CEO & Director of Academic Programs NIODA, Australia

Dr Wendy Harding is a senior practitioner in the Australian and global organisation dynamics field. Dr Harding is the current CEO and Director of Academic Programs at NIODA, having over 30 years’ experience in teaching, consulting, coaching, supervision and research. Across these years Wendy has undertaken many coaching, supervision, consultancy and action research projects in a broad span of organisational settings from large government departments to a variety of corporate and not-for-profit organisations. Organisational consulting projects have focussed on team and whole of organisation development and structural and cultural change, using a range of intervention methods. Individual coaching and supervision have been undertaken with a culturally diverse range of people working at all levels in organisations from executive level to direct service delivery.

Wendy’s coaching/supervision/consulting philosophy is based in strong beliefs in the capacity of people to be able to make change that supports their work. The role of a coach/supervisor/consultant is then to provide opportunity for shared reflection and consideration of the experience of undertaking the work in the organisation. In coaching and supervising deep reflection enables unblocking of obstructions to think, learn and action differently about the work. In organisational consulting what is enabled is the capacity to influence structure, culture and strategic processes, to thus add value to the organisation. Wendy’s practice involves the introduction of theory, method and technologies in support of these considerations, however, at its core is always about reflection and dialogue; about people working constructively together.

Brigid is a co-founder of NIODA and has worked as an organisational consultant and executive coach for over 25 years. She has been delivering experiential learning programs for over 15 years. This has included staff and Director roles on Group Relations Conferences, teaching in the RMIT and NIODA Masters degree and running external and in-house training programs. Brigid is passionate about systems psychodynamics and experiential learning approaches because of the way that they enable clients to develop a curious stance and deep insight into complex and emotionally challenging issues. Brigid has been teaching the NIODA Masters subject (and earlier iterations) ‘Through a Cultural Lens: Collaborating with ‘the Other’ at Work’ since 2010. She has also trained others to teach this subject. Organisations have become more acutely aware of the need to develop work cultures and ways of relating in which diversity is embraced for all the richness that this can contribute and in which people feel accepted and psychologically safe. Brigid’s extensive consulting and teaching experience means that she has developed to a high level the skills necessary to create a learning environment in which people feel safe and open to new experiences and new insights about themselves as leaders, about the organisational cultures that they help to co-create and about what is involved in creating safe and healthy workplaces.

Brigid has worked with a broad range of organisations. Over the past 15 years, this has been mostly in the public and not-for-profit sectors. Before that, Brigid delivered accredited in-house training to large private sector organisations such as Southcorp, Simplot and ANZ. The principals, in terms of healthy work cultures in all organisational contexts, are the same.

Helen has had over 25 years of working in organisations to inform her approach to helping others gain insights into how they take up roles and how to achieve greater alignment with individual, team and organisational purpose. Her own roles as internal planning consultant, policy and project manager, and lawyer in workplaces in both the public and private sectors have provided her with first-hand experience of the complexity and challenges of organisational life.

Helen is an alumnus and now teaches in the Master’s program at the National Institute of Organisation Dynamics Australia (NIODA). She also has a Bachelor of Laws and Bachelor of Arts from the University of Melbourne. In addition to her academic qualifications, Helen is an accredited practitioner of PRISM Brain Mapping, an online, neuroscience-based behaviour mapping instrument, and is a registered Analytic-Network Coach. Helen also has training and experience in workplace mediation and yoga teaching qualifications.