Work Life by Design

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; impact of machines and technologyHow and whytechnology drove our need for workplaces and their designworkplaces really need to do now 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; 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; 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; 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; 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 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 accumulatedleverage this “data lake” to continue to enhance the employee, manager and team experiencehow taking a community focused approach to building Culture Amp has been a key foundation in its successwhat Damon has learned about communication, transparency and trust from his conversations 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 Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential” Connect with Damon; LinkedIn | Culture Amp Connect with Mel; Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience

Imagine having the ability to curate the entire experience that your employees take when they come to your workplace. To influence each touchpoint of their journey. The things that they see, hear, do... the things they feel. In episode 127, I shared how you can use an Empathy Map to consciously design the sensory experience of your people at work, a tool that can be used both to support cultural design and physical design. In today's episode we're going to take that a step further and see how you can take that sensory experience and apply it to every touchpoint in your employees' journey to and from the workplace. With just three questions at each of the touchpoints you can curate your employee journey and enhance their overall experience. Whether you have an existing workplace that could be infused with some conscious changes, or you have the open possibility to start from scratch with a new workplace, today's episode will provide you with a foundation from which you can take more informed decisions about the employee journey you wish to create for your people.

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. LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential” Connect with Rebecca; LinkedIn | Thriving People Connect with Mel; Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience

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! 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

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. LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential” Connect with Ali; LinkedIn | Instagram | Website Connect with Mel; Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience

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 < 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. 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? 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

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; 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 LINKS Get your copy of Mel’s new Book “The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential” Connect with Meg; Linkedin | Carousel Consulting Connect with Mel; Email | Insta | LinkedIn | Website | Website | Whitepaper - The Road Map to Employee Experience