Who I am

I love aiming for excellence, and adaptability is the ultimate superpower! 

My energy comes from sharing how leaders and teams can optimise performance by blending people development with business engineering.

I'm passionate about growing leaders at every level so people feel confident, capable, and trusted to make a lasting positive impact.

Work is a big part of our life – it has to be worth our time. None of us should settle for average when we can be more intentional about what we want and commit to achieve it.

Enabling practical and team-led change for optimal return is what I'm known for.

Life is too short to be stuck in businesses where we can't add value or feel like what we do isn't good enough. I love showing people how to realise their strengths and amplify them.

Shifting thinking and changing behaviour for excellence can be tough. Success comes from being adaptive in how we show up as individuals and as part of a team.

My most important team is my family. I'm particularly committed to being the best version of myself for my children as a role model who supports their dreams too. 

I love a good challenge, and it's driven me to compete in two bodybuilding competitions to prove that I could adapt and excel emotionally, mentally, and physically. It wasn’t fun and I won’t be flexing muscles on stage again, but to stay sharp and regularly push myself I’ve taken up boxing.

My professional journey has rarely gone to plan, but it's given me 20+ years of battle scars over 13 industries, and experience in leadership, work culture, operational delivery and change in complex environments.

I understand the need for clarity, a systemised approach, and discipline to adapt for healthy performance and lasting success.

As an Air Force veteran, I also care about working with companies that want to employ veterans and first responders. It's one thing to attract high-performing people but retaining them is where the real gains occur.

Everything we do is based on trust. It's risky, contextual, emotional, and essential for living purposefully and adapting to change.

We often struggle to trust ourselves or others, and we don't always have trust when and where we need it, but we can develop it.

Across multiple industries, ridiculous amounts of time, money, and sanity are wasted on inflexible, disconnected, and unsustainable 'solutions' that constrain or block performance. 

The primary reason many improvement initiatives fail is that 'continual improvement is everyone's responsibility', it can’t be outsourced to external consultants or contractors.

Another big reason for failure is a lack of resourcing and skills. People and organisations fail when they are overwhelmed by expectations, can't adapt work practices, and aren't set up for success.

It's easy to feel battle-weary and change-fatigued from failed transformation efforts, and when working to manage the chaos of uncertainty before and during change.

High-value outcomes are the result of people incrementally adapting and improving over time. 

The more adaptive teams are, the greater their control and ability to work around challenges and lean into higher-value opportunities.

I created the Adaptive Excellence Model as an evidence-based approach for developing work culture and setting teams up for lasting success.

The key is to start with one thing and build confidence by strengthening what people can do for optimal return.  

Sustainable success comes from creating and facilitating high-value changes in partnership with delivery teams who have better insight into what they can commit to implementing while maintaining and adjusting current operations toward the vision.

Complex challenges require a personal touch to develop relationships and build internal capability. I work to develop leaders at every level and amplify team strengths through change design and facilitation. 

When people engage me, they get me as a partner who is equally invested in delivering the outcomes. 

With practical approaches, I work directly with Executives and Managers to build trust through co-design, skills transfer, and high-value change tactics.

If you're prepared to partner up on the work, I'm here for your journey. As a team, we will:

1. Obtain employee insights to address the root causes of constraints
2. Work with existing operational challenges, pace, and pressures
3. Save money by growing capacity and value without increasing your cost base
4. Provide employees with the opportunity, skills, and support to be successful
5. Co-create solutions that make sense and play to strengths
6. Implement practical outcome-driven approaches
7. Deliver in ways that are calm, sustainable, and adaptive.

I'm intentionally not for everyone and we need to work in partnership. 

A conversation about where you are, and your vision is the first step.

Message me today on LinkedIn, melanie@melaniemarshall.com.au or book a discovery call. 

If you can't find a time that works give me a call on +61 407 004 352