Tend the leader.
Restore the team.
Helping you and your team stay steady under pressure, so you can keep caring for the people you serve.
Ready now?
Text Heather on 027 300 7375
Wherever there are people, there are relationships
You care about people. Your team, your customers, your patients.
Wherever people work together, there are emotions, different points of view, unpredictability, and stress. How well we handle those decides how well we do.
The leaders and organisations that do this well treat their people as whole people. They invest in the relationships that make the work possible.
When you care deeply, it’s easy to give until there’s nothing left. Leaders and teams need to learn to balance care for others with tending themselves. That’s where my work begins.
“I can’t recommend Heather highly enough to any organisation wanting to strengthen leadership capability and support the wellbeing of their people.”
Ways to work together
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Co-designed with your organisation for managers and leaders.
Leaders learn to:
— Restore their energy
— Notice their own reactions
— Stay steady when tension rises
— Learn from mistakes, starting with their own
— Raise and repair issues early
— Rebuild trust across their teams
Delivered online or in person, with a workbook, ongoing support for graduates, and the option to train your own facilitators.
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Confidential support for leaders carrying a lot.
— New to the role and finding your feet
— Working through a hard stretch
— Growing into more senior responsibility
Leaders come away clearer, steadier and more able to choose how they respond.
Weekly, fortnightly or monthly sessions, online or in person.
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Coming soon: A 12-week group course for leaders from any organisation.
— Six weeks on coaching yourself
— Six weeks on coaching your team
— A live group session each week, recorded if you can’t attend
— Support from the group between sessions.
Learn alongside leaders from other organisations who face similar pressures.
For leaders
For teams
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Practical group courses for teams under pressure.
Team members learn to:
— Notice stress early, in their bodies and in their reactions
— Steady themselves before they respond
— Go easier on themselves and each other
— Support each other during busy and difficult periods
Teams come away calmer and better at working together.
Usually around six sessions, at your workplace or online, planned around shifts and workload.
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For teams that need to repair how they work together.
— After a restructure or a big change
— When conflict has damaged trust
— After a long stretch of strain
Together we recognise what has gone wrong, raise it, repair it and restore trust. Teams leave with clear agreements about how they’ll work from here.
A half or full day, best in person, online by arrangement.
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Solution-focused, confidential coaching for team members who need extra support.
— Managing stress that’s spilling into their work or relationships
— Finding their feet after a hard stretch
— Getting ready for more responsibility
People come away with practical ways to steady themselves and look after their wellbeing at work.
Available on its own or alongside a team course or workshop. Usually offered as a 3-6 session package, weekly, fortnightly, or monthly, online or in person.
Most leadership development
is wasted
on leaders too depleted to use it
Your people keep your organisation running. Many of your leaders were promoted because they are excellent at the work. Few were given support to lead people through strain, tension and change.
Does this sound familiar?
You sponsor a training day full of good ideas. Your people arrive tired and sceptical. Then they go back to the same pressures and the same habits. And nothing changes.
I work differently. I start with the person beneath the role.
Every session begins with an experience of calming and steadying. Each week, people take a micro practice into their work, then reflect on it together as a team. Over the course, they build a shared language and stronger connection, and the change becomes their new normal.
What changes?
People who stay.
Good staff are less likely to burn out or leave.
Problems caught early.
Tension is dealt with before it turns into complaints, sick leave or resignations.
Teams that work well together.
People share a practical way to talk about what’s gone wrong and move forward.
Better care for the people you serve.
Steady, supported staff treat customers and patients better.
Pride in where they work.
People can see the organisation living its values.
Capability that stays.
Your own people can be trained to carry the work on.
Client Experiences
“Our team has become so connected to each other. We have opened our eyes, ears and hearts to reframe the way we see each other — to create a softer connection. You hear us — the words we speak and the ones we don’t.”
— Trish, New Zealand“I have been reflecting on why these sessions have been so impactful for the whole team … the answer is the way you have gently and skillfully nudged us to think deeply, be honest with ourselves and each other, and share bits of ourselves.”
— Christine, New Zealand
Heather Bailey, ThinkFRESH Founder
I’ve spent 30 years in health and community leadership: first in nonprofit women’s health and violence prevention in the United States, then as a registered nurse, midwife and senior health leader in New Zealand, including Director of Midwifery for Southern DHB. I know what it is to carry responsibility for people while the system around you is stretched. Leaders don’t have to explain their world to me.
Whether you’re thinking about your leaders, your team or one person who’s struggling, a conversation is a good place to start.