a session on her couch then a podcast interview, but as only Meg could, she helped uncover some true reflections of what business has been like over the past 10 years and how it has shaped me, and COMUNiTI.
Plus, I even let you into my predictions for where and how I’d like to see Workplace Strategy evolve to in the future.
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As we approach the mid-point of the year, I would hazard a guess that you’re already feeling like the tank is near empty! And you are not alone!
Thanks to the events of recent years, COVID, lockdowns, floods, new ways of working, to name a few, what’s resulted is a lack of physical and emotional connection. Which has been at the expense of our human relationships, our creativity, and our emotional intelligence.
A situation that today’s guest is all too familiar with.
Deanne Boules is the Founder of Insync Workplace Solutions & a highly respected People, Safety, & Culture Consultant, Coach, Facilitator, & keynote speaker. With over 30 years of experience, she has developed a proven track record of building high-performing, inclusive, physically & psychologically safe workplaces that enable individuals to bring their authentic selves to work, feel valued, have a sense of purpose & belonging, thrive & go home safe & well each day.
Dee is passionate about supporting organisations to rehumanise their workplaces, by putting people back at the core of the business. Having started her career as a police officer with the NSW Police Force, she traversed a number of other roles, before founding Insync Workplace Solutions in 2012. A specialist WHS and HR Consulting and Training Practice, fulfilling her passion for redefining and re-humanising how human resources, workplace safety, and all things people, safety, and culture-related are practised worldwide.
During her career, Dee has experienced first-hand the devastating impact of workplace fatalities & serious injuries, attending more than most. Through these experiences, Dee started to question why people do what they do & why they make the decisions they make.
Dee and I could have easily talked about this concept for hours, as fostering community is at the core of humanising our workplaces. We discuss the benefits of taking a human-centred approach in the workplace, some of the barriers and mindset shifts to be overcome along with simple ways that organisations can take the first step.
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In my book The* Next Workplace*: Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential, I share a story of a client expressing their concern, that their current workplace was having a detrimental impact on the business. It was not supporting the behaviours that the employees were told were wanted.
The organisation wanted to see collaboration; however, the environments spatial cues told a different story.
Sadly, this is not a unique conversation.
Our environments have the ability to influence our behaviour. Our environment, provides us with messages about the way we should interact, communicate, and engage, and these messages can be consciously influenced with the right approach.
Within organisations, behaviours are the actions that we can see, that when communicated effectively, reflect the values and culture of the organisation. What we consider to be important.
And there are three ways that our environment can influence these behaviours with the right messages, which I share with you in today’s episode.
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As organisations are navigating this new landscape of “hybrid” work, a conversation that is happening more and more, is one that centres around “how do we work?” and “how do we want to work?”, before we start talking about, “what does our office look like?”.
Today’s guest, Dan Mottau, did just that.
Dan was introduced to me by a mutual colleague when I was looking for thought leaders in the People & Culture space to join me for my book launch panel in Melb.
From the first conversation I had with Dan, I was completely blown away with his approach to work and workplace. This was someone who spoke my language and absolutely understood the impact of how a workplace design NEEDS to respond to the operations of the business.
So much so, that when the opportunity arose for Dan and the team at Redbubble to create a new workplace, rather than heading straight out to market and chatting with leasing agents, though took a moment to really think about “how do we want people at Redbubble to work?”
That simple question set them off on a journey that completely transformed, not only the way they work, but then also the place that would best support that way of working.
So, I’ve invited Dan to join me here for a conversation, to share what really is a progressive, insightful and in some ways quite a radical approach to the whole process, and one that I would welcome more organisations to consider when embarking on the opportunity of creating a new workplace. To first, really question the nature of work, the way their people work and then what they truly want from their workspace to facilitate and enable that work.
What I find fascinating about this approach, is that it was a people led approach. As Dan shares with us, the project lead was their head of DBI. This was not a project that was handed down to the facilities team, via finance, it was entrusted to the People teams to deliver, hiring in the support they needed, when they needed it.
This is an approach that I want to highlight, as taking this approach to creating your next workplace, leads your business to creating a very different outcome. An outcome that puts you people at the centre, and a focus on create a space that optimises the performance of your people, not just the performance of your building.
Dan is a senior people, organisation development, learning and communications leader, who enjoys examining the underlying motivations and patterns of thinking that elicit amplifying and diminishing behaviours within and between teams.
His approach is heavily influenced by behavioural psychology and anthropology, especially as their principles may be applied to team functioning and the cultivation and sustainment of psychological safety and high performance. With a passion for accelerating the growth of leaders, and for increasing their personal impact through the success of their people.
As you’ll hear him say, he’s a people geek!
So, let’s jump into today’s conversation!
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If I asked you to describe your Brand, I’d wager that the first thing you tell me is what colour your logo is!
Whilst colour and our mark are important factors in defining our brand, they are only one very small component of your brand and cannot begin to communicate the complexity of your brand experience.
A company’s Brand Experience is the way they want people to feel when they do business with them.
And this experience starts with understanding. Understanding your Purpose, your vision, your values. Understanding where you came from, where you are going and the impact that you want to make on the way.
Once you understand who you are, who you want to be and the guiderails that are going to keep you on course, then, you can infuse that into your space telling your unique story!
Tune into today’s episode as I share the next two steps to making this a reality!
Your workplace is an opportunity to make a lasting first impression. Make it count!
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If I brought you together in a room of your peers, and asked one simple question, “Who here would call themselves a Creative?”, chances are you’re unlikely to raise your hand.
As my guests today describe, we often mistake creativity for artistry, the ability to draw or paint. However, many of us are practicing creativity everyday, without realising it. Singing, cooking, problem solving, are all acts of creativity.
Paul Fairweather and Chris Meredith, are the Two Common Creatives.
Paul is a recovering architect, formerly the co-founder of the award-winning Architectural practice Fairweather Proberts, he is also an artist, inventor and property developer.
Chris is a former Marketing Director, he is a speaker, writer, podcaster and business coach and when he’s not at work you’ll find him in, on or under the ocean, usually with a camera in hand.
Together they have combined their passion and pursuit of creativity to engage businesses to embrace theirs, helping their people create, capture, and communicate great idea’s, to solve business problems.
Their goal is to make creativity as common as a loaf of bread and as well understood as common language.
As someone who would raise their hand when asked if they were creative, I’m fascinated by this conversation as Paul and Chris share how they encourage people to unlock and embrace their creativity.
We explore;
- the role of creativity in our professional lives
- if you can teach creativity
- the common block or resistance to embracing creativity
- and what they have learned and observed about how our physical environment can impact on an individual’s creativity
As businesses struggle to solve new problems in our fast-paced world, encouraging creativity in our organisations is a key metric of success, and Paul & Chris leave us with their thoughts on where we can all start.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with the Paul & Chris
Paul - https://www.paulfairweather.com/ Chris - https://www.chrismeredith.com.au/ TCC - https://www.twocommoncreatives.com/
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It’s time to change the conversation!
There has been so much talk about the organisations that are struggling to get the workplace dynamic right, but very little highlighting those that are!
Launching my book The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential, was an opportunity to shine a light on the incredible work that a number of leaders and organisations are doing to explore the edges of employee experience and navigating this new frontier in a bold way.
With events held in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney, I took this opportunity to start a conversation with these incredible leaders, and whilst the questions had a similar context in each location, what came from each event was a very unique flavour of conversation bring the panellists unique thoughts and perspectives into view.
What emerged from these conversations were three key themes, with a few core ides as to how we can all elevate our experience of work.
So today’s episode is a wrap up of these learnings, plus a thought provoking question to get you pondering HOW this is showing up in your workplace and what your opportunity is to elevate it.
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This is our FINAL episode in the 6-part series bringing you all the conversations from my book launch events in Brisbane, Melbourne & Sydney, as we celebrated the release of The Next Workplace: Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential.
Today is Part 2 of our Sydney event conversations so if you missed part 1 or any of the previous 5 conversations for that matter, be sure to pop back and tune into those as well!
Each of these events were held with the purpose of starting a conversation on all things Work, People & Place. To take the opportunity and do something very intentional in progressing the conversation of enhancing and reimagining our workplaces for a new future.
Joined by leaders navigating the new frontier of what work looks like and the role that place plays in elevating our experience of work.
Our Sydney conversation explored the topics of
- what they have realised about the importance of the workplace,
- how they have seen the evolution of curating the employee experience in the workplace and what that looks like for them,
- how our workplaces can effectively support belonging and build connection in our people,
- what flexibility at work really looks like, and
- ultimately what does a good workplace look like?!
To join me in this conversation I invited Brad Krauskopf, CEO of HUB Australia to join us, along with Sophie Hart, Co-Founder of the Serenity Collective, host of the Thriving Workplace Event, and Nicole Karagiannis, Chief People Office at Harrison.ai.
Each of our guests bring a unique perspective to this conversation, with thoughtful insights that invited me to think more deeply about some of my own idea’s.
I hope this episode also inspires your thinking on what you can do to elevate the conversation in your workplace.
This is Part 2, from our Sydney conversations and our final episode in the 6 part series, so if you have missed any of the conversations from Brisbane, Melbourne & Sydney, be sure to head back and tune into those!
But to wrap up the book tour, lets get into today’s episode!
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The Melbourne launch event celebrating the release of my book The Next Workplace was a treat! This time I was indulged in reminiscing over another of my favourite projects, and a featured Case Study in the book, Davidson, a national workplace performance firm. What’s special about this client is that we have worked together on two projects now, Brisbane and Melbourne, and… this was the first time that Jacqui Whiteman, Davidsons COO, and I had met face to face!
Delivering Brisbane in the midst of the pandemic saw us experimenting with all the tech tools to continue to deliver our first-class service to our clients. With Melbourne following shortly after, and with their extended lockdowns, the entire Melbourne project has been delivered virtually.
This was a lovely opportunity for us to connect #IRL over a wine and reminisce, heading back to the very beginning, recalling the initial challenges that Davidson were facing in their space and the impact it was having on their people, their teams and overall business performance. Exploring the inspiration in their corporate values and social pillars, and the solution in the finished design, we then discuss the impact that the space has had and continues to have on their people, their recruitment, the cross-disciplinary collaboration and to their bottom line.
This is Part 1 in a 2-part conversation. Part 2 will follow in next weeks episode as Jacqui and I are joined by Kylie Baullo, Petrina Stewart and Dan Mottau for a panel conversation on all things work, people and place.
Melbourne is our second stop in the festivity’s celebration the launch of the book. Having kicked off in Brisbane, we finished in Sydney. All of these conversations are being shared right here on the podcast, so if you’ve missed the first two episodes from Brisbane, head back and tune into those. All up there will be 6 episodes sharing all of the conversations from the evenings, with so many takeaways on how we can all elevate our experience of work.
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To celebrate the release of my book The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential, I hosted a series of events in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney to start a bigger conversation on all things work, people & place. And how we can leverage one of our greatest assets, our Work Place, to elevate our human potential.
Our first event was in Brisbane, hosted by Hall Chadwick, a past client of COMUNiTI.
In Part 1 of our conversation, shared with you in the last episode, Director Rob Sendall and I were interviewed by Nadia Taylor, CEO of Mapien, another past clients of COMUNiTI, were we reflected on “Unearthing a Brand Story; How Hall Chadwick went back to its roots to redefine the Employee Experience”.
Today in Part 2 of our Brisbane Launch conversation, Rob, Nadia and I are joined by Kate Hill, Corporate Real Estate at APA and Jessica Sharpe, Chief People Officer at Entain Aust, as we dive into a lively conversation.
Through this conversation we discuss the role of the employee experience in our workplace and how brand experience shows up and the purpose of the workplace and how this supports their organisations to perform. We close out our conversation with an emotive conversation on the controversial 4-day work week, the opportunities and challenges whilst also taking a look at what flexibility can look like in varying service and product-based industries.
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To celebrate the release of my book The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential, I hosted a series of events in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney to start a bigger conversation on all things work, people & place. And how we can leverage one of our greatest assets our Work Place, to elevate our human potential.
Our first event was in Brisbane, hosted by Hall Chadwick, a past client of COMUNiTI. To kick off the conversations I invited Director Rob Sendall to join me as we were interviewed by another of my former clients at COMUNiTI, Nadia Taylor, CEO of Mapien.
Together we reflected on the journey we embarked on almost 6 years ago and the continued impact that the workplace has had on their business since. “Unearthing a Brand Story; How Hall Chadwick went back to its roots to redefine the Employee Experience”
This is the first part, in a two-part series from the evening. In Part 2, I’ll be sharing with you the panel conversation that followed, where we are joined by Jessica Sharpe, Chief People Officer at Entain and Kate Hill, Corporate Real Estate at APA.
You can see more of the Hall Chadwick Project below;
Case Study | Video
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Creating employee incentive programs and wellbeing initiatives have been known to take a “scattergun approach” offering the infamous fruit box or step count challenge or even prove to be nothing more than lip service beyond a company announcement.
However, to embed programs that make real transformative change to an organisation, the business first needs to understand their people and what would make the greatest impact on them and in return the organisation.
And that’s exactly how today’s guest has approached the implementation of such successful initiatives in their organisation.
Nicole Karagiannis is the Chief People Officer at Harrison.ai. With over 15 year’s experience in the Human Resources sector. Forging her career at Westpac prior to working in the fintech, health and disability sector, Nicole combines her experience and deep passion of care with the future focus of technology, to lead the Talent, Business Partners, Learning and Development, and IT professionals who enable harrison.ai to grow meaningfully, whilst fostering a culture of innovation and inclusion.
Harrison.ai is a health-tech scale-up dedicated to impacting millions of lives a day through comprehensive AI solutions as medical devices. The company operates two joint ventures: annalise.ai and franklin.ai. In her current role at harrison.ai, Nicole led the design of the organisation’s innovative “Becoming a parent” program which provides support for employees and their partners through early pregnancy loss and miscarriage.
In today’s conversation we explore Harrison.ai’s 6 pillar wellbeing program and how the pillar of Social Connection has impacted the design of their remote first workplace plus how Nicole came to develop the Becoming a Parent Program, the catalyst for the program, and how she developed a business case for the program that even got the CFO on board.
If you are business leader looking to push the boundaries of employee experience and to innovate new ways to become an employer of choice, or an employee considering the next phase of your life in starting a family, this episode will inspire you to think bigger about how your workplace can make a meaningful and intentional difference in the lives of your people.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
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Businesses often miss a HUGE opportunity when they start designing their next workplace. Often jumping in and trying to solve the immediate problem, they either start scribbling on floor plans or heading straight to market to see what the best leasing deal is. And while both activities are part of the process, they are not where organisations should start. This approach will leave your business with a short-term fix, rather than looking at the long-term view of the horizon.
The first chapter of my book The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential, and the first pillar in my Workplace Dynamics Blueprint, is Reimagining the Future of Work. And for good reason.
This is the first step that so many businesses miss, leaving them with a workplace that they begin to quickly outgrow or is no longer fit for purpose.
So. in today’s episode I’m sharing the three key things that all businesses should do BEFORE they embark on this exciting adventure to creating the next workplace, and how you can maximise this opportunity that you are likely to only get every 10 or more years.
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Introducing plants into our indoor environments can have an incredible impact on health, wellbeing and general disposition. Biophilic Design has been gaining traction in the design industry for several years now, and if you’re not familiar with this term, its essentially describing the innate human connection that we have with our natural world. And in relation to our indoor environments, it is, in essence bringing the outside in.
Which is the perfect segway to introduce today's guest, Ryan McQuerry of Auckland based interior plantscape firm, Outside In. As budding entrepreneur and lover of horticulture and nature, Ryan co-founded Outside In, in 2014.
Ryan and his team have been creating some incredible indoor plantscapes, describing the physical, emotional and profitable impact of introducing plants into our city workplaces, against the ability for us to access nature in our dense, built environments.
One of these projects is for litigation firm Meredith Connell in the heart of Auckland’s CBD. Inspired by the stress reducing, calm inducing great walks of New Zealand, Meredith Connell’s CEO wanted to recreate this immersive experience in their CBD office, for all their employees. Incorporating a custom designed Forest Floor and temperature-controlled forest terrarium, spanning 2 floors and 1,400sqm, this project is an incredible example of what is possible.
Ryan shares with us the inspiration for the project, the technical aspects of the install along with the observed and reported impact that the space has had on their employees.
The first of its kind, this project is sure not to be the last to embrace immersive interior plantscapes.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with the Outside In;
Website | Email | Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook | Meredith Connell Workplace
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“So, who are you working for?”
Working with clients to support them in the early phases of working out what their next workplace is going to look like, how it will work and more importantly how it will enable their people to work, requires me to start conversations that invite teams and employees to share their views on their ideal future workplace.
One of the questions that I get asked frequently at the outset of this process is, “So who are you working for?” The concern that many leaders have is, that if I’m asking their people what they want, that they are then somehow expected to deliver on those requests and expectations. That their vision for the business and the fact that they are paying the bill is disregarded.
The truth is very different.
Our role is to lead change. To first support the business leaders to work out where they want to be and then to guide their people there.
And along the way there will be some who believe that it “cannot be done”, and our role is to uncover the real reason beneath the tabled concerns and find solutions that work for their people and the business. Essentially calling bullsh*t and supporting another way.
So if you are a leader looking for support to lead a new way in your workplace, know that first and foremost we are working for you, but we will ensure that we bring your people on that journey with you.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
Let me know if any of these resonate for you… are you feeling overwhelmed, under the pump, stressed, completely time poor and like there aren’t enough hours in the day, which is leaving you totally exhausted and easily distracted...?
Sounding familiar? Well, you are not alone.
My guest today Dr Kristy Goodwin is here to tell us that thanks to our technology that has pervaded every corner of our lives, we are now living and working in ways that are completely incongruent with our neurobiology.
Dr Kristy has made multiple appearance here on the podcast and with the release of her latest book, Dear Digital, we need to talk, I had to have her back to share with us the impact that our “always on” digital world is having on us both personally and professionally.
Dr Kirsty is an award-winning research and speaker, who is on a mission to promote employee wellbeing and bolster workplace productivity.
As one of Australia’s digital wellbeing and productivity experts, she shares practical brain-based hacks to tame tech habits and the latest evidence-based strategies to decode the neurobiology of peak performance in the technological era.
Dr Kristy works with senior business leaders and HR executives across the country’s top organisations to support them in promoting employee digital wellbeing and performance.
In today’s conversation she’s shares with us the research and statistics on how our digital devices are impacting everything from our cortisol and stress levels to our sleep and even how we breathe! But don’t worry, she’s not going to just tell you all the bad things about our tech or recommend a digital detox, she also shares with us some simple, easy to adopt ways that we can tame our tech using her micro-habits, and implement “digital guardrails”.
Whether you are looking for easy ways to steal back your focus or a people and culture leader looking at how your organisation can foster digital boundaries as we navigate new, unchartered flexibility territory, Dr Kristy shares her ideas on how to make this a reality.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with the Dr Kristy Goodwin;
Website | LinkedIn | Instagram | Buy Dr Kristy’s new Book – Dear Digital
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
Creating workplaces that inspire the human potential of those who inhabit them is a deep purpose for me. The opportunity to inspire the leaders of businesses to take that extra step, to create something special and unique for their people and their business, just lights me up.
So, when I first met today’s guests, Claire & Sophie from the Serenity Collective back in 2019, it was love at first sight!
These two ladies have brought together their skills in innovation, learning design, change and community building to create the most beautiful community of humans, focused on enhancing the experience of work. The Serenity Collective brings together the kindest, most extraordinary people to catalyse real and lasting change in the world. Working with thousands of professionals every year has given them a unique insight into the “human side’ of business. They have witnessed first-hand the decline in physical, mental, emotional and spiritual wellbeing in the workplace and the devastating impact this is having at an individual organisation and societal level.
So, they decided to do something about and so the Serenity Collective was born!
Together these ladies have created an incredible community of change champions, inspired to transform work and the workplace so that we all thrive!
Which lead to the creation of the Thriving Workplace Event. This is not a conference, its is truly an event. Bringing together some of the industry’s best minds to share their stories, insights and what they have learnt about elevating the experience of work in their business’s so that we can all thrive.
So, in today’s conversation I’ve asked them to share why they believe this work is important, how they engage with organisations and what they have learned are the opportunities so that we can all embrace the change and adopt it into our organisations.
They also share the research that they conduct each year and the partners that they collaborate with to expand their reach out into the world, demonstrating the impact that this work can have on our people and our businesses so that we can all create thriving workplaces.
These are two very beautiful ladies and I’m sure that you’ll be just as inspired by them as I am, and those in the community they have built.
And let’s be honest… who doesn’t want to thrive at work?!?
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with the Serenity Collective;
Website | LinkedIn Sophie | LinkedIn Claire | Thriving Workplace Event 2023
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
Those who flow as life flows know they need no other force Lao Tzu
Ever wondered what it would be like for your life to feel completely effortless? Like you just breezed through your days, without hustling, striving, or pushing? Like you just moved with ebb and flow of the world around you, yet still got to where you want to go?
Embracing the quietness of the festive break, I had the space and time to reconnect with myself and realign my actions with those of the life I want to lead. A truly liberating thought.
Each year at this time I work my way through my Live a Life by Design workbook, checking in with my life plan and correcting course. I also use this time to set an intention for my year ahead. A word that anchors me to the state that I want to embrace for the year ahead.
This year my word is FLOW.
Whilst it came so effortlessly and easy this year, the layers of what this word means to me run far deeper than you might think. For me it’s a new way of living and an experiment for the year ahead.
One that embodies joy, embraces the cyclical nature of the world around us and within us and acknowledges our own unique design.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
BOOKS Do Less by Kate Northrup Essentialism Greg McKeown Effortless Greg McKeown
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper
I wrote a book!!! “The Next Workplace: Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential” is only a few short weeks away from being out in the world.
I have been writing this book for the past 4 years and researching it my whole career. Workplace design and the role that our environments play in enabling us to live our best lives is a conversation that I am incredibly passionate about and I am so thrilled to finally be able to share this passion with the world.
Writing a book is not for the faint hearted, and as you can probably tell from the fact that it has taken me 4 years to write this one, it hasn’t been a smooth and easy process. But it’s also something that I knew I needed to do to ensure that every business leader knew the opportunity that lay before them when embarking on the creation of a new space for their people.
And to help me share this journey with you, I’ve invited my coach Michelle Broadbent to turn the tables and interview me! Michelle jumps in and asks all the pointy questions form why I decided to write a book, through the process of writing, who helped me to get this done and of course, what the book is about and who it's for.
I’m so excited to be launching this book and I’d love you to come help me celebrate! I’ll be hosting book launches in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne [dates below] and would love to see you there!
And don’t forget to grab your copy of the book HERE!
Brisbane March 22nd | Melbourne March 29th | Sydney April 5th
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Michelle;
Website
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
When I got the opportunity to sit down with Paul Edwards the General Manager of Strategy and Customer at Mirvac, I couldn’t just end our conversation only having explored one aspect of what is a very large business! So welcome back for Part 2 of our conversation, The Art of Placemaking.
Mirvac is one of Australia’s largest commercial landlords, with their offering covers Retail, Office, Industrial and Build-to Rent.
The COMUNiTI team and I have recently completed the new workplace for APA, occupying 4,500sqm in Mirvac’s 80 Ann St building. This is an impressive building and one that I believe encapsulates many of the principles associated with the art of placemaking.
Placemaking is the idea that the spaces, buildings, precincts, neighbourhoods and city’s we create, form the heart of a community. It’s the idea of strengthening the connections between people and place instilling shared values. It’s the concept of creating a place that enhances user experience, delivering on physical, cultural, and social needs to establish a sense of belonging, connection and the further evolution.
So, to get the opportunity to speak with Paul about what inspired the design of 80 Ann St and its connection to place, was one I couldn’t pass up. Encompassing the heritage marketplace, the building is “quintessentially Queensland”, employing ground plane laneways and pathways, local art, whilst actively supporting homeless community engagement.
In addition to exploring this precinct, Paul also shares the journey that they have taken in creating their South Everleigh precinct in Sydney. Formerly an old railway yard, Mirvac has transformed this place into a thriving hub, embracing its heritage with a Blacksmith operating from the site, and an indigenous rooftop farm whilst considering the future sustainability with its use of solar. Paul shares with us their Place Manifesto covering the 6 Themes of ;
- Everything Connects
- Big Picture Thinking
- Creating Common
- Human Scale
- Be of the past
- Be for the future
As businesses choose where to locate their workplaces and with whom they are going to partner, these principles of delivering more than just a place for people to work, are only going to continue to become of greater priority as we strive to attract the best talent to our organisations. And I believe that considering these wider benefits is critical to our continued success and business performance, by enhancing our employee experience.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Paul & Mirvac;
Website | LinkedIn | Mirvac Whitepapers
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
Experimenting with what the workplace needs to look like as we navigate a new frontier, is an idea that many organisations are hesitant to embrace. It means doing something different, stepping outside the norms, creating a space that has not been proven and fronting up a fair bit of cash to do it. All of which sit quite outside the comfort zone and risk mitigation strategies that many businesses are prepared to accept.
Which is precisely why Mirvac, one of Australia’s largest commercial landlords, decided to take the first step within their own workplace and develop a pilot space to experiment with new ways of working, and lead the way for their customers, with their Adaptive Workplace.
Mirvac has been researching the future of the workplace long before COVID, through a series of Whitepaper Publications exploring everything from the Super Experience through to the Omni-Channel Worker. This research culminating in the concepts and principles they’ve implemented in their Adaptive Workplace.
Today’s guest is Paul Edwards, Mirvac’s General Manager of Strategy & Customer, and instrumental in the development of this progressive Pilot. Paul leads a team that set strategy, identify, and form strategic alliances, lead customer experience and transformation, build brand and deliver marketing for the Integrated Investment Portfolio business at Mirvac. The team, work across developments and existing assets, delivering services to the business which include foresight research, end to end design, customer experience design, brand programming, digital strategy, communications, and marketing.
This conversation takes us behind the scenes of;
- what lead to Paul and the team creating this progressive pilot space,
- the people that they engaged with on the way,
- the ideas, theories and concepts that they were hoping to test by creating the space
- the feedback, insights and learnings to date
- what the next steps are for this pilot space
As organisations grapple with what the future of the workplace will look like, this is a conversation that sheds some light on the possibilities before us and the role that data plays in informing our next steps.
This is the first part of my two part conversation with Paul, as I couldn’t give up the opportunity to make the most of my time with him and find out more about Mirvac’s approach to their property portfolio. In the second part of this conversation Paul and I discuss The Art of Placemaking, discussing two of their developments, 80 Ann St in Brisbane and South Everleigh in Sydney.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Paul & Mirvac;
Website | LinkedIn | Mirvac Whitepapers
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
2.5years ago, in the beginnings of a pandemic, I decided that I should launch my podcast. 100 episodes on and here we are! 🎉
A LOT has changed in this time. We’ve lived [and are living] through a pandemic, completely turned our idea of work upside down, questioned why we even need a workplace and battled so many more questions than we’d care to answer!
Over the past 100 episodes this podcast has been an integral part of my own journey in navigating this tumultuous time.
It has seen me transform not only my ideas on design, the workplace and the role that we play in supporting our clients on this journey, but it has also transformed me personally. I have grown, developed, and expanded my personal work style, my leadership, what I view success to be, and my depth of understanding on, what is culture, what it really means to embrace wellbeing, the relationship of brand and culture and even the extent to which our environments impact and guide our performance.
So in today’s episode I’m distilling the core learnings I’ve gleaned from these 100 episodes. What’s inspired me, changed my thinking, and set me on a new path.
I’ve captured them in three core themes;
- Wellbeing is embedded and holistic
It’s something you can see in a business, and it can be financially measured
- The Role of Our Environment
It impacts our behaviour and performance far more than I had truly understood
- It’s an inside job
Leadership, happiness, success. It all starts with you.
This podcast has given me the platform to engage with some incredible people who are the best in their field and each of them have left their mark.
Here’s to the next 100 episodes!
Until next time,
Mel
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Book a Discovery Call
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
I am taking a quick break for a couple of weeks and I wanted to share with you some of the listener favourites from the back catalogue.
If you haven't had a chance to listen to this one previously, or you're new here, I hope you enjoy this one!
I will be back with fresh new episodes in a couple of weeks!
Our environments have a HUGE impact on how we feel. This is the whole business that I’m in, designing and delivering workplaces that enable the strategic goals, vision and operational performance of a business. But it’s not just limited to our corporate workplaces. When you apply that same philosophy to any environment around you, consider what it is enabling? How does your environment make you feel?
Different spaces invoke different feelings and shift our ability to concentrate, collaborate or be creative. But it’s not just our physical environment that we need to be conscious of….
In today’s episode I’m sharing with you 5 ways that our environment influences us and our sense of Calm and what you can do to use your space to regain your sense of Calm each day.
We explore;
How your physical space influences your energy, your ability to focus and to be creative and how to choose wisely The impact of getting outside into nature and how as little as 40 secs can make a difference The additional mental load that a messy space has on your cognitive load and how to clear it How to use ALL our senses to instil calm in our environment How our internal environment is just as important as our external
This episode is a little insight into the recent 5 Days from Chaos to Calm challenge, I hosted, where over 5 days I share with you daily microhabits to integrate into your daily life to regain your calm.
If you enjoyed this episode and want to experience the whole 5 days of Calm, head over to the website, where you can still join the Challenge. https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/calm
I am taking a quick break for a couple of weeks and I wanted to share with you some of the listener favourites from the back catalogue.
If you haven't had a chance to listen to this one previously, or you're new here, I hope you enjoy this one!
I will be back with fresh new episodes in a couple of weeks!
------ A new year awaits us, and it’s how we purposefully and intentionally step into that year to achieve what we want that matters. Every year I spend a couple of days planning out the year ahead; what I want to achieve and where I want to focus my precious energy. Last year was the year I began to walk my own path and shrugged off notions of success of others that I had been carrying around and trying to live up to. But I’ll be honest; at the end of 2021, I was drained and completely exhausted. So, this year I have mapped out my activities and intentions but designed a way to achieve my goals without completely depleting all my energy. In this episode, I cover; My process for establishing focus and intentions for the year ahead. How I was able to look forward by looking back Understanding self-care, protection and boundaries Why I fell out of love with goal setting Doing more with less My ‘word’ for 2022 and why it resonates Unpacking intentions and my 5 intentions for the year ahead. I hope you enjoy this episode and find motivation to step into the new year with purpose and intention, as well as a focus for looking after your energy and wellbeing as we continue to live in difficult environments. Don't forget to sign up for the Work Life Lounge because in the next Masterclass, I’ll be taking you through my whole process for planning and goal setting, along with all the strategies and resources you’ll need to set yourself up and stick to it. Join me on February 10 at 10am AEST to set your intentions and map out your 2022! www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge
I am taking a quick break for a couple of weeks and I wanted to share with you some of the listener favourites from the back catalogue.
If you haven't had a chance to listen to this one previously, or you're new here, I hope you enjoy this one!
I will be back with fresh new episodes in a couple of weeks!
There has been a lot of conversation in the media of late about organisations handing out wellbeing days and rolling out new initiatives to combat The Great Resignation. However as you’ll hear in today’s chat, it’s not as simple as adding a few extra days of leave to the calendar; it takes careful, long-term planning and material change at an organisational level.
Jessica Sharpe is the Chief People Office for Entain Australia, a FTSE 100 company that is one of the world’s largest sports betting and gaming groups operating in the online and retail sector. You may be familiar with them as the local home of Ladbrokes and Neds. Jess has spent her career establishing and enhancing the HR functions into numerous businesses across multiple industries and as she reflects in this episode, whilst it has at times been a challenging path, it is one that has equipped her well in running lean and effective teams and learning how to influence and educate stakeholders on the value of investing in their people. When Jess isn’t at work, influencing and optimising human behaviour, she’s at home attempting to do the same with her three boys! Myself and the team here at COMUNiTI have had the great pleasure of working alongside Jess and her leadership team over the past 12mths, supporting their workplace transformation as they navigated the challenges of operating in a COVID world. We have been very privileged to have been able to witness first-hand the practices that have been implemented to see Entain leading the way in workplace flexibility, health & wellbeing and leadership that has enabled them to roll out Entain Day. In this chat, we also cover; Jess’s career journey to date and how she came to be the Chief People Officer at Entain How the organisation has evolved in response to the global pandemic Entains mission to drive diversity & inclusion, not just in the technology sector but globally And Jess’s own personal practices to support her living her own work life by design Jess is a warm, engaging and thoughtful leader and the opportunity to glean her insights in how she has supported Entain to move forward with such a bold workplace initiative is truly inspiring. Work Life Lounge – sign up for free thanks to COMUNiTI!
www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge Jessica Sharpe LinkedIn Melissa Marsden Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Taking a future focused approach is a central part of the work that I do in guiding organisations in reimagining their next workplace. Observing the current state, understanding the businesses strategic objectives, and then overlaying their brand and culture, we develop the blueprint for their workplace that will enable them to achieve their goals.
And where does this all start? Typically, with the question “What do we do?”
So, in today’s episode, I’m sharing with you my Workplace Predictions for 2023, based on the conversations that I’ve been having with my clients, my observations of what’s happening in the market and the outcomes that created from the process. And these three predictions are;
- Exploration of the questions “What do we do?!?!” - What does my workplace need to do? What does it look like? How much space do I need?”
- Consolidation & right sizing of Workplaces
- Our workplaces are becoming “Creative Coworking” environments
As we take a look at each of these three predictions, we’ll look at;
- What are some of the questions that you need to start exploring in your business
- The impact of your workspace on relationships, communication, and the energy of your people
- The value of consolidation and the impact on the energy of your business
- Why all collaboration is not equal, and the variety of spaces required to support your teams
- Why our workplaces need quiet spaces, even when we can WFH
- The pursuit of the “holy grail” of tech
If your organisation is navigating any of these challenges or beginning to start this conversation, this is an episode, you’ll want to tune into. It will get you thinking and arm you with some points to start the conversations in your organisation.
Thank you so much for re-joining me here on the podcast after my break! Wishing you and your loved ones a very Merry Christmas and a safe and Happy New Year! See you in 2023!
And… don’t forget if you LOVED this episode, please share with just ONE person so that we can continue to elevate our whole experience of work!
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Book a Discovery Call
Workplace Dynamics Blueprint
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
“We know that our workplace isn’t working, but we don’t know what to do to change it…”
This is one of the most common statements I’m hearing now when it comes to organisations starting their journey to rethinking how their workplace… works.
Organisations are wanting to understand how they can create a better experience of work for their people using their space. How they can create a place that people want to be, and one that enables them to perform.
Unfortunately, there is no quick or easy answer to this question. It is nuanced and very specific to each business, but what I can tell you is that the answer lies in your employee experience.
And when it comes to the design our workplaces, there are three layers to designing your workplace experience, and it’s important that each of these are addressed equally.
- It’s an employee’s experience working with your company
- It’s an employee’s experience of the physical workplace environment
- It’s an employee’s experience of change
In today’s episode we’re going to explore these three layers with a view to understanding how you can begin your journey.
- Why defining your employee experience is the foundation
- How to infuse your employee experience into the physical environment
- How the alignment of the heart, body and mind of your workplace enables your workplace to perform
- Why guiding change in your workplace is the key to success
This is a BIG conversation, and with numerous contributing elements that need careful consideration. This episode will help you to uncover your starting point, so that you too can begin to design the experience that you want for your employees.
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Book a Discovery Call
Seqwater Onboarding Video
Gallups Employee Experience Framework
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
Maintaining connection in a hybrid world of work is no small task. Following periods of extended separation due to lockdowns during the pandemic, we are now navigating a new world of work where, with our increased flexibility of where we work, we are facing new challenges in staying connected and fuelling our sense of belonging.
My guest today is Tegan Davies, the General Manager and Head of Wellbeing at The Oranges Toolkit. An award winning social enterprise that builds positive wellbeing, mental and emotional agility in workforces and communities, returning profits to Camp Quality to support kids facing cancer in Australia.
Tegan is an experienced and passionate wellbeing designer and facilitator. She is also a former Board Member at Action for Happiness Australia, a business coach and qualified yoga teacher.
Through her work with Oranges Toolkit Teagan is building the wellbeing literacy of corporations across Australia, by supporting their employees in navigating these intense periods of change, with a view to improving their wellbeing.
Today’s conversation is a deep dive into how we can build connection in our workplaces, a foundational requirement in creating psychological safety.
We discuss;
- The foundational principles of building wellness literacy in our organisations
- The simplest, yet most often overlooked way to build connection
- The impact of regular deposits into our colleagues “feel good” bank
- The ripple effect of our emotions and how we show up
- The early insights into The Oranges Toolkit survey on what it takes to create connection
As a fellow science nerd, I love this conversation with Tegan as she shares the data and science of our emotions and the impact on us and those around us, and why awareness is only the first step.
Join The Oranges Toolkit mailing list to receive the Connection Whitepaper when it's released!
LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Tegan & The Oranges Toolkit Website | LinkedIn | Connection Whitepaper
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
Books mentioned; Atomic Habits – James Clear Effortless – Greg McKeown
Have you ever noticed how sometimes you become so absorbed in what you are doing that you lose track of time? That what you are doing feels so effortless, so easy that you can almost do it without thinking? This is what it feels like to be working in flow. To be working in your zone of genius, where you do what you do with absolute mastery.
In today’s episode I’m sharing with you how you can find your own zone of genius, by reflecting on the process I’ve finding my own, and why it’s not all about just focusing in on our “work life” but our “whole life”.
You’ll learn;
- Why just because your good at something doesn’t mean it’s in your zone of genius
- How to find your zone of genius through reflection, analysis, and environment
- Why you need lived experience to find your zone of genius
- Why your zone of genius requires you to think bigger than just your career, but to more broadly your whole life
This is your life. You get to write the script, but sometimes knowing what to write can be the greatest challenge. Let’s start by owning your unique talents, perspective and insights, the things that bring you joy!
LINKS
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
Guiding your people through change successfully can be one of the most difficult things an organisation can do. I’ve seen how change can be done poorly, and often because of simply not knowing that engaging people through the process and onboarding them into a new space or to a new system, was needed to ensure its success.
People are creatures of habit and what we see happen is that old habits, routines, and rituals get transferred to the new state, where they no longer work or go against the new way of working or operating.
So, I wanted to get the back story on why change is so important to get right in an organisation and some of the things we should be considering when embarking on a change process, and when we need to bring in the professionals to support us.
Today’s guest is Dr Kate Byrne. With a PhD in Communication and 20+ years in the field, Kate is an experienced strategist, change leader and communication practitioner who supports senior leaders through organisational change and on how to design and bring to life, strategic narratives.
She is the host of The New Way podcast, as well as the managing director of EVER Change & Communication - a dynamic consultancy that helps public sector leaders drive and deliver organisational transformation, behavioural change, to improve organisational performance and help their people adopt new ways of working.
We chat about;
- The greatest area that organisations are looking for support when it comes to change
- The impact of storytelling and how to use a strategic narrative
- The tipping point for engaging external support for implementing successful change
- Why change follows a framework but requires to be unique to your business
- Why communication is the core of a successful change strategy and why we need to focus on the “moments” vs the “events”
- The one area that all businesses should be focused on to elevate our experience of work
Plus, we kick it off with a common values alignment… our No Dickheads policy! And end with our shared passion for continual evolution and why change is good!
Links
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Kate
Website | LinkedIn | Podcast
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
Running a business with a newborn is no small task! So, in today’s episode, I’m sharing with you the intimate details of how I prepared my business, my team, my clients and myself, for this time ensuring we were set up for success.
With a new baby, you really are at their beck and call so being highly intentional with the finite amount of time that you do have, is so important to ensure that you are investing it wisely. It also means that there are likely to be a few things that either get put on the back burner or are pushed out.
Putting this plan in place enabled me to be present with my new baby, and with my clients where it mattered most.
There were three things that I needed to make this time work for me, my business, my clients and my family:
-
Assess the existing workload.
- With a pipeline of work needing to be delivered, I had no capacity to accept any more, so closing the books was the first step
-
Assess the tasks and activities – what could be successfully outsourced?
- With a guaranteed period of absence, who could I get to step in and cover me for a short period of time?
- What parts of the project could I completely handover to reduce my load and free me up to do only what I can do?
-
Needed a plan
-
- I needed a plan that captured key dates, project milestones, communication channels, when and how I could be contacted and what to do incase of an emergency. This plan was our road map to the prep required before bub and the first 8 weeks after bub was born, ensuring that everything was managed as planned.
So, how did it all go… you’ll have to tune in to find out!
Links
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
Running a business with a newborn is no small task! So, in today’s episode, I’m sharing with you the intimate details of how I prepared my business, my team, my clients and myself, for this time ensuring we were set up for success.
With a new baby, you really are at their beck and call so being highly intentional with the finite amount of time that you do have, is so important to ensure that you are investing it wisely. It also means that there are likely to be a few things that either get put on the back burner or are pushed out.
Putting this plan in place enabled me to be present with my new baby, and with my clients where it mattered most.
There were three things that I needed to make this time work for me, my business, my clients and my family:
-
Assess the existing workload.
- With a pipeline of work needing to be delivered, I had no capacity to accept any more, so closing the books was the first step
-
Assess the tasks and activities – what could be successfully outsourced?
- With a guaranteed period of absence, who could I get to step in and cover me for a short period of time?
- What parts of the project could I completely handover to reduce my load and free me up to do only what I can do?
-
Needed a plan
-
- I needed a plan that captured key dates, project milestones, communication channels, when and how I could be contacted and what to do incase of an emergency. This plan was our road map to the prep required before bub and the first 8 weeks after bub was born, ensuring that everything was managed as planned.
So, how did it all go… you’ll have to tune in to find out!
Links
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
With organisations working hard to lure employees back into the workplace, this is the ideal time for us to take a fresh perspective on what it takes to elevate our workplace experience; by creating an environment that people choose to come to. The role of the office has shifted from a place we needed to “go to work”; to a place that facilitates connection, collaboration, communication, and learning, promoting a new level of productivity, health & well-being. With this perspective, now is the time to take a wider view and look outside the typical workplace to be inspired by how other industries create places where people choose to return to, again and again. Industries, such as hospitality. Today’s guest is Brad Krauskopf the founder and CEO of Hub Australia. A market-leading premium workspace-as-a-service platform renowned for its customer service and company culture. Hub delivers hospitality-driven solutions that create workspace experiences that people love, And that is something that myself and the COMUNiTI crew can vouch for as tenants of their Anzac Square space. Hub is also a BCorp, they are certified Carbon neutral, are WELL Health & Safety accredited, and has been ranked 4 years running as one of Australia’s best employers by the Great Places To Work program. Brad is also the founding Co-chair of Flexible Workspace Australia, the peak industry body for flexible and coworking space in Australia. As both a tenant and a big fan of coworking this was a great opportunity for me to sit down with Brad and learn more about the hospitality-led approach that the HUB are renowned for. We chat about: • Why HUB have made it a priority to obtain the credentials they have and the impact on their business • How we are “unshackling work from place” as a result of the pandemic, the role that coworking spaces play, and the future of “work near home” options • Brad’s observation of the real estate market and if “the office is dead” • How our workplaces can incorporate a hospitality-led approach and the value it adds to our people and place • Why landlords are welcoming co-working operators into their buildings and the opportunities they provide for all tenants Whether you are looking to elevate the experience of work for your people, considering shifting to a flexible space model with coworking, or planning ahead for your next lease renewal, this episode will give you food for thought on how you can create a workplace that delights your people! Links
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Brad
Website | LinkedIn | Liberated Work Whitepaper
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
With organisations working hard to lure employees back into the workplace, this is the ideal time for us to take a fresh perspective on what it takes to elevate our workplace experience; by creating an environment that people choose to come to. The role of the office has shifted from a place we needed to “go to work”; to a place that facilitates connection, collaboration, communication, and learning, promoting a new level of productivity, health & well-being. With this perspective, now is the time to take a wider view and look outside the typical workplace to be inspired by how other industries create places where people choose to return to, again and again. Industries, such as hospitality. Today’s guest is Brad Krauskopf the founder and CEO of Hub Australia. A market-leading premium workspace-as-a-service platform renowned for its customer service and company culture. Hub delivers hospitality-driven solutions that create workspace experiences that people love, And that is something that myself and the COMUNiTI crew can vouch for as tenants of their Anzac Square space. Hub is also a BCorp, they are certified Carbon neutral, are WELL Health & Safety accredited, and has been ranked 4 years running as one of Australia’s best employers by the Great Places To Work program. Brad is also the founding Co-chair of Flexible Workspace Australia, the peak industry body for flexible and coworking space in Australia. As both a tenant and a big fan of coworking this was a great opportunity for me to sit down with Brad and learn more about the hospitality-led approach that the HUB are renowned for. We chat about: • Why HUB have made it a priority to obtain the credentials they have and the impact on their business • How we are “unshackling work from place” as a result of the pandemic, the role that coworking spaces play, and the future of “work near home” options • Brad’s observation of the real estate market and if “the office is dead” • How our workplaces can incorporate a hospitality-led approach and the value it adds to our people and place • Why landlords are welcoming co-working operators into their buildings and the opportunities they provide for all tenants Whether you are looking to elevate the experience of work for your people, considering shifting to a flexible space model with coworking, or planning ahead for your next lease renewal, this episode will give you food for thought on how you can create a workplace that delights your people! Links
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Brad
Website | LinkedIn | Liberated Work Whitepaper
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
After 5 months off to welcome our new son Nash to the family, I’m back and ready to dive in!
I know it probably sounds strange, being a new mum again, but I am feeling refreshed and re-inspired from my break and with a fresh perspective on work and life.
So, today’s episode is to catch you up on what’s been happening over the last 5 mths and to share with you the clarity that comes from a little distance, plus what you can expect from this next season on the Podcast!
Clarity comes from space, and whilst I’ve had a little person very much up in my space over the past few months, I’ve had the mental space to reflect on what’s next for me and my work life.
So I’m sharing with you…
- How re-connecting with your values can help you redesign your work life
- How I used the 80/20 rule to narrow down my focus in the business
- The three ways that I’m being intentional about the finite amount of time I have
- How I’m using the business to leverage that time by working in my zone of genius with other geniuses to deliver extraordinary value to our clients!
PLUS, I’ve got a very exciting announcement to share with you… my book will be released early next year!!!
The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential
This book has been in the making for a while now and I’m so excited to be able to share it with you. The Next Workplace, is about connecting the concepts of modern day management theory to the structural design of our physical workplace environments, aligning, enabling and inspiring the human potential of every organisation.
AND this next season of the podcast is going to be exploring these concepts of what’s next for our workplaces as we chat with academics, business leaders, change champions, innovators, and landlords on what it takes to elevate our experience of work.
If there’s a topic you’d like explored or a guest that you’d like me to chat with so you can be a fly on the wall, then get in touch and let me know.
Links
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
After 5 months off to welcome our new son Nash to the family, I’m back and ready to dive in!
I know it probably sounds strange, being a new mum again, but I am feeling refreshed and re-inspired from my break and with a fresh perspective on work and life.
So, today’s episode is to catch you up on what’s been happening over the last 5 mths and to share with you the clarity that comes from a little distance, plus what you can expect from this next season on the Podcast!
Clarity comes from space, and whilst I’ve had a little person very much up in my space over the past few months, I’ve had the mental space to reflect on what’s next for me and my work life.
So I’m sharing with you…
- How re-connecting with your values can help you redesign your work life
- How I used the 80/20 rule to narrow down my focus in the business
- The three ways that I’m being intentional about the finite amount of time I have
- How I’m using the business to leverage that time by working in my zone of genius with other geniuses to deliver extraordinary value to our clients!
PLUS, I’ve got a very exciting announcement to share with you… my book will be released early next year!!!
The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential
This book has been in the making for a while now and I’m so excited to be able to share it with you. The Next Workplace, is about connecting the concepts of modern day management theory to the structural design of our physical workplace environments, aligning, enabling and inspiring the human potential of every organisation.
AND this next season of the podcast is going to be exploring these concepts of what’s next for our workplaces as we chat with academics, business leaders, change champions, innovators, and landlords on what it takes to elevate our experience of work.
If there’s a topic you’d like explored or a guest that you’d like me to chat with so you can be a fly on the wall, then get in touch and let me know.
Links
Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential”
Connect with Mel
Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website
With only 2 weeks before we welcome our newest addition to the family, this isn’t quite the podcast episode that I had planned to be sharing with you back in January when I was mapping out this season’s episodes! I had planned to share with you how I’d snagged myself a Unicorn GM enabling me to sail off into babyland with my business baby in the best of hands, however that dream didn’t come to reality, despite the best of intentions…
When I found out I was pregnant, I jumped into action mode, tuning into podcasts to hear how others before me had restructured their business’s to accommodate a 2IC, the planning and training to feel like they could “let go” and enjoy those precious early months with their baby and I wanted that!
But alas, this episode is to give you a behind the scenes look into another scenario that can and did play out for me in my business, because I’m all about sharing the highs and the lows of business and what can and does happen.
To round out Season 4 of the podcast, as I take a break to enjoy those newborn cuddles, I want to leave with you a real account of preparing a business for a baby.
We cover:
- The planning, recruitment, and promotion in the search of our Unicorn, including the challenges of finding “the right person”
- How remaining aligned to my intentions for this year and for this addition to our family set me on a different course to the one I would “normally” have embarked on
- How a shift in my own mindset created a gap in the business and shifted the goal posts
- How despite what we hear in the media, not everyone wants to step into that gap
- The opportunity that comes with change and vulnerable, honest conversations can lead to a new and improved business model
- The importance of taking a step back to reflect rather than diving into “fix it” mode
- The plan moving forward…
This episode is a reminder that whilst not everything is always rainbows and unicorns, sometimes a situation, that on face value isn’t living up to the expectations you set, can turn out to be far more aligned with your bigger vision than you realised.
Insta | LinkedIn | Facebook | Website | Work Life Lounge
Attending #IRL events again has to have been a highlight for me in the past month and the Thriving Workplace event did not disappoint!
This event is unlike any other conference and was a deep 2 days of sharing ideas, experiences, and the opportunities to make our working lives more fulfilling for everyone.
Not only did I get to walk away from these two days with an overflowing cup, from the conversations, connections, and inspiration from those I shared it with, but I also expanded my personal perspective on what it takes to create a Thriving Workplace.
In today’s episode I’m sharing with you the three key themes that emerged for me from this gathering, the learnings that I am taking away to share with my clients and colleagues and the impact that these, sometimes small, shifts have made within the organisations that shared their stories.
One thing is for certain, creating a thriving workplace is a holistic endeavour that requires our organisations to share the responsibility and approach from a range of viewpoints to maximise the potential before us.
It requires conversation, policy change, shifts in language and mindset, openness to new possibilities, new routines, new rituals, and new behaviours.
This is just the start of a much broader conversation, that in many ways has been enabled by the pandemic. The opportunity to re-examine what was, in order to create what could be.
I’d love to know what your organisation is already embracing and what opportunity you could take back into your workplace from these three key themes to see your workplace transform from the inside out.
Melissa Marsden
LinkedIn | Insta |
Website | Work Life Lounge
Creating organisational change at a grass roots level requires a lot of different skills, which is why I enjoy working alongside my friend and colleague Dr Meg Hooper to support the businesses and leaders that we work with. Together, we do this from not just a physical perspective but also a psychological one.
With a shared passion for the impact and influence of space and place, Meg and I work in tandem to enable organisations to make positive shifts in their workplaces to enable high performance.
Today’s episode is a treat, to be able to share with you some of the conversations that we have about how our world of work is changing and the opportunity that this brings with it. We cover everything from why change management needs to start early and the impact of a 1hr workshop on shifting mindsets, through to the science behind energy management and motivational theory, through to how this is contributing to the Great Resignation.
Meg is the Director & lead Psychologist of Carousel Consulting, specialists in Change Management and Organisational Transformation, she brings a science-based perspective to our conversations that I find enlightening and always walk away better for. Meg and I can and do chat for hours, so we thought we’d share with you some of our conversations!
And if you want more, pop back to Eps 44, where Meg and I explore the concept of designing work in a “choose your own adventure style”.
Dr Meg Hooper
LinkedIn | Website
Melissa Marsden
LinkedIn | Insta |
Website | Work Life Lounge
The demand for workplaces that respond to the health and wellbeing of its occupants has exponentially increased off the back of the global pandemic, driving a need for organisations and landlords alike to deliver on a more holistic approach to building design and construction.
Whilst in the past the adoption of healthy building practices may have been more aligned to market positioning and differentiation, potentially viewed as more tokenistic approaches to wellbeing, today we can attribute the investment in these avenues to substantial uplifts in employee performance and productivity, delivering ROI to businesses.
And this is where my guest today has seen a huge shift in the way we approach the design of our buildings and spaces through his involvement with the Well Building Institute.
Ken-Yi Fong is one of the leading healthy building design and acoustic experts in Australia. Ken has an impressive list of accreditations and affiliations that have seen him become a WELL Accredited Professional and then appointed to the WELL Global Advisory Board and member of the WELL Faculty.
Ken is all about amplifying the impact of people and organisations using Health, Wellbeing and Wellness as their secret weapon! He leads the Healthy Buildings & Communities work in Arup Melbourne, where he supports the Property sector to achieve greater commercial outcomes (faster leasing, higher premiums on saleable assets, stronger organisational engagement, etc) by leveraging the Healthy Buildings Frameworks
Ken has a deep passion in helping families and individuals amplify their impact in all spheres of life. He achieves this by coaching and education in the fields of healthy buildings/spaces, habit formation, productivity, and holistic health coaching. He is also an amateur bio-hacker and crypto enthusiast.
This is a fascinating conversation that explores what the WELL Building Institute & WELL Building Standards are, but more importantly the impact that the concepts and frameworks that form this standard have on our people and the direct impact of that on our businesses.
For many of the organisations that I work with there is a genuine interest in developing solid health & wellbeing initiatives for their employees, however applying this to the built environment can sometimes seem rather ethereal and not directly applicable. This conversation will change your perspective on this and provide you with some tangible stats that will enable a more robust conversation around the boardroom table, to elevate the need to adopt a healthier approach to the design and fit out of your next workplace.
Ken also leaves us with an insight into how he has designed his own work life, that truly resonated with my own views.
So, lets jump on in!
Links
Ken-Yi Fong
LinkedIn | Website
Stok Paper
Leesman Index
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook | Website | Work Life Lounge
Data provides knowledge, and with knowledge comes insight and wisdom.
But... you need to know what to do with it…
The conversation about returning to the workplace continues and what you may not know is that all the data that you need to leverage your environment and create an experience that employees WANT to return for lies within your very 4 walls!
The challenge is working out how to unlock it and what to do with it!
In today’s episode we’ll recap on the 5 pillars that underpin the workplace dynamics in your organisation and how these pillars form the foundation for creating your employee experience at work.
When unlocked, these pillars enable your workplace to become a beacon for your employees, one that draws them in, connecting to their hearts and minds, to build the social capital in your business.
This social capital is built on a platform that comes from our human need for connection, our need to belong and to establish community, much of which requires us to be within physical proximity [I’ll share some neuroscience that backs this up!].
But transformation doesn’t come without struggle, So, I’ll also share with you ways that you can guide your employees through this change, addressing their concerns, meeting them where they are at, and bringing them on the journey to create a workplace that delivers an “experience”, from which everyone will THRIVE!
LINKS
Workplace Dynamics Blueprint
Work Life Lounge
Website
Insta
Today’s episode is a bit of a sneak peek behind the curtains of my own work life… today I am going to be introducing you to three amazing and very different women who I’ve got in my corner. Over the past 12 years, I have worked with coaches in various capacities to support my continued learning, professional and personal development. These coaches have ranged in style from pure business coaches to NLP and life coaches, through to mindset coaches and the more holistic and what I would describe as spiritual coaches.
Each has supported me at a different phase and season of my life to navigate a challenge, uplevel my skills or help me focus on bringing my A Game in the area of my work or life that I’ve needed at that time.
Let’s face it, the past two years have been a total shit show and if I’m honest, so has been my mindset and the state of my business at times, which is why in the past 2 years I have been working with not 1, but 3 coaches to support me in the various aspects of my life and work.
And today, I’m going to introduce you to these amazing women who have got my back!
Tina Tower, Michelle Broadbent & Amber Hawken.
In today’s conversation, we are covering everything from
- Why you would want a coach
- How coaches have supported them to get to where they are today
- What to look for when hiring a coach
- The various models of coaching and how to decide what’s right for you
Plus, they answer the question “Do coaches have coaches?”
I’m hoping that after this episode that if you are feeling like it’s time to level up in your business or career, that you’re feeling a little stagnant and are looking for your next challenge or that you just need someone to keep you accountable, that this will be the little kick in the backside that you needed, to go seek out your own coach and prepare to take great leaps forward!
BIOs
Tina Tower started her first business at age 20, a small tutoring centre and educational toy store that over 5 years she transformed into a franchise of 35 Begin Bright centres employing 120 staff.
After the franchise was acquired in 2016, she started coaching other service-based business owners only to find herself constantly repeating herself, which led her to the world of online coaching.
Today Tina has run several online programs, however, her game-changer has been Her Empire Builder, which I am fortunate to be part of! Her Empire Builder is a membership program supporting female entrepreneurs to establish and grow their online businesses. She is on a mission to help 100 women build a $1million a year business by 2025.
Tina has been instrumental in helping me navigate the online business world, which I can tell you is a massive shift from the world of bricks and mortar businesses!
Michelle Broadbent is a business strategist with a 20-year career as a trusted advisor to female entrepreneurs across a vast array of industries. I have observed Michelle from afar for a few years before finding myself with direct access to her through Tina’s HEB program, where I promptly jumped on her services with a desperate plea for help as I navigated my way out of the downturn resulting from COVID.
Michelle has been a realistic voice of reason, offering practical solutions and operational support to cut through the overwhelm and help me stay focused on what really matters!
Amber Hawken, you may be familiar with as one of my very first guests on the podcast back in Episode 4, Transforming Leadership with a Calm Mind, which was actually how I met Amber! It was after this episode that I said, “I need to work with you!” and here we are today!
I affectionately refer to Amber as my “woo woo” coach as her teachings, perspectives and lessons go far deeper into the fibres of our being.
As Amber describes, she has been working with humans for more than a decade and reverences our natural ability to emotionally and mentally self-heal and spiritually actualise.
Starting out her career as a radiation therapist, she transitioned away from the industry in 2012 and has since explored ancient cultures, different dimensions and bridged east and west. With a pragmatic mind and a country girl spirit, she has a unique blend of practical and down to earth approaches to the arena of therapy, embodied healing, integration, energy, and consciousness.
LINKS
Tina Tower
https://www.tinatower.com
Instagram @tina_tower
Michelle Broadbent
https://www.michellebroadbent.com.au
Instagram @michbroadbent
Amber Hawken
https://amberhawken.com
Instagram @amber_hawken
Mel Marsden
Insta
LinkedIn
Facebook
Website
Work Life Lounge
Did you know that the Monday to Friday, 9 to 5 workday was established by Henry Ford in the 1920’s? Seems to me that a lot has changed since the days we stood over factory lines, yet we still subscribe to the same working rituals.
Many of us, prior to the Pandemic, never even stopped to consider why it is that we work the way that we do or that there was even another option to be considered.
There has been a silver lining that has shone through the pandemic, one that has awoken us to the outdated work rhythms and structures that no longer work for us. We have been exposed to our conditioned thinking, our acceptance of “this is how it’s always been done,” and forced to recognise that there are other ways, and they can work.
In today’s episode, I’m taking you on a short history lesson of “work”, how the 9 to 5 came to be and why it no longer works for us on so many levels.
We’ll discuss the two main things that I believe have arisen out of this “awakening” and we dive deeper into the aspect of individualisation and designing our work lives to work for US and our families.
We explore chronotypes, the rise of the gig economy, the elusive pursuit of work life balance, asynchronous working, plus the sea change/tree change that many have embraced with “work from anywhere” policies.
This episode invites you to take this opportunity to take a step back and look at the bigger picture and identify where your current work ritual and routine may not be supporting you and your productivity and reimagine a new way forward.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook | Website | Work Life Lounge
Imagine this… You’re on a business retreat and as part of the “surprise & delight” culture, you’re being driven to an undisclosed location for your next activity. You arrive at a local swimming pool where you are taken into a classroom and you begin to learn about the physiology and biology of breathing, the impact that is has on the performance and function of our physical body. You’re shown how different breathing methods influence the amount of oxygen in your blood, how many breaths you can take and how simply changing the way you breath using different techniques can change the way you feel in your body.
The next thing we are in the pool, practicing various breathing techniques as we swim from one side to the other with a single breath, elevating our heart rates and then doing it again experiencing that feeling in your chest, of the pressure building, of so desperately wanting to take a breath but pushing through….
I continue to progressively push myself physically out of my comfort zone over the course of a few hours – to the point that if I was a surfer, I could survive a wipe out.
What was happening right there in that pool, was that I was being shown how with the use of my breathe, my mindset and practiced techniques, I could continue to push myself beyond what I would have previously considered my physical limits, and to demonstrate to myself that I am capable of more than I thought, with the right tools.
This whole experience was led by today’s guest, Nam Baldwin. I was fascinated by this session and the work that Nam does, and how he has translated his experience of working with elite athletes to working with some our top business executives.
Nam has an impressive client list that includes, Mick Fanning, Steph Gilmore, Pat Rafter, AFL’s Richmond Tigers, NRL’s Sydney Roosters plus Olympic Athletes and World Champions.
And he’s also the best kept secret of some of our top 1% business leaders…
Nam has a gift for simplifying the complicated science behind brain and body performance, & delivering it in life-changing, digestible sessions, creating proven successes and powerful outcomes across all scenarios.
In today’s episode we get into:
- How the techniques that he taught us in the pool translate into the boardroom
- The power of the breath and why such a simple thing can be so powerful
- His definition of performance and why it’s not about going harder for longer
- Why a foundation of personal wellbeing is so important for our own performance
- Managing good stress and bad stress
- As well as How our own sense of identity and purpose contributes to our overall wellbeing, resilience, and prioritisation of what’s important
Nam has a way of explaining things in a way that make sense and you can take away and implement into your daily life.
NAM Baldwin
Website
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook | Website | Work Life Lounge
Our environments have a HUGE impact on how we feel. This is the whole business that I’m in, designing and delivering workplaces that enable the strategic goals, vision and operational performance of a business. But it’s not just limited to our corporate workplaces. When you apply that same philosophy to any environment around you, consider what it is enabling? How does your environment make you feel?
Different spaces invoke different feelings and shift our ability to concentrate, collaborate or be creative.
But it’s not just our physical environment that we need to be conscious of….
In today’s episode I’m sharing with you 5 ways that our environment influences us and our sense of Calm and what you can do to use your space to regain your sense of Calm each day.
We explore;
- How your physical space influences your energy, your ability to focus and to be creative and how to choose wisely
- The impact of getting outside into nature and how as little as 40 secs can make a difference
- The additional mental load that a messy space has on your cognitive load and how to clear it
- How to use ALL our senses to instil calm in our environment
- How our internal environment is just as important as our external
This episode is a little insight into the recent 5 Days from Chaos to Calm challenge, I hosted, where over 5 days I share with you daily microhabits to integrate into your daily life to regain your calm.
If you enjoyed this episode and want to experience the whole 5 days of Calm, head over to the website, where you can still join the Challenge.
https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/calm
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook | Website
We've all been through a LOT the past 2 years and sometimes it can feel like it's only happening to us! We can sometimes feel like we are living in the middle of a total sh*t show, while Sally over the fence has it all together..... I'm super excited about today's episode because I have brought together three very special ladies Dr Kristy Goodwin, Angela Lockwood and Dr Alison Young in a panel-style discussion, exploring overwhelm, burnout and how we can put boundaries in place to support ourselves when we're navigating "all the things"
Each of these women are total rock stars in their own right, you can learn a little more about them below!
I wanted to hear what they are observing in the people they are supporting, to help draw back the curtain a little and enable us all to realise, that it's not just happening to us, we aren't alone.
In this episode they cover:
- Their personal experiences over the past 2 years
- Some funny anecdotes about working from home and lock down life
- Triggers we should be keeping our eye on
- Ways we can shift ourselves out of a triggered state, regain our sanity and put the handbrake on burnout
I loved this conversation and knew it was going to be a great episode to record. What else would you expect by putting 4 women together talking business, burnout and motherhood!
You may have heard Dr Kristy on the podcast before, way back at Eps 17! Kristy translates the science of digital productivity and wellbeing into realistic strategies so individuals can achieve peak performance in a digital world. She's a professional speak, a researcher, an author and a mum of 3 young boys!
Angela is Australia's leading authority on creating calm classrooms, kids and families. She's the Founder of Educate Therapy, a consulting practice bridging the gap between the health and education systems, the author of two books on creating calm, "The Power of Conscious Choice" and "Switch Off" and the host of "A Kid's Life" podcast. She's also a mum of 2!
And last but not least we have gorgeous Dr Ali, who is a chiropractor on a mission to help working mums reclaim their health and rebalance their hearts to overcome burnout, exhaustion and fatigue. As a recovered burnt-out mother herself, she understands the fine line that exists between vitality and doing everything too often. Ali's first book is coming out in April to help all mums step into their light and shine brightly. She's also a mum of 2!
Links
Dr Kristy Goodwin
Website
Hybrid Working Whitepaper
Instagram @drkristy
Angela Lockwood
Website
Instagram @angelalockwood_
Check out her Parent Masterclasses
Dr Ali Young
Website
Instagram @dr.aliyoung
Her new book “Work.Mama.Life” is coming out April 2022
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
One of the questions that I am asked a lot is
“What are you seeing happening in workplaces? Are we working from home, going hybrid or is it just back to Business as Usual?”
So as someone who has the privilege of seeing how various organisations are navigating the challenges and opportunities that come with our new world of work, I thought I’d share with you exactly what I see happening.
Firstly, I want to give you my definition of Hybrid work, what it is and how it enables organisations before diving into answering the questions I get;
- How are different organisations approaching the design and use of their workplace?
- Is it differing by state?
- How are different organisations adopting a hybrid approach?
- What are the opportunities and challenges?
And finally if you are thinking about how to transform your workplace in the future, a few things for you to consider.
If you’re keen to learn more, come and join me at the Thriving Workplaces conference in Sydney 30 March – 1 April, I’ll be hosting a 3 hour workshop covering my Workplace Dynamics Blueprint and empowering you to transform your workplace from the inside out.
https://theserenitycollective.com/pre-event-workshop/
The Key Takeaways;
- How to identify the core challenges that organisations face moving forward
- Strategies to unlock the data in your organisation to optimise your workplace for your people
- The tools to engage at all levels of your organisation to optimise your future of work.
Or join the FREE 5 Day Workplace Challenge where over 5 days I share with you some of the tools you can use to understand your organisation better and implement positive change.
Or dive straight into the Workplace Dynamics Blueprint Program.
Want to support your team in Working From Home… check out the Work From EDITION
Want to chat? Book a 15min Call with Me
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
With everything that we have been navigating over the past 2 years, boundaries, or more correctly “lack of boundaries” has become one of the most common topics of conversations, amongst friends, colleagues, clients and within our Work Life Lounge community.
With the Blurring of work life and home life as we’ve juggled working from home, home schooling and the uncertainty of life around us, boundaries are an area that many of us have referred to as needing to be better, stronger or even established.
Today’s guest is Dr Rebecca Ray, a Clinical Psychologist, Author and Speaker. She uses a science-backed, heart and hard truth approach to help big-picture-thinking women and creators live a life that’s fulfilling, unapologetic, and free. Rebecca has been a Clinical Psychologist for the best part of two decades. She is also the author of multiple books including Setting Boundaries and the Host of Podcast Hello Rebecca Ray.
Rebecca joins me in this episode to discuss;
- What we are actually saying when we say we need “better boundaries”
- Why we find it difficult to put boundaries in place
- The internal challenge that comes from identifying a need for a boundary
- The conflict that eventually simmers up for us when we aren’t true t our boundaries
- How setting boundaries starts with a path to self acceptance
- A simple way for us to express our boundaries in a non-confrontational way that opens communication
This is a timely conversation for so many of us. Enjoy this chat with Rebecca Ray!
If you want to learn more from Rebecca, be sure to join us in the Work Life Lounge for her upcoming Masterclass.
Heal Your Boundaries: The Path to Personal Empowerment is a transformative masterclass designed to show you the keys to unblocking your capacity to set and keep empowered boundaries. In this masterclass, you’ll discover:
- The role your unconscious plays in stopping you from setting boundaries (or causing your boundaries to disconnect you from others)
- Who your Inner Leader is and why you need to be in touch with them every day
- How to navigate your unconscious and conscious experience to heal your boundaries
Connect with Dr Rebecca Ray;
Website = www.rebeccaray.com.au
Instagram = @drrebbecaray
Book = Setting Boundaries
Podcast = Hello Rebecca Ray
Work Life Lounge
Chaos to Calm Challenge
Live a Life by Design Program
Setting you Up for Success Webinar
If you’ve been following me or this Podcast for a while, you’ll know that I’m passionate about transformation; both in life and in work. Making real change in the lives of people, and the organisations in which they work is truly what lights me up.
This has come about because I have spent much of my adult life working on my own transformation. Everything that I am sharing with you here is all about the things that I have learned to improve myself as a human being, as a mother, as a wife, as a friend, as a leader, as a business owner, but also then how I can create better workplace environments for the clients that I engage with.
In this episode, I am sharing with you all the ways you can work with me both personally and professionally so I can support you to do the same. Whether it’s aligning your actions through understanding your values, purpose and rhythms, or reimagining and transforming your workplace to make the most of your space, boost employee experience and make a real difference to your bottom line.
Visit the links below to view the programs and workshops I have available to support you, and get a better understanding of how these transformations will benefit your work and life.
I hope to hear from you soon!
LINKS
Work Life Lounge
Live a Life by Design
Work With Me
Workplace Dynamics Blueprint - program
Workplace Dynamics Blueprint - COMUNiTI
COMUNiTI
Website
Email me!
Book a 15min call
I don’t know about you, but it feels like this year has started at full speed!
At COMUNiTI, we’ve hit the ground running and completely bypassed the Christmas/January slow down. Given the last few years, I’m certainly not complaining, although, I’m conscious of ensuring that I manage everything I need to whilst protecting myself from burnout and overwhelm.
With school being pushed out by 2 weeks (thanks Qld!) and no extended vacation care, I certainly have a juggle on my hands to manage my kids, projects, workload, not to mention future proofing for when I have my baby in May!
The mental load can be heavy and it’s easy for overwhelm to creep in, so in this episode I list my favourite ways to manage this to protect your energy; physical, spiritual and mental, to ensure you stay on track.
I cover;
- My 5 steps for battling overwhelm
- How setting your goals for the year helps realign when things seem too much
- Why putting on your own oxygen mask first is essential
- Setting you up for success for the year ahead
I hope this episode provides you with some strategies to keep your energy lifted and your wellbeing front-of-mind to get your year started right.
Don't forget to sign up for the Work Life Lounge because in the next Masterclass, I’ll be taking you through my whole process for planning and goalsetting, along with all the strategies and resources you’ll need to set yourself up and stick to it. Join me on February 10 at 10am AEST to set your intentions and map out your 2022!
www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge
Essential Oil: https://ikou.com.au/products/breathe-wellness-essential-oil-10ml
It's 2022 and so far, it’s been new year, same virus 😐
But a new year awaits us, and it’s how we purposefully and intentionally step into that year to achieve what we want that matters.
Every year I spend a couple of days planning out the year ahead; what I want to achieve and where I want to focus my precious energy. Last year was the year I began to walk my own path and shrugged off notions of success of others that I had been carrying around and trying to live up to. But I’ll be honest; at the end of 2021, I was drained and completely exhausted. So, this year I have mapped out my activities and intentions but designed a way to achieve my goals without completely depleting all my energy.
In this episode, I cover;
My process for establishing focus and intentions for the year ahead.
How I was able to look forward by looking back
Understanding self-care, protection and boundaries
Why I fell out of love with goal setting
Doing more with less
My ‘word’ for 2022 and why it resonates
Unpacking intentions and my 5 intentions for the year ahead.
I hope you enjoy this episode and find motivation to step into the new year with purpose and intention, as well as a focus for looking after your energy and wellbeing as we continue to live in difficult environments.
Don't forget to sign up for the Work Life Lounge because in the next Masterclass, I’ll be taking you through my whole process for planning and goal setting, along with all the strategies and resources you’ll need to set yourself up and stick to it. Join me on February 10 at 10am AEST to set your intentions and map out your 2022!
www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge
This whole season has been about designing a work life that you love; and when we move forward into a new year which will no doubt hold its own unique opportunities and challenges, I want to leave you with a highlight reel of important learnings to allow you to step consciously into 2022.
In our final episode for Season 3, I’ll be recapping the most valuable takeaways from our amazing array of guests to allow you to go back and relisten to episodes to provide you with tools and inspiration for the year ahead.
I’ll cover
- The learnings and a-ha moments under three common threads of self-awareness, personal agency and rest & recovery
- The rituals and routines this season’s guests shared that help them design their ideal work life
- Tips and tools to help you move forward consciously into 2022.
I want to say a huge thank you to all of our guests this season, for their generosity of time and their knowledge and for being able to contribute all of this valuable information for all of us to take away and implement in our own lives. And a big, big thank you to you for continuing to tune in each and every week and your ongoing support. I wish you and your families a magical and restful Christmas. And I look forward to being back here with you in 2022 with a whole new season of the Work Life by Design podcast!
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
North Star Download
Work Life Lounge
You probably know the name Mars Inc best for providing our favourite treats; Mars Bars, Snickers, Skittles, Malteasers, M&M’s (I could go on and on!). But what you may not know is Mars Inc. is at the forefront of holistic employee health and wellbeing, making it one of the World’s Great Places to Work.
With 130,000 Associates, operating in 80 countries across the Globe, as a private, family-owned business, Mars Inc is motivated by the freedom to build a better tomorrow today. At the core of this is their understanding that the health and wellbeing of their associates [how they refer to their employees] is what really matters to see this happen.
Today’s guest is Dr Gary Webb, Mars Inc.’s Regional Health and Wellbeing Manager for Asia Pacific, Latin America, Middle East and Africa as well as a member of the Mars Inc Global Health & Wellbeing Centre of Excellence and Leadership team.
A former consultant to the World Health Organisation [WHO] Gary has 20 years’ experience in workplace health across Australia and the global market. He has worked as a mentor to many work health and wellbeing professionals in Australia over the last 10 years and also works as a volunteer across a number of community, schooling and sporting organisations.
As you’ll hear in today’s conversation, Gary is a passionate advocate for the establishment and execution of holistic health & wellbeing initiatives across organisations that are embedded to enable real change and the operational & leadership shifts that are required to effect it.
In today’s chat Gary and I discuss;
- What makes Mars Inc one of the world’s Great Places to Work and the role that an embedded culture of Health and Wellbeing has had on this continued success
- The various initiatives that Mars have, not only around improving the lives of their Associates but also much more broadly, the world, and the freedom that being a privately owned business has given them to enable this
- How COVID has impacted the workplace and the variabilities across continents & cultures in supporting employees to stay safe and well
- The opportunities that we can all embrace as we begin to look forward to the future of work, and the role that health & wellbeing will play in its design
As Gary says in our chat, when wellbeing is executed holistically, you don’t need to measure ROI, you can feel it and see it. Some great insights in this conversation about the surrounding considerations that give us all the permission to see embedded Health & Wellbeing become a reality.
Gary Webb
LinkedIn | Website |
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Work Life Lounge – www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge
North Star Download – www.melissamarsden.com.au/northstar
One of my favourite quotes is;
Only shine your light on the things you want to grow.
It’s become a bit of a mantra for me, reminding me that where I put my attention my energy flows and if I want to be intentional and make the most of the precious time that I have I should in fact be very mindful about where I direct it.
If you focus on the bad stuff and you’ll only notice more of it, sending you into a downward spiral, if you shine your light on the amazing things that bring you joy and notice how much more wonderful things you have in your life, opportunities will present themselves and put that spring in your step!
But to know where to shine your light, you first need to get clear on what it is that you want to grow…. And that is where conscious planning and goal setting come in.
As we are drawing near the end of another (challenging) year, it’s a timely reminder for us to start to shift our attention to the new year that is before us. In my view if we are waiting to the new year to start to put in place all those new year's resolutions and start with a fresh attitude, we have missed an opportunity.
Why not start now?!?
So today, I want to outline a few ways that you can begin to become intentional about your focus, set your goals and take the first steps towards actioning them!
I’ll also cover
- The science behind goal setting
- Reflecting and reframing
- The common myths about goals
- How goal setting and planning go hand in hand
- My process for goal setting
Don’t forget to download my free Setting your North Star workbook to help you establish your values and purpose to help in your goal setting journey. Go to www.melissamarsden.com.au/northstar.
You can also sign up for the Work Life Lounge for FREE until January 31 courtesy of the sponsorship of COMUNiTI. Our next Masterclass is with Dr Kristy Goodwin and managing digital wellbeing on December 9. Sign up at www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
There has been a lot of conversation in the media of late about organisations handing out wellbeing days and rolling out new initiatives to combat The Great Resignation. However as you’ll hear in today’s chat, it’s not as simple as adding a few extra days of leave to the calendar; it takes careful, long-term planning and material change at an organisational level.
Jessica Sharpe is the Chief People Office for Entain Australia, a FTSE 100 company that is one of the world’s largest sports betting and gaming groups operating in the online and retail sector. You may be familiar with them as the local home of Ladbrokes and Neds.
Jess has spent her career establishing and enhancing the HR functions into numerous businesses across multiple industries and as she reflects in this episode, whilst it has at times been a challenging path, it is one that has equipped her well in running lean and effective teams and learning how to influence and educate stakeholders on the value of investing in their people.
When Jess isn’t at work, influencing and optimising human behaviour, she’s at home attempting to do the same with her three boys!
Myself and the team here at COMUNiTI have had the great pleasure of working alongside Jess and her leadership team over the past 12mths, supporting their workplace transformation as they navigated the challenges of operating in a COVID world. We have been very privileged to have been able to witness first-hand the practices that have been implemented to see Entain leading the way in workplace flexibility, health & wellbeing and leadership that has enabled them to roll out Entain Day.
In this chat, we also cover;
- Jess’s career journey to date and how she came to be the Chief People Officer at Entain
- How the organisation has evolved in response to the global pandemic
- Entains mission to drive diversity & inclusion, not just in the technology sector but globally
- And Jess’s own personal practices to support her living her own work life by design
Jess is a warm, engaging and thoughtful leader and the opportunity to glean her insights in how she has supported Entain to move forward with such a bold workplace initiative is truly inspiring.
Work Life Lounge – sign up for free thanks to COMUNiTI! www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge
Jessica Sharpe
LinkedIn
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
This was the title of a recent post I shared.
I was reflecting on the rough ride that I’ve been through personally over the last 12 months in my business and was surprised by the reaction to it. When I wrote it I felt like I was lowering the curtain a little however in hindsight I think it was actually quite a vulnerable share, that connected with so many on a deeper level.
So, in today’s episode, I wanted to share with you what I did to get me out of that funk! The work I did. The people I surrounded myself with. What I read. The actions I took.
And the remarkable shift that I have experienced as a result, when nothing outside of me changed, it was all just a matter of perspective. I had a choice to reframe my view of the world and “choose” a brighter outlook. To enjoy the process and surrender the outcome, after all, despite how much I want to, I can’t control everything…
I just needed to only shine my light on the things I want to grow.
What have you been shining your precious light on?
If you’re looking for greater clarity on the vision you want from your life, check out the 25 year painted picture guided visualisation. You can learn more HERE
Join us in the Work Life Lounge for FREE until the end of January – Sign up HERE
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Building and sustaining an organisation that is still thriving 30 years on is no small feat.
In today’s chat I welcome Bruce Davidson. Executive Director of Davidson, an organisation specialising in enhancing workplace performance through their service streams of Business Advisory, Recruitment and Technology Consulting, they have continued to evolve to stay relevant in an ever-changing world.
Bruce’s main passion in life is assisting organisations and individuals to reach their potential. With an innovative mind, compelling attitude and ever-constant passion for the industry, he is committed to leading Davidson to the position of one of Australia’s leading workplace performance consultancies.
As you’ll hear in this episode, Davidson are also passionate advocates for supporting the community. Bruce is also the Chair of Yalari - a Non-For-Profit organisation deeply committed to its mission to educate and empower Indigenous children from regional, rural and remote communities to bring about generational change and empowerment for ongoing success, with a vision to develop over 1000 indigenous leaders.
COMUNiTI have also had the great fortune of working with Davidson on the Workplace Strategy, Design and Delivery of their Brisbane Head Quarters, completed in September 2020. The project has since been recognised by several industry awards for its contribution to the betterment of workplace design. We get to hear Bruce’s perspective on the project and the impact that this has had on their people and their business as they emerged from a post-COVID lockdown in 2020.
In today’s chat we cover a bit of ground, everything from what it takes to build a sustainable business, through to Bruce’s own personal routines and rituals to ensure he’s still loving his work life after 30 years, along with the impact that they are observing in workplaces navigating COVID in the new world.
So, sit back, relax and enjoy this chat with Bruce Davidson.
Bruce Davidson
LinkedIn | Davidson
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook | North Star Download | Work Life Lounge
Personal growth and professional growth are inextricably linked. In you career, you may think that professional development is what will get you to the top, but let me tell you, when things get really hard, it's not your professional capability that sees you through. It’s your mindset, your resilience and your personal growth.
In this episode, I cover;
- The power of personal growth
- How you can level up personally
- Finding direction, values and joy
- Taking ‘The Next Right Step’
- Tools and Resources – where to start
To get you started on your journey of personal development, don’t forget to grab the Setting Your North Star download. This little downloadable is my toolkit to clarifying your purpose and uncovering your values. Two things that I like to think of as setting my Northstar; the place that I am heading to you can grab this at www.melissamarsden.com.au/northstar
If you’re ready to take it a bit deeper, you’ve still got a day to sign up for my Live a Life by Design program; a 6 week immersive experience to help you design the work and life that lights you up.
Throughout the program, I’ll take you through all the tools that have helped me take stock and unpack what it is what I want from my one magical life. If you’re ready to stop living by default and start living by design, sign up for Life a Life by design at www.melissmarsden.com.au/Life_by_design.
If you want to grab your three FREE Months to the Work Life Lounge powered by COMUNiTI, sign up now at www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge. Join us in a closed membership space where you’ll get access to monthly Expert Masterclasses, Live Q&A’s and a resource library to help you level up your life and work.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
We’ve talked about Personal Brand for a number of years now, however our guest Nicole Hatherly, shares with us the opportunity that awaits us as we emerge from the effects of COVID 19; to own our Signature Brand. The opportunity to authentically communicate who we are at our core and the value we bring.
I have had the great pleasure of knowing Nik for a number of years and the personally working with her over the last 3 years and she has been instrumental in supporting me to truly understand what it is that I do and articulate it in a way that captures attention.
Nicole is a leading Global Brand Catalyst, an award-winning international Brand and Leadership Strategist, international Keynote Speaker and Thought Leader, Profile Expert and passionate creator of your Signature Brand for the Now Normal and the powerful Brand Catalyst process.
She’s a qualified Design Thinking Methodologist, Brand Etymologist, Executive Coach, Board Level Advisor, and Founder and Director of Brand True North and Global ‘Life Work Pivot’ Program Brand Your Way.
For over 27 years (she started very young 😉), Nicole has delivered award-winning strategies and campaigns for iconic brands, global organisations and influential thought leaders.
She now energises brands, activates thought leaders and ignites audiences to deliver beyond their ‘products and services’ by articulating their value, amplifying their voice and activating their thought leadership for impact and legacy.
So strap yourself in for this conversation, grab a pen and paper, this one is interactive and hit the link below to grab your own copy of the Signature Value Map so that you can start to unpack yours.
In this chat we cover;
- Nik's own journey of personal and professional branding
- How your Signature Brand is a new concept that connects our head and heart for work and life
- Nik’s take on the “now normal” and what we can be doing to embrace our work life
- We dive into the Great Australian Resignation and what it means as a corporate professional
- Nik takes us through a mini -masterclass to completing our own Signature Value Map
- She also shares her own journey of designing a work life she loves, the hurdles she’s faced, the realisations and the rituals that she’s embedded to ensure she’s living her best life!
Nik is a gorgeous, generous, genius who has the innate ability to cut through the noise and just nail what is that you do. A true master of words! Plus, she’s a powerhouse of energy and this is one conversation that you are going to walk away from with a whole new appreciate for how you put yourself out there.
WORK LIFE LOUNGE
The Work Life Lounge is a membership space where we bring to you Monthly Masterclasses from leading thought leaders on all things work and life, so that you can take the action you need to design your work life on your terms.
Nik will be presenting our first Masterclass in the Lounge. In her Masterclass she will be diving deep into the Signature Value Map, so that you can Raise your brand, profile & purpose to thrive in work & life.
And for the first 3 months, you get an access all area’s VIP pass courtesy of COMUNiTI! Absolutely free! So head to www.melissmarsden.com.au/worklifelounge for more details and to register.
Nicole Hatherley
Signature Value Map | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
What makes you happy? What is something you do that makes you feel free, content and full of joy? Something that doesn’t take energy but creates it.
How often do you get to do that? If the answer is anything other than ‘often’, this episode is for you.
These little things that bring us joy; rhythms and rituals we incorporate into our lives are the things that allow us to refill our tanks and continue to keep giving. After all, as the saying goes, you can’t keep pouring from an empty cup.
In this episode, I cover:
- The value of routines and rhythms
- Incorporating these to design your ideal life
- Filling up your tanks – mental, physical and emotional
- Why you should find more time for joy
- Managing your energy and setting boundaries
Don’t forget to take your seat in the Work Life Lounge with your VIP All Areas Pass for 3 months, powered by COMUNiTI. Visit www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge to take advantage of this offer and get access to amazing guest expert masterclasses, a resource library and Live Q&A chats, all completely free for the first three months.
To help you start building the work life you love, download your copy of Setting your North Star. Visit www.melissamarsden.com.au/northstar for tools on understanding your values and purpose.
I hope you leave this episode with the resolution to make more time for the things that bring you joy; enjoy!
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
Preparing ourselves for the future of work can be a daunting task. Faced with the rapid transformation of technology, the adoption of automation and AI into our workplaces and let’s not forget to throw in there a dose of global pandemic, who could blame you for thinking that the outlook was challenging. But as you’ll hear from today’s guest, it is also filled with possibility.
Andrea Clarke, is an advocate for people becoming “future fit”.
As a former television news reporter and Washington D.C. correspondent, Andrea covered major news events for Al Jazeera English, the Pentagon Channel and Thomson Reuters before working on humanitarian aid programs to re-build Iraq and Afghanistan.
Andrea then led the communication campaign for the Save Darfur advocacy movement to stop the genocide in Sudan.
Through her work she has been fulfilling her life’s purpose for growing careers, and in 2012 founded FutureFitCo, a digital learning business developing future fit people at scale, by accelerating the skills needed to lead with impact.
She is also the author of the award-winning book 'Future Fit: How to Stay Relevant and Competitive in the Future of Work'.
- In today’s chat we cover;
How Andrea’s career in front of the camera inspired her desire for others to communicate with impact - What it means to be future fit and the steps you can take to prepare yourself for the future of work
- The value of a Growth Mindset and how this skill alone will propel your career forward
- The importance of shared purpose within organisations, how to find it and communicate it
- The silver lining of COVID and how it has opened the door for us to redesign our world of work for the better
- How creativity is in all of us and what you can do to tap into yours
- Andrea’s own sense of purpose and the events that led her to understanding and articulating her own values
- The routines and rituals that Andrea uses to ensure she’s showing up as her best self
As quoted by Andrea;
“The future of work is about our talent. It’s about the way we negotiate change, actively pursue transformation & deploy human skills to create value - both for ourselves and the organisations we work for.”
Andrea is an engaging and straight-talking woman on a mission to transform our organisations from the individual level for a better future. You’ll leave this chat inspired to look inward and evaluate your skills and opportunities for growth.
Andrea Clarke
Future Fit Co. | LinkedIn | Instagram
Melissa Marsden
Download your Setting your North Star workbook
www.melissamarsden.com.au/northstar
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
"Being responsible for our own lives... our behaviour is a function of our decisions, not our conditions". – Steven Covey
Often, we resign ourselves to the fact that we live in a world where so much is out of our control like global pandemics and external circumstances and the limitations they place on our actions. The world can begin to feel heavy.
However, when we bring our attention back to focusing on what we can control, we are able to increase, expand and grow our personal power.
In this episode, I explore;
- Your circle of influence (the things we can control)
- The circle of concern (the external things we cannot control)
- Shifting and managing energy, focus and influence
- Expanding your comfort zone and the reason we feel comfortable playing small
- Taking back your power
You’ll leave this bite-sized pep talk today with the reminder that our lives are completely up to us. Sure, negative things can happen to us and around us, however it is our choice as to how we respond to those factors. It is our decision what we do about it. That is within our control and that is where the magic happens.
Don’t forget to download my free Setting your North Star values and purpose workbook to help you start designing your unique and desired life. Visit www.melissamarsden.com.au/northstar
If you’re ready to deep dive and learn skills and content to level up your work and life and join a community of like-minded women who are designing their dream life, join our Work Life Lounge! You can find out more at www.melissamarsden.com.au/worklifelounge.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
Talking about Money is often a taboo subject, however if we want to be empowered to take control of our own financial literacy it’s a subject that we really need to get comfortable with.
Today’s Guest Mel Browne an ex-accountant, ex-financial advisor & ex-working till she drops. These days she’s a best-selling author, financial educator, business strategist & mentor and entrepreneur who is particularly passionate about helping women live a life by design, and not by default.
Something we both have in common.
Mel is passionate about changing the conversation that women in particular have around money, how we make it, save it and spend it.
- In today’s chat we cover;
What living a life by design means to her - How our money story and money type influences our decisions and approach to money
- The money messaging that the media portrays to men and women when it comes to our behaviour with money
- How to navigate the money conversation in your relationships
- The routines and rituals that Mel has incorporated into her life so that she can continue to live her life by design
While Mel is an ex-accountant, and full of financial wisdom, she is also full of personality and sage advice for those of us who no-longer view corporate burnout as a career option.
So, let me introduce you to Mel Browne.
Mel Browne
Instagram | Show links
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
What does your dream life look like?
This season is all about designing a work life you love and big part of that is making sure it fits with the life that you want to live.
To do this you first need to define your own version of success, not what others or society consider to be a successful life. This is a trap we fall into often, and it’s important to take a step back and re-evaluate as life and circumstances change to define what we truly want and how we’ll know when we’ve achieved it.
Defining what a successful, joyful life is for you is a big part of then determining what your complimentary work life looks like.
In this episode I’ll take you through:
- The importance of clarity of vision
- A three-year business plan
- A 25-year life painted picture and why you should plan so far in advance
- How these two visualisations marry up to create the life you love and create change and progress in your life now
If you need a little more guidance in creating your 25 year painted picture, and 3 year business plan, so you can design the life of your dreams and align your business, head over to my website www.melissamarsden.com.au/paintedpicture and download my guided audio where I'll talk you through each of the aspects for you to imagine the life and business of your dreams and provide you with the actionable steps to turn your dream into a reality.
Or, if you’re looking for a bit more help defining your values and purpose, download my free Setting your North Star download. It has tools to help you define your values and purpose to allow you to create your vision with better clarity. Head to www.melissamarsden.com.au/northstar
Enjoy, find a quiet space, and allow your heart and mind to dream.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
Creating a work life that you love doesn’t mean that you need to head out and set up your own business. Often we hear of people who have climbed the corporate ladder, only to hit burn out and decide that the only way forward is to take their skills and go it on their own.
Well today’s guest is here to share with us, how if being an entrepreneur is not the path that you desire, there is another way.
Olivia Ruello is the CEO of Business Chicks, stepping into the role in 2016, when founder Emma Isaacs expanded into the US. Business Chicks is Australia’s largest and most influential community for women in business, committed to the personal and professional growth of women.
Liv has had a portfolio career starting out in Industrial Relations, before joining Business Chicks to lead their Partnerships and Brand team, for four years from 2009. She spread her wings in 2013 moving across to the Commonwealth Bank, where she drove a unique leadership and culture agenda for the corporate banking division, focused on embedding vision and values to create a more human centric culture.
Olivia has a deep passion and sense of purpose, advocating for women’s economic security and empowerment, advancement in leadership roles and supporting the growth of female led businesses.
As you’ll hear in today’s chat, Liv comes from a lineage of strong women who have done much to support the advancement of women and it is an absolute pleasure to have someone who I deeply admire for the culture that she has built within the team at Business Chicks join me to share her wisdom.
You’ll leave this conversation inspired, and with new perspective on how you can design a life you love.
Olivia Ruello
LinkedIn | Business Chicks
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
One of the foundations to designing a life and career that you love is understanding your values. That means understanding your own sense of right and wrong, good and bad, what's important and what is not important to YOU, not what you’ve been intrinsically taught, or to those around you.
Values serve as the guide rails to our lives. They keep us moving forward in the right direction, stop us from wandering off course, or into areas that don't feel good, or right for us. They help us to embody the qualities that we want in order to guide our actions and behaviours and build the life we want to live.
This is relevant both in a corporate setting and at an individual level. As individuals we need this sense of self-awareness so that we can have our own moral compass and as an organisation we need them so that we can align our team, create focus, direction, and importantly, demonstrate what is ok and what's not ok.
In this episode, I talk through;
- Why values are crucial and what can happen when you don’t stop to identify them
- How values operate in an organisational setting
- The concept of values as ‘buckets’ and how we can design a life and work life we love by identifying what’s important to fill these buckets.
If you are looking for some help defining your values, are or in need of a refresher to check in to see if they still resonate with you, download my free Setting Your North Star workbook. The tools in this workbook help you to identify your sense of purpose and the values that are most important to you. Get your copy at www.melissamarsden.com.au/northstar.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
One of the things that I have noticed as I have grown is that the experiences that we have are not unique to us and that if we look around often many of us are challenged by the paths that our lives have taken. While we may not be openly and outwardly shouting it from the roof tops or even whispering it to our closest of friends, there is for many of us a period of breakdown which leads to break through.
And this is where today’s guest Keri is here to share what she has learned from both personal experience and from working within Health Retreats how we can reconnect with our midline and move forward in alignment with our own personal path.
Keri Krieger is a modern-day mystic, fusing her passion for spirituality with the ancient remedies of Chinese medicine and acupuncture to guide women in coming home to themselves.
Keri acknowledges that our daily lives are filled with so many responsibilities and overwhelm, so she is on a mission to provide women with the tools they need to bring things back to basics so they can thrive as they are destined to do
This is a very conversational chat between two women navigating the messy middle covering everything from burnout to finding a slower pace of life, exploring the cycles and seasons of life to wisdom that comes with age.
Keri even shares with us some of her own rituals for reconnecting with her midline, along with the challenges that can come when we let our ego chime in.
Keri Krieger
Website | Facebook | Instagram
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
“He who has a why to live can bear almost any how”
Friedrich Nietzsche
Ask yourself this;
What is it that you hope to achieve while you're here on this earth? And what is the impact that you want to make? Why do you do what you do? Why is it important? What is the impact that that is going to have on the people around you?
Knowing why you do what you do is just as important, if not more important than, doing what you do.
Knowing what you do and how you do it is the logistics, the functional and the logical part of your day to day. Knowing why you do it, is what connects you to your greater purpose in life. Your whole reason for being. The impact that you are going to have on those around you, your community, and the world at large. It is the legacy that you will leave for having been here on this earth.
In today’s episode, I unpack three reasons knowing your ‘why’ is important ranging from the Japanese philosophy of Ikigai to business coaching to aligning your moral and decision-making compass.
Knowing your why is just one of the factors that forms part of the ability to live your life by your own design. When you know why you want to achieve the things that you do you can then make more informed decisions about who you want to work for, the type of work that you want to do and, most importantly, who you want to be.
If you are looking for more help on understanding your why, head to my website and download my free ‘Setting your North Star’ workbook. It has useful tools and tips to help you align your purpose and values to your life. Visit melissamarsden.com.au/northstar for your copy.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
In this week’s chat, I am incredibly excited to bring you our guest; the beautiful Samantha Wills.
For those of you who are not familiar with Samantha, she is the creative powerhouse behind the Samantha Wills jewellery brand. Starting this business in 2004, as a fresh face 21-year-old from her dining room table, she grew it into a successful global business. She lived in New York for 10 years, had production houses in Asia and India, and offices in France and Japan. She then famously announced its closure in mid 2018, when it was continuing to enjoy widespread commercial success. Because there was a lot more going on behind the scenes.
Samantha has recently written a memoir of her life's journey in her book Of Gold and Dust, which is a beautiful, unveiled, and honest account of what it took for her to build the Samantha Wills jewellery brand, the sacrifices that it required of her, and how it took her a two-year journey to come to the decision to close what was a highly successful business.
Samantha is an incredibly talented and intuitive businesswoman; she has come up with some genius ways of creating business partnerships and staying true to herself. So, in today’s conversation, we dive into all of this and cover everything from the rise of her business, to how she felt in some of those darkest times navigating very personal and professional challenges that she encountered, along with the resilience that you can find when you're sitting in the rubble of your life. And most importantly, the power that comes from rising out of that.
We also dive into how the strength of her values guided her exit from the business and the courage and integrity that comes with that through to a fearful moment as she started to turn 30. And she was realising that she had been sacrificing so much for her business, she hadn't been ticking life's boxes or the boxes that we're told that we should be ticking.
This is a conversation that will really going to get you thinking about your own life choices. It's going to have you nodding along in agreement, and it's really going to give you a good laugh along the way. She is a beautiful person both inside, generous with her energy and wisdom. I hope you enjoy this one as much as I did.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
I’ll let you in on a little secret.
Balance is BS. There is no work/life balance. You can’t have a work persona and a life persona.
It’s all about integration.
In today’s episode, I’m going to be discussing The Balance Wheel – the most useful tool I’ve found in examining and evaluating all the different segments of our lives and identifying where our time and energy needs to be spent.
I’ll go through:
- What is a balance wheel?
- The segments of life (outside of work!)
- Work/Life integration and boundaries
- Setting goals and shifting your balance wheel
- A real life example of balancing the wheel in action.
Also, the Live a Life by Design 6 week experience is now LIVE! Sign up here for more tools and strategies on creating a work and life you love.
Or if you want a bit more of a taste, sign up for the FREE Level UP! Masterclass going through actionable strategies to transform life and work. Just register here, and you’ll get the Setting your North Star download for free.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
One person that I believe optimises the idea of creating a work life they love is Tina Tower. Tina is a self-confessed professional development junkie and lover of work, but has also learned the hard way that continuing to push through is not always the best way.
Tina has lived a vast and varied life to date, starting her first business at 20, she went on to found and grow her tutoring business into a national franchise of 35 centres. When her business was acquired in 2016, she began coaching other people on how to scale their service-based businesses, however, she found she was often repeating the same fundamental information and so decided to create an online course.
Deciding to test out her newfound freedom with online course creation, Tina set off to travel the world for a year with her husband and two children visiting 28 countries, whilst growing the online business a few hours a day.
Since returning her online empire has continue to grow and she know runs her “little’ online business from her small farm on Australia’s East Coast.
In today’s chat, Tina shares with us both the ups and downs of business, but more importantly how her mindset and approach to her work life has morphed and evolved to match the seasons of her life. She shares how her purpose for her life and her business fuels her drive every day and the routines and rituals that she has embraced to ensure that she is showing up in a way that delivers massive value to those that work with her.
As a member of Tina’s Her Empire Builder, I have had the great pleasure of working closely with Tina over the past 12mths and seen the passion that she has for her business but also the foundations that she has laid for herself to ensure she’s living her best life in alignment with her vision.
Tina Tower
Website | Instagram | Book
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
You’re probably thinking, ‘Mel, don’t be ridiculous, I know who I am’. But do you really, truly know who you are? How you work, what makes you tick? What values you stand for or stand against? Could you tell me these things if I asked you?
And the reason I asked this question is because until we truly know who we are, I believe that we are just really reacting to the expectations and requests of others, whether that be our family, our friends, our boss, our colleagues, our clients, or even just society in general. Just like I did.
Today, I unpack why it’s important to understand what makes you tick, how this helps you show up in work and life and how having this knowledge and insight can help you maximise your strengths and help you work towards what you want.
I cover:
- Tools to understand your motivations
- How this knowledge allows you to level up your life
- The value of personality profiling style tools in a team environment
LIVE A LIFE BY DESIGN
In this six week program, I take you through the tools and the frameworks that I have curated over the last 10 years to live a life by my own design. Plus, I've also then taken the steps of how to put it into action and provided a framework to help you start designing your dream life. Learn more about the Live a Life by Design experience here, and join the waitlist.
FREE DOWNLOAD
If you’re interested in the first tools in the workbook to see if this is for you, download the Setting Your North Star exercise!
Melissa Marsden
Website | Facebook | Instagram
Do you trust your gut instinct? Maybe you only trust it in certain aspects of your life like work or relationships? Sometimes our gut feeling is our best indicator of which direction to take, but learning to tune in to it can be a journey.
Today I am joined by Tory Archbold the Founder and Director of Powerful Steps.
Prior to 2019 Tory was running the Global PR agency Torstar, launching big brands, celebrities, and influencers such as Megan Gale, Nespresso, Victoria’s Secret and Drew Barrymore in the Australian market. However, while she was getting everyone else’s message out to the world, she realised she had her own story to tell.
Launching Torstar in her twenties, she had built a fabulous life as a single mum, running a global business with a team of 22 including two executive assistants. It was a near death experience and 10 years of being stalked that gave her a fresh perspective. She wanted a life with more purpose.
Today, Tory is the CEO of Powerful Steps where she is on a mission to share her toolkit with high octane businesswomen to plot their personal roadmap to success.
This was such a fabulous conversation with Tory where we journeyed through her previous business Torstar and the possibilities and opportunities that she has embraced to see her create Powerful Steps. She shares with us the importance of trusting your gut instinct, the power of clear values and her mantra for life, as well as her 3 pieces of advice for anyone wanting to live a life by design.
Tory Archbold
Website | Email | LinkedIn | Instagram | Powerful Steps Podcast
Melissa Marsden
Book a Coffee Date | Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Welcome to Season 3!
Work life by Design has just celebrated its 1st birthday so a BIG thank you for tuning in and listening in; I appreciate the support and love.
This season I want to dive deep into what this podcast says on the tin; designing a work life that you truly LOVE.
Today, I’m going to tell you a bit about my story; how I ended up here, including the parts where I blew up my life on purpose and how I searched high and low for my true purpose and the meaning of a life truly authentic to me. I’m talking self-help books, philosophical paradigms, conferences and retreats, life coaches; you name it, I did it.
This journey over the past 10 years has led me to explore various tools, frameworks and ideologies around people, culture, leadership and business, that have supported me to design this work life that I love and this is what I’ll be sharing with you with the help of some incredible guests!
If you’re interested in getting started right away, you can download my FREE mini workbook on purpose and values; activities that will help you set your North Star.
Go to: www.melissamarsden.com.au/northstar to get your copy!
I am very excited to be bringing you this season because it is one that is very close to my heart. It has been a personal journey that I have lived and I want to share that with you so that you can have it too, whether you are an entrepreneur or you are climbing the corporate ladder – you can get where you need to go if you have the right tools.
As always if you have any questions, want to know more get in touch on Instagram @melmar or send me an email, melissa@melissamarsden.com.au
I look forward to bringing our first guest to you next week!
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Website
Is the office dead? Does productivity come at the expense of wellbeing? How do you manage Zoom fatigue? How do you maintain connection in a remote workplace?!
It’s been a huge season of Work Life By Design as we’ve explored all the big questions around what the future of work looks like after the impact of COVID.
We’ve had some incredible guests from a wide range of backgrounds and industries all with different ideas on how to navigate the future of work and manage the expectations of their people with the bottom line of the business.
This week I take you through a summary of each episode to give you the key takeaways and actionable strategies from topics such as:
- Equality at work
- Remote and hybrid working environments
- Productivity and Wellness
- The importance of culture, belonging and humanising the work experience
- Reimagining the future of work
- The role of technology, for better, for worse and how to manage it
- Dealing with the zoom fatigue and the cognitive load of remote working
- The importance of The Third Space and preparing your mindset for interactions
- Workplace design, the impact of the physical space on chemistry and the importance of strategy
If any of the highlights spark your interest, listen to the full episode and let me know what you think and what you’d like to hear more of via Instagram @melmar, LinkedIn or on my website.
I’ll be back next week with a brand new season, with a focus to helping you develop the skills and strategies design the life you love.
Thanks for joining me!
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | Facebook | Website | LinkedIn
It may be beautiful but it just doesn't work....
There many reasons why your workplace doesn't work; layout, lack of understanding, doing what you’ve always done. Often clients underestimate the impact of interrogating their brief. It’s common for them to approach a designer or a builder with a wish list, layout and design in mind and the builder complies.
But there is so much more to it.
This week I discuss:
- Why offices just don’t work, even if they look amazing
The essential things you need to consider when designing a workplace - The foundations of a workplace strategy
- Why that workplace strategy is crucial to commercial success
If you are experiencing challenges in your workplace and you like the sound of how a great workplace can begin to transform your business, there are few options;
- Your Workplace Future Ready program – 7 week do-it-yourself workplace transformation
- Workplace Dynamics Blueprint AUDIT – opportunity for us to look at your organisation and give some advice on how to start to transform
- Workplace Dynamics Blueprint – full strategy solution to see your workplace transform and create an environment for high performance
If you're not sure which one you need, book a call and I’d be happy to have a chat and discuss your options with you. Let’s design a workplace that works!
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Take a moment and think back to the beginning of 2020. How has your interaction and use of technology changed?
I would hazard a guess that at the start of 2020, you rarely worked from home, you may have done the occasional Zoom call [if you even knew what zoom was] and there was no way you would have entertained presenting to a client on it. All your team meetings were done in person.
Life looks pretty different right now.
Today’s guest is Cameron Douglas, the newly appointed CEO of Videopro. Cameron has been a long standing employee of Videopro who has worked his way to the top and is now proudly leading the organisation into an exciting new technology enabled world.
As the name suggests, they are the professionals when it comes to video, servicing the professional services and education sector along with their retail stores open to the public.
Cameron and I discuss the opportunities and challenges that technology has afforded us, as well as taking a look at where the future of workplace technology is going and how it is shifting our experience of work.
We often think of workplace technology as our laptops, the servers and the connectivity of these, however the world of workplace technology can be far more expansive from recognising your number plate as you enter the building, to assigning you a desk and ordering your coffee.
It has the ability to transform our experience of work.
More productivity = less innovation?
Communication with our immediate teams has increased with the move to remote working styles, however interactions outside our team or with distant networks has significantly diminished.
We’ve been able to increase our productivity, but our hybrid communication structures, water cooler conversations, impromptu brainstorming sessions and incidental interactions have been lost. So, have we created digital silos, or as I call it, the cubicle of 2021?
In today’s episode, I look at how the rise of digital communication has impacted us and how to tackle the delicate balance between digital overload and digital silos. I cover:
- The value of tacit learning and external perspectives and different departmental views
- The real cost of productivity
- Actionable strategies and resources to breakdown the digital silos and facilitate strengthening team bonds
I’d love your feedback!
Take a screen shot of the pod or a pic of where you’re listening today and tag me, share and slide into my DMs @melmar so I can send out a huge thanks! I’m keen to understand how these episodes are helping your work life. Or, Join the Work Life By Design Facebook group for more content. Let’s connect!
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
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The ability to transition from one event to another has a significant impact on how we show up in those spaces. The mindset and mental state that we approach each task, activity, conversation or moment with ultimately defines how that situation turns out.
As more of us are continuing to work from home or engage in a hybrid work style, the conscious awareness that we know need to bring to these moments has become increasingly important.
So, who better to chat to about the impact of these moments than Dr Adam Fraser; researcher, speaker and the author of “The Third Space” just one of his four best selling books.
Dr Adam Fraser is a human performance researcher and consultant who studies how organisations adopt a high-performance culture to thrive in this challenging and evolving business landscape. In this time, he has worked with elite level athletes, the armed forces and business professionals of all levels. In the last 10 years he has delivered more than 1500 presentations to over half a million people in Australia, US, New Zealand and worldwide.
In today's episode we chat about;
- What is ‘The Third Space’?
- How cognitive overload is affecting our ability to move through “the third space” effectively
- How can you use Adam’s three-part process to effectively prepare yourself in that critical transition moment in “the third space”
- How we can re-recreate lost “third space” moments when we are working from home
- How we as leaders can support our employees through change
- The workplace’s reputation for dismissing emotion and how we can hold space for our teams to move through emotion
- The impact that constant interruptions are having on our mental capacity to concentrate and ways that we can begin to find periods of “flow” in our work day
Adam’s research is peppered throughout this entire conversation providing a data driven response to his thoughts and giving many of our “feelings” a valid and scientific explanation.
Dr Adam Fraser
LinkedIn | Website | Book
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Feeling overwhelmed and exhausted. It’s the big conversation at the moment.
I’m seeing it in the people I’m coaching, the people I’m connecting with and I’m hearing it from colleagues in the industry.
It seems that many of us that are feeling this way - and turns out there is a LOT of data that explains why.
Research shows we’ve been working longer hours during COVID, but to me, this doesn’t seem like anything new because certain industries and professions have always carried these expectations.
Regardless this is something that we need to be paying attention to. The World Health Organisation has released a report stating that we are at a 35% higher risk of stroke and 17% higher risk of dying from heart disease when we work 55 hrs or more, compared to working 35-40hrs a week.
So in this episode I want to share with you some of the research around why we are feeling this way, examine the science behind it and provide you with some ideas to manage your work life to reduce your feelings of fatigue, overwhelm and exhaustion.
Let’s jump in!
LINKS
WHO - Working Longer Hours
https://www.who.int/news/item/17-05-2021-long-working-hours-increasing-deaths-from-heart-disease-and...
Microsoft Brain Research
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/work-trend-index/brain-research
Microsoft 2021 Work Trend Index: Annual Report
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/work-trend-index
Change your Microsoft Calendar Settings
Settings in Microsoft Outlook
Today I’m joined by Dr Meg Hooper, Organisational Psychologist and change specialist. Meg is a registered psychologist with a PhD in organisational psychology and she brings an academic thought process to a very similar world that I tend to work in.
Meg looks at work and our work lives from a very different angle, but with the same intentionality around what the outcome should be. Today, we have a really interesting conversation around how systems within our organisation support the type of work that we need to do and us as individuals, how we can promote self-leadership and self-determination so that we can really start to build our own ways of working and how that actually needs to feed into our individual resilience responses.
So the context of what we discussed today is around what can be described as ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’; how can we enable, support and empower our people to determine how and where they work and within the predefined parameters of the organisational culture and policies?
We also discuss:
- What is organisational psychology?
- Individual resilience vs team resilience
- The importance of boundaries in the workplace
- Understanding practical elements of cross-functional collaboration
I thoroughly enjoyed this chat; Meg and I have very similar ideas about how our world of work can operate in a very positive and proactive manner. I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed recording it.
Dr Meg Hooper
LinkedIn | Carousel Consulting | Facebook
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
"People will forget what you said, they will forget what you did, but they will never forget how you made them feel" Maya Angelou
In today’s episode, I delve into the relationship between clients and designers and why a fundamental connection is essential for success.
This is a topic I’m incredibly passionate about and one of our core values at COMUNiTI is "it's all about the Chemistry". Essentially, that means we seek to work with people we gel with; people who get us, what we do and how we do it.
We've been tested on these a few times and we've had to make some tough calls, but I’ve learned that trying to make chemistry work on a job is far harder.
I’ll touch on:
- Why chemistry is crucial
- The difference between negative and positive conflict
- Communication breakdowns
- Outcomes and relationships
- What you as a client should look for when selecting a team to work with
- Communicating your unique chemistry - the experience of doing business with you.
I’ll also touch on how chemistry in your business translates into your customer experience, an exceptional example of this I recently experienced and how important this is when designing your space.
Ready? Let’s jump in!
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
As Australians we have been relatively insulated from the impact of COVID unlike the rest of the world, so as part of this season and understand the future of work, I was keen to understand what “work life” looks like on the other side of the globe.
In today’s episode I chat with Kursty Groves a workplace strategist and innovation consultant based in the UK. Kursty helps workplace leaders reinvent the future of work and spaces that support connected cultures. With a background in innovation consulting, capability development and design, Kursty’s approach to workplace is grounded in coaching and co-creation, putting people at the heart.
Her passion lies in seeking to understand what makes work work, and how environments can inspire people to perform their best and you will hear this shine through in this conversation.
She is also the author of two books, a postgraduate professor and an award-winning designer with over 20 years experience facilitating innovation and design thinking, as well as the host of The Office Chronicles podcast.
I feel very privileged to have been able to have this conversation with Kursty, to understand her perspective as a fellow workplace strategist and advisor to some of the worlds largest brands.
In today’s chat we discuss;
- What work and life looks like in the UK right now
- The work that she does and how it supports organisations to create enhances workplaces
- How the work and the conversations she is having with organisations has changed over the past 12-18mths
- How organisations that were more innovative and creative in their workplace design faired better through the pandemic and what underpinned that
- Designing intimacy and professional relationships in a world where proximity is no longer the norm
- The question that everyone is asking “is the office dead”
- How Kursty has intentionally and consciously designed her life to work for her
Kursty Groves
Podcast | Website | LinkedIn
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
When we talk about persona profiling, we usually think of psychometric testing and other sorts of personality profiling tests. In the workplace, we generally use these in the context of recruitment and understanding a candidate’s personality before we hire them to understand if they are a cultural fit for our organisation.
What you may not have thought of is personality profiling is incredibly useful from a workplace design perspective. Understanding personal preferences of teams, and individuals within those teams allows us to design a workplace that aligns with different ways of working.
Join me as a break down how we can use persona profiling to make workplace design intelligent. I’ll go through the four role types that exist within organisations, how each role behaves and how you can navigate the opportunities that exist in the design of your workplace to enhance your employee experience and commercial outcomes.
If you are interested in beginning this journey in your business, you can join the Your Workplace Future Ready Program and begin to transform your workplace from the inside out.
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Work is an incredibly important aspect to the lives of many of us and finding a workplace that enables us to thrive and to contribute forms a large part of our personal feeling of purpose and of belonging.
Rhonda Brighton-Hall is CEO of mwah. Making Work Absolutely Human, Chair of the AHRI Institute, National D&I Advisory Panel, a Patron for ASPECT (Autism Australia) and recognised as a game changer in the future design of organisations, HR, leadership, diversity and inclusion and work.
Having worked, lived and lectured in Asia, Europe and the USA, Rhonda is a former AHRI HR Leader of the Year and Telstra Businesswoman of the Year.
Launched in 2017, mwah. is a determinedly optimistic Think Tank about the future of work, a growing community, and a tech and analytics business changing the way we understand people and culture; designing a future of work that works for more of us.
Rhonda is a beautiful soul with an obvious passion for disrupting workplace with the intention of helping them be better so they can do better.
In today’s chat we discuss:
- What is culture and how do you define it?
- Is there such a thing as a good culture or a bad culture?
- Why is belonging important and what can we do to support it?
- What impact has remote working had on culture and belonging?
- As organisations where are the opportunities for us to learn from the great social experiment of COVID and intentionally create our experience of work into the future
A passionate yet light-hearted conversation, Rhonda is a joy to speak to and you will glean an alternative lens through which you can begin to look at your organisation.
Rhonda Brighton-Hall
MWAH | LinkedIn | MWAH LinkedIn | Newsletter
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Taking over the lease on a fitted out workplace to support your organisational growth often makes sense on paper however, I often see the intangible costs of this decision realised down line.
In this episode I’ll share with you how these intangible costs show up and the impact on the performance of your business and how you can begin to build the capability internally to transform your business.
Your Workplace Future Ready Program
https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/your_workplace_future_ready
Melissa Marsden
One of the things that I observed during the last 12mths was how we likened the experience of the pandemic to the themes and realities of science fiction movies. Some more positive experiences such as the opportunities that technology has enabled to connect us into a global community, and others less so, as we navigated the changes to our realities with the introduction of a virus that was beyond our ability to control.
Today’s guest is Futurist and Founder of the think tank and trend analysis firm, Thinque, Anders Sorman-Nilsson. Thinque provide data-based research, foresight and thought leadership assets for global brands across 4 continents with a vision to disseminate and decode “avant garde ideas which expand minds and inspire a change of heart.
Working with clients such as Microsoft, Apple, Facebook and McKinsey to name a few, Anders is an awarded keynote speaker, author and the host of the 2nd Renaissance Podcast.
Through our conversation today we explore
- what is a futurist and the role that they play in supporting organisations to navigate the future.
- How decentralised work will continue to evolve and the impact that this will have on our cities and CBD real estate
- The blend of the physical and virtual work environment
- The skill sets that we will need to harness as Artificial Intelligence and Virtual Reality become more prominent in our worlds
- The role of creative thinking and innovation in our work
- Anders insights on how we can prepare ourselves for the future
As someone who likes to explore the opportunity the future presents with my clients as we reimagine the work environment, I found this conversation both insightful and human.
Anders Sorman-Nilsson
Thinque | LinkedIn | Podcast
Melissa Marsden
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
There has been much discussion about what the future of work will look like and the decisions that some organisations have already taken, and some at the extremes; to remain working remotely for good or mandated returns to the office.
In this episode I’m taking you through Matt Mullenweg’s, 5 Levels of Autonomy. As the Founder of Automattic, the creators of Wordpress and a fully distributed workforce of over 1200 people in 57 countries, he has a clear view of these 5 levels that organisations can move through to achieve what he describes as Nirvana.
I’ll then share with you my thoughts on some of the considerations that we will need to contemplate and potential hurdles that we will need to overcome as we move through these 5 Levels from our previous IRL [in real life] workplaces.
This is a new landscape for us all and I’d love to know what conversations you’ve had in your workplace as you begin to navigate the way forward and the future of work in your organisation.
LINKS
Naked Ambition Podcast
Matt Mullenweg
Making Sense Podcast
Gitlab – The Drawbacks of Remote Work
Melissamarsden.com.au
The global pandemic has had a significant impact on the way we all work and live, and this impact has had a flow on effect to our wellbeing; physically, mentally and emotionally.
As you’ll hear in this conversation, its not only our work and life that we need to be considering its also our wellbeing and performance.
Today’s guest is Dr Adrian Medhurst, the co-founder of Benny Button a work-life wellbeing and performance business. Adrian explains the inherent link between our wellbeing and our performance and how this impacts our ability to perform at work.
Adrian is a Doctor of Organisational Psychology, a speaker, author, educator and thought leader on a mission to optimise performance and wellbeing for people and organisations. He specialises in performance psychology, wellbeing science, stress mastery, mindfulness, behavioural change and innovation.
The conversation around wellbeing in our workplaces is not a new conversation however what we have observed is that it is now a more prominent one.
In today’s chat with Adrian we discuss;
- The impact that COVID has had on the wellbeing of our people
- How organisations can begin to understand and address this impact with their people and 5 questions to help you start the conversation
- The reframing of resilience to resourcefulness
- The concept of “experimentation” and the change of mindset that it brings
- The tools that organisations can use to support the wellbeing of their people in the workplace
- How Adrian, personally, took the adversity of COVID and turned it into adventure
Benny Button
Connect with Adrian on LinkedIn
Melissa Marsden
We have recently celebrated International Women's Day with the theme #choosetochallnenge and I had the pleasure of sitting on the panel at Orange Digitals recent event, alongside Nicolette Baker and Brooke Jamieson moderated by Liz Ballantyne.
This is a collection of my takeaways and thoughts from the event of where we could continue to choose to challenge and what this looks as both men and women in our organisations from;
- Starting the conversation and how we can all begin to manage up
- The importance of co-creation and inviting different perspectives to the conversation
- Balancing opportunity and the impact of male parental leave
- Onsite Childcare
- What success looks like for you?
Plus I also share a section from Glennon Doyles book Untamed, around how as women we can have an instinctual response that we can choose to challenge. You can find the book HERE
How can you continue the conversation?
Claudette is the Head of Property Strategy & Performance at Australia Post where she is responsible for managing their corporate property portfolio and the continual evolution of their workplace to support the highly dynamic and changing organisation.
Claudette has worked in the property industry for 25 years, graduating from RMIT with a degree in Interior Design. Claudette’s focus quickly centred on workplace design and strategy where she spent 20 years delivering workplace projects for a broad range of clients and industries.
In today’s chat, Claudette and I discuss:
- What Australia Post’s property portfolio looks like, across the entire organisation and in more detail at a corporate office level,
- How COVID has impacted the workplace operations differently in each of the states with the varying extents of time out of the office,
- How they have managed the organisational needs to date
- As people, our ability to adapt and our resourcefulness to change when we need to; and
- Her perspective on the death of “hotdesking”.
Claudette provides an insightful and considered approach to workplace management and how the pandemic has shifted mindsets and the opportunities that we are now presented to reimagine our future of work.
Claudette Leeming | LinkedIn
The pandemic has changed the way we work forever.
In Season 2 of Work Life by Design, we will be exploring what the future of work looks like and impact that COVID has had on how, where and why we work.
We will be looking at how workplace design has evolved, the expectations of employees and employers, the health & wellbeing agenda and our need to belong.
I’ll be bringing you guests from a wide range of expertise surrounding our world of work, including one of Australia’s largest employers, wellbeing and performance experts, futurists and workplace strategists from the other side of the globe.
I’ll also be peppering in my research and musings on the future of work and how it has forever changed in light of the pandemic.
Join the conversation;
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
A question I am asked A. LOT! But I can also tell you that many companies don’t allow enough time! 😖
The answer is not that straight forward.... it depends 🤷♀️
Today I talk you through the variables that impact how long it takes to design and build the workplace of your dreams! So you can make sure you don’t leave your run too late and need to compromise on one of your largest business investments. 🤗
Doors are closing TOMORROW to the Your Workplace Future Ready program. Join the program to build your own internal capability and save your organisation $$$ managing the transformation of your organisation from the inside out.
DOOR CLOSE Tuesday March 2nd, 3pm AEST. You can sign up at the link below
Your Workplace Future Ready Program | Doors Close Tuesday, 2nd March
Read more about who you need on your team;
https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/blog/whotohireandwhen
Come join the conversation;
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
To celebrate the launch of the Your Workplace Future Ready program, I’ll be going LIVE daily discussing all things work! If you’d like to join and have a question you can find me on Instagram, Facebook & Linkedin – see the links below.
While many organisations have the best of intentions in supporting their employee’s wellbeing, we need to be looking beyond offering a fruit box or introducing a step challenge.
The health and wellbeing of our employees is an employers responsibility, as Gallup say;
“People with thriving wellbeing simply do better in life. And companies with thriving employees do better business.”
We need to be looking at the three elements of wellbeing and how our workplace environments are supporting them.
I'm going live at 10am every day to celebrate the doors to the Your Workplace Future Ready program opening. This is my 7 week online program to build your internal capability and empower you to transform your workplace from the inside out.
The doors to the program are open, until Tuesday March 2nd, 3pm AEST. You can sign up at the link below.
Your Workplace Future Ready Program | Doors Close Tuesday, 2nd March
Come join the conversation;
Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
To celebrate the launch of the Your Workplace Future Ready program, I’ll be going LIVE daily discussing all things work! If you’d like to join and have a question you can find me on Instagram, Facebook & Linkedin – see the links below.
It wasn't until we all packed up and went home during our first lockdown at the end of March 2020, that we realised the impact that having a daily routine and rituals had on structuring our day. The act of getting up, getting dressed and "going" to work, all work together to shift us mentally and physically into "work" mode.
The ability to consciously shape that energy shift and guide people through the routines and rituals that are important in your workplace, is an opportunity many organisations don't know they have.
The doors to the program are now open, but only until Tuesday March 2nd, 3pm AEST. You can sign up at the link below.
Melissa Marsden Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Your Workplace Future Ready Program | Doors Close Tuesday, 2nd March
To celebrate the launch of the Your Workplace Future Ready program, I’ll be going LIVE daily discussing all things work! If you’d like to join and have a question you can find me on Instagram, Facebook & Linkedin – see the links below.
Purpose is the reason an organisation exists beyond making money.
Finding our purpose as an organisation can be a difficult path to navigate. Not because we don't have one, but because as an organisation we may find it difficult to articulate or communicate in a way that engages our employees.
However, when we know our purpose, we can begin to enable a clear line of sight for our people on what it means for us to be living our purpose as an organisation.
In this episode I share with your why it all starts with purpose and how it informs your brand experience. And when your brand experience is infused throughout your whole business it leads your culture.
The doors to the program are now open, but only until Tuesday March 2nd, 3pm AEST. You can sign up at the link below.
I’m also hosting a FREE Masterclass on Thursday 25th Feb at 10.30AEST, “How to transform your workplace and become an Employer of Choice”. You can register for that one below.
Melissa Marsden Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Free Masterclass, How to Transform Your Workplace to Become an Employer of Choice | Tomorrow, 25th February
Your Workplace Future Ready Program | Doors Close Tuesday, 2nd March
To celebrate the launch of the Your Workplace Future Ready program, I’ll be going LIVE daily discussing all things work! If you’d like to join and have a question you can find me on Instagram, Facebook & Linkedin – see the links below.
To kick it off today I’m talking about reimagining our future of work. What we need to be observing in our organisations, the data we need to be collecting and the trends and opportunities that we can be looking to, in order to imagine what our future of work looks like.
The doors to the program are now open, but only until Tuesday March 2nd, 3pm AEST. You can sign up at the link below.
I’m also hosting a FREE Masterclass on Thursday 25th Feb at 10.30AEST, “How to transform your workplace and become an Employer of Choice”. You can register for that one below.
Melissa Marsden Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Free Masterclass, How to Transform Your Workplace to Become an Employer of Choice | Thursday, 25th February
Your Workplace Future Ready Program | Doors Close Tuesday, 2nd March
Doors open to Your Workplace Future Ready next week!!! Tuesday 23rd February.
What is Your Workplace Future Ready?
This is my signature 7 week online program where I guide you through the 5 pillars that underpin the workplace dynamics in every organisation.
There is an art and a science to creating high performing workplace that people actually love and want to be in everyday and over the last 20 years I have been developing the tools and methods that I share through this program.
Imagine a workplace that not only enabled productivity but enhanced wellbeing...without the need to engage with multiple consultants costing your organisation $$$
There are a number of opportunities that organisations can act on to enhance the experience of work for their people, and I want to empower you to build your own internal capability to navigate these opportunities, enhance your employee experience of work and position your organisation as an employer of choice.
HERE'S A GLIMPSE INTO YOUR FUTURE...
- Your workplace is a magnet for the industry's top talent
- Employee retention has soared and employee engagement has tripled
- Your employees are more productive than ever while reporting increased happiness, health & wellbeing
YOUR WORKPLACE FUTURE READY IS EVERYTHING YOU NEED:
- To position your workplace as an employer of choice
- To build your capability to deliver workplace change internally
- And the principles of creating a workplace for high performing teams
Melissa Marsden Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook
Free Masterclass, How to Transform Your Workplace to Become an Employer of Choice | Thursday, 25th Feb
Your Workplace Future Ready Program | Doors Close Tuesday, March 2nd
Well, we didn’t see that one coming, and like many I’m sure that we could all use a drink and good lie down after this year!
This episode was a challenging one to record, because honestly it has been an incredibly difficult year, but none the less, here we are.
2020 has been the year that saw us switch to working from home overnight, achieving something that years of change programs have struggled to do! It saw us embrace “top dressing” and introduced us to a raft of new skills that we didn’t know we needed or possessed.
In this episode I’ve taken a look back over the year that was and recapped on the lessons and learnings that we’ve all had to learn as well as how this year has shown up for me personally and all that I set out to achieve.
We dive in to understanding
- How maintaining and establishing new boundaries become important for our own wellbeing
- The routines and rituals we didn’t realise we had until we no longer had them and the new ones, we required to create to identify work from home, when they were physically the same place
- How important it is to communicate even when you don’t have all the answers
- The need for time apart & alone, and how important it is for us to recharge our own batteries
- Kicking personal goals and those that I missed during #COVID
- How much smaller the world got and the opportunity to connect across borders and continents embracing technology
- How COVID broke the rules and enables us the opportunity to experiment with new ideas and business models
On Jan 12th 2021, I’ll be sharing my annual planning routine in an intimate workshop in Brisbane. If you’re around would love for you to join me and lay the groundwork for you to live your life by design in 2021.
Live a Life by Design - Workshop | Learn more
Fiona is the Founder and CEO of Naked Ambition, a design-led innovation company. She is also the host of Naked Ambition the Podcast where she interviews the people who are making an impact in leadership, Innovation and design, across the world.
As a fellow design thinking and purpose led business owner I’m really excited to have been able to interview Fiona on how she has supported the transformation of organisations through her work and the positive impacts that she has seen this bring to individuals, clients and businesses.
This episode unpacks what innovation is within our organisations and Fiona explains the three horizons that organisations can consider in creating and leading more innovative companies, the outcomes that can be achieved and how enabling these skills internally can sustain greater long term innovation within in the organisation long after the consulting team have left the building.
We also discuss the transformation that we have witnessed by great leaders and how their raw humanity has led their organisations through what has been arguably one of the toughest periods of our lifetime, and the initiatives that have been rapidly implemented to respond to the needs of their people.
We discuss;
- What is innovation and where do we start to put a focus on innovation in our business
- Which area’s of business organisations are putting more focus on in order for them to become more innovative
- The self awareness and consciousness of our personal work styles that has been a positive outcome of the pandemic
- The opportunity that virtual collaboration can bring to a project and the simple tools you need to optimise the experience
We also mention a couple of books and podcasts through the episode, you can find the links to those below:
When by Dan Pink
Essentialism by Greg McKeown
Naked Ambition with Amy Childs
Naked Ambition with Lisa Gray
Matthew McConaughey with Ryan Holiday
Such an enjoyable conversation that really gets to the heart of personal awareness and reflection on why we do what we do and, our own personal work styles.
Melissa Marsden | www.melissamarsden.com.au
Naked Ambition | www.naked-ambition.com.au
Fiona Triaca | www.linkedin.com/fionatriaca/
Gaining clarity on our own sense of purpose and the values that we wish to live by form the foundation from which we can then live out a life of alignment. When we are unclear on these aspects of our life, we can get off course, make decisions that don’t feel right and enable others to make decisions for us, as we have no real clarity on where we are heading, our North Star.
By centring ourselves around our purpose and being able to articulate what it is that we stand for and stand against, we are empowered to make decisions confidently, to communicate what it is important to us and to attract people into our lives that align with our desire.
This episode will take you on journey to prompt contemplation of what your north star looks like and the actions you can take to re-orientate yourself in its direction.
You can download a copy of the worksheets I mention in the episode at the link below.
Download Ikigai & Values Template
Cassandra Goodman is a coach, facilitator and the author of the newly realised book Self-Fidelity. With over three decades of business experience across multiple industries she has held many different senior leadership roles, including Global Director of Employee Experience at a healthcare company where she activated the organisation’s purpose ‘Longer, Healthier, Happier Lives’ for their 86,000 employees across the world.
In addition to growing her own business, Cassandra is a Thrive Global facilitator and executive coach. Thrive Global is an organisation founded and led by Arianna Huffington with the mission to end the global epidemic of stress and burnout. Cassandra is passionate about contributing to this mission.
In this episode we discuss;
- what is “self-fidelity” and why is this important in creating workplaces that inspire human potential
- How our conditioning in the workplace may have been misguiding us and preventing us from living our true nature as humans
- The 4 elements of self fidelity
- The one thing that you can do today to align your work aspirations to your true nature.
You can connect with Cassandra on LinkedIn and if you’d like to learn more on Self Fidelity you can purchase a copy of her book at the link below. Use the code DESIGN at the checkout for FREE shipping.
Cassandra Goodman LinkedIn | www.linkedin.com/cassandra-goodman/
Cassandra Goodman Website | www.CassandraGoodman.com
Self Fidelity | www.Self-Fidelity.com
Have you ever considered the link between the values and the expected behaviours in your organisation? When we set the values of our organisation, we need to go deeper in order to clearly communicate the expectations of our culture. In going to that next level we are looking at the behaviours that we expect to see when we are living in alignment with the values of our organisation. When we have clarity of the behaviours, we can then begin to use our environment to encourage people to do more of the things that align with the expected values of the business.
This episode is going to give you a sneak peak into what we cover in this module in the Your Workplace Future Ready program. In the program we dive into this topic looking at the science that sits behind our workplace design, and how you can uncover the values and then articulate the behaviours that you’d like to observe in your workplace. You’ll also understand how to use your workplace to reinforce the desired behaviours to enable your organisation to live out its values.
Melissa Marsden | www.melissamarsden.com.au
Your Workplace Future Ready program | Join the wait list
In today's episode, the tables are turned and I'm being interviewed by Amanda Bulow from the Awesome Women Podcast. We discussed;
- all things workplace design,
- how our workplaces have evolved,
- the different types of typologies and space settings that we have in our workplace environments,
- we debate whether or not the open plan office is dead,
- what we might be expecting to see in our workplaces in a post COVID World; and
- how the workplace will need to consider the next generation.
Amanda wraps up the episode with a dive into my career history, discussing how I came to be an Interior Designer and the Founder & Director of COMUNiTI plus I share some of my thoughts on what it takes to run a successful business and what I wish I'd known when I first started out.
Melissa Marsden | www.melissamarsden.com.au
Amanda Bulow | www.awic.org.au/
Awesome Women Podcast | Click here to listen
Creating a new workplace environment can be a really exciting, but also a pretty daunting time. So it’s important to get the right people on your team to guide you.
This episode gives you a shopping list of the external advisors that you might want to have on your side and engaging with across your journey. Designing and building your new workplace doesn’t happen all that often and you want all the help you can get to make this as enjoyable and as fun as possible, while making sure that you're getting the right advice.
We cover everything from leasing through to building your new dream workplace and who you’ll need at each step of the way.
Melissa Marsden | www.melissamarsden.com.au
Tom Price is the Founding Director of Aston Qld and Simon Backhouse is the company's Associate Director of Workplace Technology. Aston are specialist building services engineers and technology consultants operating solely in the commercial workplace sector. They are dedicated to delivering advice, design and technical support in the areas of engineering and workplace technology. With clients such as Atlassian, Zoom & Dropbox in their portfolio, Aston are at the forefront of what’s happening in workplace design and technology and the impact on our future of work.
I was fortunate enough to get an insight into how they see the future of work playing out in technology space in this interview.
We cover everything from our desire for intuitive technology to the impact that working from home has created on the technological infrastructure of our organisations.
In this episode you’ll learn about;
- The richness of conversations that are now happening around workplace design as a result of COVID
- How workplace management systems will be able to support the organisation of people and place into the future
- The ability to see how our workplaces are really being utilised through data
- How technology is an important component of how we feel about our workplace environments and our experience of work
- The dramatic evolution of workplace conferencing technology and the shift from large expensive purpose built systems to mobile and agile
- Cautions the overuse of technology and the opportunity to support both sides of our brains
- How enabling your organisation to be future ready needs to encourage a little bit of play
- The possibility that Virtual Reality will bring to our workplaces
- The inequality challenge that we are now faced with around “work from home’
- The challenge of replacing the face to face watercooler conversation with technology
Whilst this conversation is a lot about the technology of organisations we also get a little philosophical about us as humans and leaders and how technology is not necessarily the answer to everything.
Melissa Marsden | www.melissamarsden.com.au
Aston Consulting | www.astonconsult.com.au
Achieving optimal results from your next workplace requires input from a variety of stakeholders. It requires a diverse range of opinions and view points to ensure that you have looked at the possibilities from the view point of each of the users, and you might even be a little surprised by what you learn about your organisation.
In this episode
- I'll be guiding you through who you should be involving in the process in order to achieve the best outcome.
- We talk about why you would involve these people and the contribution that they can make to rounding out your workplace brief.
- I'll share with you some of the ways you can engage with these stakeholders in order to facilitate their feedback, and
- How through using our 3 step model you can begin to design a future workplace together.
If you are looking to transform your workplace for the future, YOUR WORKPLACE FUTURE READY can support you in laying the foundations you need. A 6 module online program covering the 5 pillars of the Workplace Dynamics Blueprint. www.melissamarsden.com.au/programs
Melissa Marsden | https://www.melissamarsden.com
Does that “ping” of your email make your whole body tense? Chances are you could be experiencing “digital stress”.
Dr Kristy Goodwin is a speaker, author, researcher and media commentator exploring the impacts that our digitalised lives have on our physical health, mental wellbeing and productivity. She works with organisations, both big and small, to optimise employees’ digital wellbeing and productivity as they navigate remote working arrangements.
Kristy makes understanding the why of how we engage with technology and how we can counteract our dependencies with it, easy and tangible. Using scientific research, Kristy works with individuals and organisations to tame their tech in order to consciously manage their digital distractions to enhance mental wellbeing and productivity.
In this episode we discuss the impact that our technology is having on our physical health and particularly our eyes, the side effects of being tethered to technology and how we need to balance our “screentime with greentime”. We also get a bit nerdy discussing neuroscience and the chronotypes that guide us in finding our most productive work time.
One of the most challenging situations for us all at the moment with the shift to remote working, is the setting of what Kristy calls “techspectations”, the rules that underpin the use of technology and the expectations that we have within our organisations.
Kristy shares with us the three most important things we can do as leaders in our organisations to move the needle for our employees and their relationship with technology.
Passionate about changing our relationship with technology this is one chat that we can all take something actionable away from.
Melissa Marsden | www.melissamarsden.com.au
Dr Kristy Goodwin | www.drkristygoodwin.com
Your Workplace Future Ready | https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/your_workplace_future_ready
An organisations brand is far more than a logo, website or a suite of colours. It is the representation of the organisations purpose, why they exist, where they came from and where they are going. It is their story and personality. Your brand is much more than a logo and a suite of colours.
Your brand is a representation of who you are, what you stand for and how you want people to experience you.
“Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room”.
The brand of an organisation runs deeper than its logo and colour pallet. It's the stories that have shaped it through history and the impact that the business is making in the world. The secret is in exploring this and then infusing it into the built environment so you can feel it, touch it and see it.
Every business has a unique brand personality and when this is infused into the very fabric of the environment, it elicits emotion, a feeling of connection and leads to the creation of culture.
With all the challenges that 2020 has delivered to us, I’m witnessing the need of many organisations to revaluate their workplace environments and how they wish for their people to engage. And that means that the space we need to facilitate those engagements also needs to change.
As many of us are still navigating this time, I’ve decided to share my 20+ years experience in creating environments that enable high performing teams in my new program “Your Workplace Future Ready”.
This program will dig deep into the psychology of work, look at the science of how we work and help you unpack the intelligence that already exists in your organisation to guide you towards your future of work.
Click on the link below to join the Waitlist. Doors open 20th October.
Your Workplace Future Ready | https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/your_workplace_future_ready
Melissa Marsden | https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/
As humans we are hardwired for social connection in order to survive, a deep need to feel like we belong. My guest in this episode helps us to understand the connection between organisational culture and the rules of belonging.
Fiona Robertson is a culture and leadership expert, she is also the author of Rules of Belonging - change your organisational culture, delight your people and turbo-charge your results.
Fiona was also the Head of Culture at NAB, and was actually there at the same time as our last guest Sarah Skeats who was Head of Brand, and it was together that they transformed the brand and culture of NAB delivering a completely integrated brand strategy “more than money”. IF you haven’t had a chance to listen to that episode, skip back to Episode 13 after this one and take a listen to her take on the connection between brand and culture.
Fiona shares with us her experiences of how culture is often misunderstood and how having the best strategy in your organisation is only a piece of paper unless you have the culture required to execute it.
We discuss the impact of the physical environment on our behaviours and she also shares a beautiful example of how just the shape of a table shifted mindset and changed the conversation, decision making and balance of power within a room.
This conversation covers a lot of ground from the impact That working from home is having on our sense of belonging, the brain and its interpretation of social pain and her iceberg model describing the reasons for functional & disfunctional behaviour.
Fiona and I could have talked about this topic for hours! Her passion and deep connection to enabling organisations to align strategy, culture and belonging radiates from her.
Fionarobertson.com
Fiona Robertson LinkedIn
Melissamarsden.com.au
Your Workplace Future Ready Program
Melissa Marsden Instagram | @melmar
How do you know what size tenancy is going to be right for you? Current space +10%? Industry average?
In this episode we’ll be exploring some of the common mistakes that are made in determining how much space you need. I’ll then share with you three steps that you can take to analyse how your organisation is using your workplace in order to put some data and science behind determining the floor area that your business will need.
This episode covers a LOT and gets into the finer details of determining your office space requirements so that you are well informed when going to market for your next workplace.
Melissa Marsden | www.melissamarsden.com.au
Sarah Skeats is a Partner of BoB Group, or otherwise known as Business of Brand, where she is also the Managing Director of BoB Australia. BoB are a purpose driven business supporting organisations to make an impact and “shift the world into a new era”.
Sarah has delivered record-breaking acquisition, retention and brand campaigns with leading global and national brands including Microsoft, Telstra and recently as the Head of Brand at NAB, where she delivered the latest brand strategy, More than Money.
However as you’ll hear in our discussion, Sarah realised that in order to truly deliver on a brand strategy, it needed to be integrated into the entire business, which she realised very quickly needed alignment with the culture team. The success of this strategy was how it was tied back to the core of the business and alignment with the organisational purpose.
We also discuss
- the difference between brand and branding
- the impact of brand through every touch point of a business and how it's instrumental in from the top in defining purpose & vision right through to sales & products
- the opportunity that comes from pulling your market towards you through by building community
- As well as how uncovering and shining a light on your employee’s personal brands can open up new market channels and revenue streams in your business
We also chat about one of our clients Hall Chadwick, their brand story and how the process of uncovering their brand enabled them to visually see how they showed up through the physical environment. You can listen to that one again if you missed it back at Eps 3, of the podcast.
Sarah explains how when we connect into purpose, understanding our brand and our community, we can then create a space that articulates their brand and bring it to life in a physical space. She also shares with us the true impact that a well-executed brand can have on your business, and how investing in your people enables you to live up to your brand promise, along with the role that purpose plays in business.
Sarah has worked with hundreds of businesses and business leaders globally, helping them grow and step into their own potential through brand led growth. She is here to shift their belief of what’s possible.
BoB Earth www.bobearth.com
BoB https://businessofbrand.com
Your Workplace Future Ready Program - JOIN THE WAITLIST! https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/your_workplace_future_ready
Creating a new workplace can be a really exciting but also daunting time. There are a lot of big decisions that need to be made and these decisions are ones that we are going to be needing to live with for a long time.
In this episode we discuss all the factors that influence the cost of your workplace from floor area and workplace style through to how your brand influences the level of finish that you desire. We’ll also be looking at how time impacts on costs and how with the right lease deal, you can actually build a new workplace for FREE.
Your workplace is an investment in the future of your organisation. It is the space that enables your people. When done well, your workplace is an asset that continue to perform for your business.
Melissa Marsden | www.melissamarsden.com.au
Workplace Dynamics Blueprint | Your Workplace Future Ready https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/your_workplace_future_ready
Dealing with the tough stuff is not new to any of us, but actually doing this and doing it well can be a challenge for many us. Thankfully this is at the heart of what Ali Hill loves to support leaders and organisations to do daily.
Ali is a registered psychologist and CEO of three-time AFR 100 company Pragmatic Thinking. Using her expertise across leadership, culture and psychology, she and the team at Pragmatic thinking help organisations build better leaders by building better people.
Ali is also the author of two best selling books and the host of one of Australia’s top podcasts Stand Out Life.
In this episode Ali talks us through the opportunity we each have in our organisations to create high performing teams, how we can embrace the ability to support our remote and distributed teams, her shift in thinking around the link between culture and performance and shares how the team at Pragmatic Thinking have implemented three key structures into their day to help them focus their motivation and productivity.
Ali gives us a few tips on how we can have the tough conversations and the impact of “contaminated space” and our emotional memory and how we can still continue to have our tough conversations even over zoom!
A really insightful conversation on the actions that we can each take to support our teams and continue to adapt to our evolving environments.
www.melissamarsden.com.au
Pragmatic Thinking
Pragmatic Thinking – Linkedin
Ali Hill – Instagram
Workplace styles - What are our options? What are the various types of environments that exist for us to consider when moving into our new workplace? Now is a really exciting time for us to reimagine our workplace in the future. We've been presented with so many possibilities that lie before us. We're going to be looking at everything from the traditional right through to running a remote workforce, and what makes up each style and how different types of industries have typically aligned with each style. We look at how technology is enabling us to work differently and what that means from a workplace environment perspective.
If you enjoyed this episode, I would love you to engage in the conversation further and jump on over to Facebook and join our COMUNiTI Dialogue Group. You'll find other great resources and people to connect with on a similar journey.
COMUNiTI Dialogue | https://www.facebook.com/groups/697144931023446/
Melissa | www.melissamarsden.com.au
Coworking is a concept that has fascinated me for years. In this episode, Jonathon and I unpack how these spaces operate and what the financial metrics & community engagement needs are to make this model work for both the operator and the resident. But perhaps even more importantly we discuss how the design of our physical environment influences our behaviour and organisational performance, and how he has seen this first hand through the tenants of his coworking space.
Born in Ireland, raised in the Middle East, educated in the United Kingdom and living in Singapore. Jonathan has experienced some interesting insights into the way the world works
Jonathan found his love for entrepreneurship early; founding his first company in Singapore at the age of twenty four. After learning the hard way how isolating international entrepreneurship can be, he went on to found one of Singapore's first coworking businesses, Collective Works in 2012 at the age of twenty six using his skills of expatriate community building to create environments that supported people.
In this episode we discuss everything from what coworking is and is not, how the traditional model of the serviced office has evolved and how technology can be sophisticated enough to service even the highest of security requirements.
We also explore the importance of design iteration; the ability to observe and reinvent spaces to accommodate the changing needs of the people who use the space. Jonathon went so far as to create 9 persona’s for his clients in order to support their varied needs, and space for both the extrovert and the introvert.
We even discussed what the future of commercial leasing may hold and how coworking has disrupted the real estate market and the opportunity to move from an asset mindset to that of a user experience.
Jonathon has a wonderful way of seeing the world and connecting the dots. I thoroughly enjoyed this conversation, as I got to dig into all the things I’ve been quite curious to know about running a successful coworking operation. If this is something you’re keen to explore further, you can also grab a copy of his book.
Melissamarsden.com.au
Jonathan O’Byrne | https://www.jonathanobyrne.com/pages/about
Jonathan O’Byrne Book | - https://www.jonathanobyrne.com/pages/coworking-inc-book
The global pandemic has shifted how we work. While we can’t predict the long term impact that the pandemic will have on our workplaces, what we have seen is an acceleration of the future of work and the role that technology is going to have in keeping us safe and enabling our productivity.
In this episode we explore what some of the technology’s that our buildings may look to incorporate into the future and how workplace management technology will enable us to monitor, manage and coordinate our workplaces. We’ll discuss the role of wellbeing and how our buildings will look to become “healthier” into the future and how that can then translate into the physical design to enable employee wellbeing.
To support the evolution into the future a Workplace Strategy will be required as the foundation from which we build upon and this will encourage us to look at the true purpose of workplaces and where we are going as an organisation. We discuss the shift in binary thinking of “either/or” to “and” and how this shift in mindset will lead to a hybrid approach to work and the opportunities it will present.
I’ll also share my views on the idea that the “hot desk is dead”.
I mentioned a few resources in the episode, you’ll find those here;
COMUNiTI Returning to the Workplace Toolkit https://comuniti.com.au/returning-to-the-workplace/?fbclid=IwAR3WuZb22GM7si8d7fPxxD9s3ZZXFZq-IrkHl9-85XK-hVF32iwiA7ck1mo
WELL Building Standards https://www.wellcertified.com
Unwork Article https://www.unwork.com/blog/how-covid-19-will-change-the-world-part-three-workplace/?fbclid=IwAR1QVVq90wqXr2CjJjnUchPhZi4Dddcb0GmqrhWUE3YZfdyf6lOw9IsXxlY
Melissamarsden.com.au
Why does your organisation need a wellness strategy?
As we are navigating our way through one of the most challenging times in our history, never has there been a more important time to develop and implement a wellness strategy that responds to the needs of your organisation. Many organisations roll out fruit boxes, flu shots and engage their people in step count challenges. While done with the very best of intentions, these initiatives can often be seen as failing to provide an ROI to the organisation, as they aren't connected to the corporate objectives and goals of the business.
Katrina Walton is the founder and director of Wellness Designs, a boutique workplace wellness business supporting Australasian organisations to create healthy, safe, engaged and high performing workplaces. Katrina and the team at Wellness Designs have identified that in order for a wellness strategy to truly succeed, that the capability to manage the strategy needs to come from within the organisation. So they develop their practitioner training program to ensure those charged with supporting the organisation were supported themselves. They have since gone on to launch the hub, a workplace wellness Resource Centre and community for those interested in knowing, learning and sharing all things workplace wellness.
Katrina believes that healthy employees equal healthy organisations which equals a healthy economy, a win win scenario. In this episode, we look at what a wellness strategy is, why your business needs one, and how you can ensure that your wellness strategy is delivering value to your business and isn't just another strategy that gets filed in the drawer.
Wellness Designs | https://wellnessdesigns.com.au/
Melissa Marsden | https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/
What is the True Purpose of our Workplace? This episode explores why we go to work, how we came to be at this place we call work and how our workplaces fill a social need and connection in each of us. We also look at how our workplaces connect our personal purpose to that of the organisation and how we can achieve significant productivity and performance gains when we socialise at work.
“If in doubt, do it!”
Putting off starting a family in exchange for your career, is a conversation that I have had many times with my female friends and colleagues. In this episode of Work Life by Design I’m chatting with Nadia Taylor from Mapien on her experience of shifting from thinking she didn’t want children to integrating her new son Atlas not only into her career but also into her workplace.
As a passionate advocate for returning mums to the workplace, I was fortunate enough to watch as Nadia navigate this experience successfully, returning to work with Atlas in arms at 2 weeks old. Nadia inspired me that it was possible to continue to operate a successful business and return to work with a baby with a little planning.
As an Executive Director at Mapien, Workplace Strategists, Nadia shares with us her career journey of growing from a graduate to building a million dollar practice and how deciding to have a child was decision she had put off. We discuss the impact that a lack of role models can have on your perception of what is acceptable, the fear that stops us from asking for opportunities at work, along with the cultural shift that comes from having a baby in the office.
If you are considering starting a family and how you can continue your career or are an organisation looking to embrace greater flexibility for your workforce, you need to tune into this episode!
Melissamarsden.com.au
Mapien.com.au
Take your baby to work by Sarita James
"I believe the most powerful thing on the planet is the human mind, and we all have one. So why not take the best version of it with us everywhere we go." Brett Robinson
In this episode I had the pleasure of chatting with Amber Hawken and Brett Robinson. These two individuals have an infectious passion for enabling people to achieve their biggest potential and for each of us to be the most optimised human being we can be, and together they have founded Calm Mind Co. Created to shape conscious leaders and shift cultures using mindfulness, meditation and mindset, by first beginning with the individual and then rippling out into the collective.
Amber is a powerhouse With a Diploma of Mindfulness-based Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, she is also a qualified Neuro-Linguistic Programming Practitioner, Deep State Re-Patterning Therapist and a Meditation Teacher.
Brett, has consulted as a Performance Coach & therapist at Olympic Level, Various AFL, NRL & ARU teams and many other athletes. Brett says that he used to be addicted to human performance, now he’s addicted to human behaviour, coaching CEO’s and high performing business owners and entrepreneurs on mindset, emotional intelligence, nutrition, breathing, gut health and so much more!
In this episode our conversation delves into the impact our physical, mental & emotional capacity can have on enabling us to live optimally, the transformational effect of leading with a calm mind on our business’s and the impact of dissolving the separation that can exist so we can bring our whole self to work.
I loved recording this episode and the conversation has continued to mull over in my head. I hope that you are able to take as much value from this as I did and that it may open up a new perspective for you and your business.
Melissamarsden.com.au
https://calmmindco.com
https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/the-amber-hawken-podcast/id1208011314
https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/your-life-of-impact-with-brett-robbo/id1254861349
Your brand is so much more than a logo. It’s your story, what you stand for and how you want to be seen. In this episode I’m pleased to be introducing you to Dugald Warby. Duge is one of the partners at Hall Chadwick Qld, a firm that was founded 40 years ago with deep roots back to Western Queensland.
In this episode, Duge and I discuss their pride for their history, how they have managed to maintain their small firm mentality and what it takes to make it 40years in business. With a client base that spans from inner city to loyal 3rd generation rural clientele we explore how these relationships have stood the test of time and the impact that Hall Chadwick’s strong country values have played in this.
Having the pleasure of looking deeper into their organisation several years ago when designing their new workplace, I had the opportunity to look under the façade and get to the heart of their business, to truly understand their culture and how their country heritage infused their business. Duge and I discuss how they started the journey of “we need more space, we need a new office” to how the design of their workplace has enabled their team and the feeling that it gives to people before they have even met someone, and how the space reflects who they are really are.
Hall Chadwick | https://www.hallchadwick.com.au/
Hall Chadwick Case Study
Hall Chadwick Breakfast Seminar
Melissamarsden.com.au
Designing a workplace that yields results is in fact a science. Dr Libby Sander is Assistant Professor of Organisational Behaviour at Bond University, where she researches the impact that our workplaces have on our lives across, neuroscience, architecture, psychology, entrepreneurship and urban design. As a follower of Libby's work, I was intrigued to understand the link between a well designed and considered space and the comfort and performance levels of individuals. In this episode we discuss the effects that our environments have on our ability to concentrate, communicate and perform and how the aesthetic beauty of the space we occupy can also subliminally affect our preferences. You'll learn about how our brains react to our physical environments and why it is so important to consider our environments holistically, including lighting, air, noise, colours, materials and amenities. Libby shares with us her framework for defining our best work environments, as well as how our unique personalities impact on our personal preferences for spaces and why a one size fits all approach doesn't work. Libby Sander | Linkedin Melissa Marsden | www.melissamarsden.com.au
In this very first episode of Work Life by Design, I am pleased to be introducing you to Nadia Taylor. Nadia is not only an Executive Director at Mapien Workplace Strategists, she is also an amazing woman!
Mapien have been on an transformational journey over the past 2years that has seen them evolve from a traditional, slow moving organisation to one that has rapidly adopted change, achieved a successful business merger and acquired several businesses.
I have had the joy of knowing Nadia for about 4 years now. COMUNiTI have also had the extreme pleasure of calling Mapien one of our clients and the privilege of supporting them in this transformation that saw them achieve their highest financial performance in their 35year history only 6mths after moving into their new work environment.
In this episode Nadia shares just how important it is to have a strong foundation of values in your organisation and the business value that can be achieved by measuring every decision against these values.
Nadia has an extensive knowledge of leadership and people experience which she has combined with a hands on approach to growing a people focused business. She also loves to travel and explore new horizons, preferably with her 3 year old son Atlas by her side.
Mapien | https://www.mapien.com.au/
Nadia Taylor | https://www.linkedin.com/in/nadiataylor/
Melissa Marsden | https://www.melissamarsden.com.au/
COMUNiTI Livingstones Project Profile
Hello, I'm Mel Marsden and welcome to Work Life by Design. In a time when we can work from anywhere, why is it that we actually need to "go" to "work" to "work"? You're about to hear how organisations have optimised their business by shifting employee and business mindsets from slow, stagnant operations, to agile and flexible environments, established premium levels of employee experience and realised substantial profits.
Website: melissamarsden.com.au