When an organization is growing, changing or facing important decisions, the challenge is rarely just knowing what to do — priorities compete, perspectives differ, and what looks like one issue is often several things at once.
I work alongside senior leaders and leadership teams — across boards and organizations spanning very different sectors — bringing outside perspective, challenge and support to the real work of leading.
The work creates space to step back, see what's difficult to see from inside, have the conversations that matter, and find a way forward.
What we work on
Leaders come to this work when:
- An important decision is proving difficult to resolve
- Direction is unclear or priorities are competing
- The leadership team isn't working together as effectively as it could
- Tension or conflict is beginning to affect the work
- Growth or change is exposing issues that were previously manageable
- Roles, expectations or accountability have become unclear
- The senior leader is carrying complexity that's difficult to work through alone
Assumptions are tested. Tensions are named. Different perspectives are explored. Decisions are worked through. New possibilities become visible.
How the work takes shape
Executive Advisory and Leadership Team Days often form the core of an ongoing relationship. Team Coaching and Strategic Facilitation can form part of that work or address a particular need in their own right.
Executive Advisory & Coaching
Regular confidential conversations with the senior leader to step back from immediate demands and work through decisions, people, priorities and emerging challenges. A place to think with someone who will listen carefully, ask difficult questions, challenge assumptions and bring an independent perspective.
A senior leader questioning their capacity for the next season used our conversations to step back and reconsider both what they were carrying and what might be possible. What emerged was renewed energy and confidence, alongside a bolder vision for what could come next.
Leadership Team Days
Focused working days with the senior leadership team, typically held throughout the year. One day might focus on strategic direction and priorities. Another on team alignment, a difficult decision, accountability, conflict or significant organizational change. These are not off-the-shelf retreats — we use the real work of the organization to strengthen both the decisions being made and the team's capacity to lead well together.
As part of a strategic planning process, a leadership team used a focused working day to consider what had emerged from the work so far and discern what needed to happen next. Together, they surfaced the priorities that would shape the next stage of the process and explored a scorecard framework for tracking progress and strengthening accountability.
Team Coaching & Leadership Dynamics
When a specific issue, decision or team dynamic surfaces, team coaching sessions keep the conversation moving. Where useful, the Strength Deployment Inventory (SDI) provides a shared language for understanding motivation, strengths, communication and conflict. The structure provides rhythm and continuity; the agenda evolves with the organization.
A senior team working through real dysfunction — unspoken expectations, conflict that had gone unaddressed — moved to real collaboration, building a team charter for handling disagreement.
Strategic Facilitation
For a specific strategic moment — a planning cycle, a major decision, a governance question — this is focused facilitation, separate from the ongoing rhythm of Executive Advisory or Leadership Team Days. We start from what actually needs to happen: the decisions that need to move, the tensions likely to surface, the questions worth testing before committing to a direction. There's no pre-packaged process — the design follows what the organization needs to work through, not a template.
A not-for-profit preparing for its next strategic cycle gathered perspectives from stakeholders across the organization. The leadership team was able to make sense of what they were hearing, surface the questions that needed deeper attention and use that learning to inform the next stage of strategic planning.
What are you leading through right now?
If some of this sounds familiar, let's start by talking about what's happening and what matters now.
No pitch — just a conversation. From there, we can decide whether working together makes sense and what that could look like.
Book a conversationWant to stay connected? White Space offers short reflections for leaders who need space to think.