Leadership You Don’t Need to Recover From.
Something has brought you here.
This work is for aspiring and early-career social work leaders who want to stay grounded in their values as they step into leadership.
Whether you are navigating that transition yourself, or you lead an organisation that is losing capable people, you are in the right place.
This work also serves allied health professionals, psychologists, nurses, occupational therapists and youth workers who lead in human services settings and identify with the values that drew them to care-based practice.
There are four ways we can go deeper. Each one begins with the same question: what kind of leader do you want to build your career on?
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1:1 Leadership Coaching and Supervision
For the social worker ready to think differently about who they are as a leader
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Social Work Career Coaching
For the social worker navigating a career crossroads
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Inside Out Leadership Circles
For social workers, allied health professionals and human services practitioners who want to grow alongside people who understand exactly what this feels like
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Leadership Training and Wellbeing for Teams
For the organisation ready to stop losing its best people
1:1 Leadership Coaching and Supervision
One conversation at a time. Unhurried. Shaped entirely by what you bring.
The gap between the role you are in and the leader you want to be is rarely about skills. It is almost always about identity.
These sessions are designed for social workers stepping into leadership for the first time, navigating the reality of leading in complex systems, or looking for professional supervision that is grounded in social work values and practice. The work also speaks to allied health professionals, psychologists, nurses and youth workers who lead in human services settings.
Each session is shaped entirely by what you bring. The approach draws on reflective practice, values-based inquiry and 35 years of experience inside human services systems. Leave with greater clarity, steadier responses under pressure and a more grounded sense of who you are as a leader.
This is not support that asks you to become someone else. It is the kind that helps you become more fully yourself.
Build a career you don’t need to recover from.
*Sessions are priced at the AASW recommended rate for experienced social work practitioners. This reflects Jody’s commitment to making this work accessible to the people who need it most.
This work may also contribute to your continuing professional development requirements. AASW members can discuss CPD documentation with Jody. Members of other professional bodies should refer to their own framework requirements.
Jody is willing to discuss reduced fees for individuals experiencing financial hardship. Please reach out directly.
Individual (inc GST)
1 session — $289
3 sessions — $780
6 sessions — $1,490
Organisation-supported (exc GST)
1 session — $435
3 sessions — $1,170
6 sessions — $2,240
Social Work Career Coaching
Build a career you don’t need to recover from.
Social work career coaching is for practitioners at a crossroads: those navigating a career pause, a sector change, a return to practice, or a decision about whether to stay in or move on from leadership.
It draws on the same reflective and values-based approach as leadership coaching but the focus shifts to the broader arc of your career. What do you want from it? What are you willing to trade? What are you not willing to lose?
This is particularly relevant for social workers who are questioning whether their current role is still the right fit, considering moving into a different area of practice, returning after a break, or rebuilding after a difficult professional experience.
It is not career advice in the traditional sense. It is a structured process of thinking clearly about who you are and what you want your professional life to look like.
Same session structure and investment as 1:1 Leadership Coaching and Supervision.
Jody is willing to discuss reduced fees for individuals experiencing financial hardship. Please reach out directly.
Individual (inc GST)
1 session — $289
3 sessions — $780
6 sessions — $1,490
Organisation-supported (exc GST)
1 session — $435
3 sessions — $1,170
6 sessions — $2,240
Inside Out Leadership Circles
Leadership was never meant to be done alone.
There is something that happens when leaders come together in a small, carefully curated group: the isolation lifts. The sense that you are the only one navigating this dissolves. And the thinking gets sharper, faster and more honest than it ever does alone.
The Inside Out Leadership Circles bring together six to eight social workers at a similar stage in their leadership journey. Over six months, the group meets monthly for 90-minute facilitated sessions to explore real leadership challenges, build reflective practice and develop the kind of peer connections that research confirms are one of the strongest protective factors against burnout and early career exit.
In between sessions, participants have access to a shared private peer channel where the conversation continues. The peer connection does not pause between sessions. That is where much of the value lives.
This is not a training program. There are no correct answers and no prescribed frameworks to master. It is a facilitated space where you can think out loud, be challenged gently and leave each session with something clearer than you arrived with.
Six 90-minute facilitated sessions over six months, meeting monthly. Plus a shared peer channel active throughout.
Small curated group of six to eight participants at a similar stage. Real leadership challenges explored in real time. Cross-organisational insight you cannot get from within your own team. Structured reflection drawing on a purpose-built social work leadership framework developed through the Churchill Fellowship research. Peer connections that continue well beyond the six months.
The research is clear: peer connection in leadership is not a nice-to-have. It is a protective factor. And it is one of the most underused resources available to social work leaders.
Individual (inc GST)
Circles — 6 sessions over 6 months
$1,680
Organisation-supported (exc GST)
Circles — 6 sessions over 6 months
$2,520
*Sessions are priced at the AASW recommended rate for experienced social work practitioners. This reflects Jody’s commitment to making this work accessible to the people who need it most.
This work may also contribute to your continuing professional development requirements. AASW members can discuss CPD documentation with Jody. Members of other professional bodies should refer to their own framework requirements.
Jody is willing to discuss reduced fees for individuals experiencing financial hardship. Please reach out directly.
Inside Out Leadership Circles intake opens when a cohort of six to eight practitioners at a similar stage is confirmed. A brief initial conversation is part of the process.
Leadership, Training and Wellbeing for Teams
Build a culture your people don’t need to recover from.
Social work organisations across Australia are losing capable leaders earlier than most workforce strategies account for. The evidence from leadership research is consistent: the transition into a new leadership role is the highest-risk period. For social work leaders, who navigate identity shift, values tension and peer relationships simultaneously, the early months are when support is lowest and risk is highest. Not the burnt-out veterans. The values-driven practitioners you just promoted.
Most organisations respond by recruiting harder. The research points elsewhere.
Social workers do not leave because they lack commitment. They leave when the conditions around them make it impossible to remain themselves. When the gap between the leader they are being asked to be and the person they actually are becomes too wide to hold.
This is a solvable problem. The evidence from nine countries of Churchill Fellowship research is identifying exactly what conditions change that outcome.
Three ways organisations work with me:
Support for an intact leadership team: facilitated training workshops, seminars and sessions designed to build reflective practice, strengthen team culture and address the specific identity and wellbeing challenges of leading in complex systems. Typically a series tailored to your context, from a 90-minute session to a full-day workshop.
Support for a cohort of aspiring leaders: a private Leadership Circle for a group of identified high-potential or newly promoted social workers within your organisation. The highest-value investment you can make in your leadership pipeline, because it addresses identity, belonging and peer connection at exactly the moment they are most at risk.
Facilitated training and professional development: bespoke leadership and wellbeing training for your broader workforce. Topics are drawn from the Churchill Fellowship research and tailored to your context. Contact Jody for a training directory and rate card.
Replacing a mid-career social worker costs an average of 1.5 times their annual salary. That is before the disruption to clients, team stability and institutional knowledge. Across a sector where social workers are nationally listed among the top 20 occupations in demand, and where demand is projected to grow by more than 23% over the next decade, the cost of solving a retention problem with a recruitment strategy is compounding every quarter.
This is not generic leadership training. It is identity-led, evidence-informed work grounded in nine countries of original research into what actually keeps social work leaders well, grounded and in the profession long term. Every engagement is tailored to your context. There are no off-the-shelf programs here.
And if your organisation is already doing exemplary work on retention, leadership development or succession planning, I would love to hear from you too. The research needs those stories just as much.
Organisational engagements are scoped to your context and needs. Tailored programs begin from a half-day facilitated session. The starting point is a conversation.