Maree Harris has managed her own consultancy since 1989, and has more than 25 years experience helping people grow and develop their professional lives so that they can creatively manage the challenges they and their organisations face.

Until the mid 1990s, her consultancy specialised in counselling and psychotherapy. Major change then took place in organisations here in Australia as a philosophy of economic rationalism shifted the goal posts and all business decisions became subservient almost solely to economics - even in the more people-oriented human service sector.

Maree found herself seeing, for "counselling", increasing numbers of people in middle management overwhelmed with the change process they were being called to implement with little support or training to make it happen. These people were highly competent and experienced managers. They did not need counselling but back in the mid 1990s coaching was virtually unknown here in Australia and counsellors were all there were for people who wanted to work through challenges they were facing in their professional lives.

Without identifying what she was doing at that time, Maree actually coached these people to empower themselves for the change they were being called to manage, to re-discover their strengths and to "re-model" their leadership and management skills for these new and different challenging circumstances. People came feeling failures and left feeling empowered and with new energy and enthusiasm for what they were being asked to do.

Maree has developed and now uses this strength based approach in all her coaching and professional development work. She is committed to helping people find and work with the positive, to become resilient, empowered, pro-active professionals. While she is solution focussed and action oriented, she emphasises the importance of reflection and the development of self-awareness for people.

Maree is committed to helping people find and work with the positive, to become resilient, empowered, pro-active professionals.

She believes this is what solidly grounds their own development and produces leadership and management decisions grounded in wisdom, integrity and values consistent with their true selves.

Her PhD, completed in 2003 - Being A Reflective Practitioner in An Age of Uncertainty - developed the thesis that it is reflective practice and the qualities that produce the reflective practitioner that are essential to success and the development of excellence in our present age of uncertainty. She therefore has considerable experience in helping the leaders and managers of today become reflective practitioners.

Since the mid 1990s, Maree's counselling and psychotherapy consultancy engaged in coaching with increasing numbers of leaders and managers, resulting in its closure in 2005. She then established People Empowered with its specific emphasis on professional development for leaders and managers in these changing and challenging times.

Maree brings to People Empowered a wealth of experience - her extensive understanding of people dynamics and people development and behaviour, her excellent interpersonal skills - people skills and so called "soft skills", her experience in staff supervision, her work in education from primary through to tertiary and adult and her training in mediation. This combines to see her create leadership development processes that are highly specific and relevant to the people with whom she works.

Maree also has a strong belief that we need to invest in and engage our people. They are an organisation's foundation; they make it what it is; they truly are its greatest asset. All her work moves from that premise of helping leaders and managers look after their people so that their people can look after their organisation.

She has developed considerable experience working with leaders and managers in developing the people skills they need to build and inspire engaged employees. She has a commitment to also helping them envision and make reality the creative balance between their business imperatives and the way they look after their people.

While based in Ballarat, Victoria, Australia, she travels widely providing her professional development services to a broad range of people both in Australia and overseas. Coaching is done either face to face within easy travel distance of Ballarat and by telephone across Australia and beyond. She is also developing professional development programs and resources on the internet via her website.

Maree is always available to talk through with people their coaching and other profesional development needs.

She can be contacted via email or by telephone or on Skype ID -m.harrispe.

Alternatively send her an email with your phone number and she will phone you. Yes, she'll phone you anywhere in the world!