About Us

Amanda Lehman

Amanda specialises in psychological wellbeing in the workplace and works with a wide range of clients on topics including resilience, healthy sleep, work life balance, stress management, healthy balanced thinking and mindfulness. She also supports leaders and individuals in developing emotional intelligence, interpersonal communication and career transition.

Christine Welsh

Christine has over 20 years of experience in strategic and operational human resources which includes workplace coaching, change management, redeployment and redundancy, job analysis and evaluation training and facilitation, mediation, conciliation and conflict coaching, corporate investigations and organisational reviews, staff management, and policy development and implementation. Christine has an array of industry experience working with: Commission for Children; Department of Housing, providing training for Senior Managers in performance management and giving and receiving feedback; Department of Education and Training; State Training Services and the Adult Migrant Education Service; University of Technology Sydney, managing a change program to amalgamate two faculties into one, including job analysis and evaluation; Ageing, Disability and Home Care practicing mediation and conflict coaching.

Edith Hurt

With a professional background in senior management and Human Resources in large corporations, the Financial Services industry, and NGOs, Edith has deep experience and expertise in a range of areas. These include: Relationship Management and Emotional Intelligence/Political Astuteness development; Project Leadership (accredited Master Project Director); Change Management and Organisational Development. Edith has in depth IT, HR, general management, project management, change management, and business analysis and process improvement experience, in industries including insurance/financial services, IT, health, import/export, professional services, and the Public Sector. Additionally, Edith has extremely wide ranging and deep experience in dealing with Performance Management and Talent Development, as well as Risk Management and Compliance, and developing Business Continuity plans. She is also a senior facilitator and speaker for Beyondblue.

Dr Kell Tremayne

Kell has a PhD in psychology with dynamic experience in lecturing, tutoring, coordinating at University, and as a consultant in the area of time management, optimising performance, stress management, and effectiveness. His experience in facilitating and coaching include: behavioural change, people development, effectiveness and efficiency, leadership and focused performance. As a Unit Coordinator for 1200 students at the University of Western Sydney, Kell had responsibilities of coordinating, lecturing and tutoring psychology students, and possess excellent email management skills! A great deal of his experience has been working with elite and emerging athletes and business people over the past 15-20 years. Using his education in sport psychology, he has worked with teams and individuals including the Australian Olympic Women’s Water polo Team, the NSW Institute of Sport, and the AFL Players Association. As one of Australia’s senior sport psychologists he has made contributions to scientific, regulatory, and professional bodies.

Kerry Rosser

Kerry has held various senior leadership roles in banking and finance, and over 20 years in the learning space, including 7 years as National Learning and Development Manager, Global Learning Services at ANZ Bank and 3 years as Strategic L+D Manger for Federal Government agency, ANSTO. She has a clear line of sight to what makes Leaders successful, and how to build strong and productive relationships within both private and public sector organisations. Kerry is a highly experienced and qualified Coach, Trainer and Facilitator, including accreditation on the Harvard “Immunity to Change” processes. She is extremely pragmatic and down to earth, and has a proven track record of obtaining real results for leaders in the workplace. Her coaching style is based on a combination of cognitive and emotional intelligence approaches, which makes her an expert in developing and maintaining relationships across an organisation. Kerry practically applies current findings in positive psychology, brain-based behavioural change and neuroscience, to obtain real and lasting results.

Kimberley Hannagan

Kimberley is a highly experienced and qualified coach, trainer, facilitator, mediator and conflict manager. She develops and delivers high quality, in-depth, research based training and coaching solutions for cultural change, organisational change, communication, mediation, conflict management and process management fields. Kimberley has lectured on MBA and other academic programmes, and conducted training in workplaces for over 20 years. Kimberley has a wide range of experience in both public and private sectors. Her industry experience has enabled her to develop a practical hands-on approach to analysing and diagnosing workplace change, communications and conflict issues, processes, behaviours, and culture. She tailors experiences, and regularly received feedback demonstrates Kimberley’s ability to connect learning principles with the specific workplace environment and experience.

Mary Regan

Mary is a highly experienced and qualified Coach, Trainer, and Facilitator with over 30 years of experience in HR, people management, recruitment, organisation culture and development initiatives, change management, WH&S, and facility management. She has a proven track record of successfully coaching executives and managers and leading organisational change. Mary has held various Senior HR Director, Manager and Leadership roles in the automotive, oil and gas, aviation industries and the Public Sector, including 7 years as Group HR Manager for the Ford Motor Company and Premier Automotive Group Australia, and 2 years in Corporate Management Unit at the NSW Treasury. Mary’s approach is practical, down to earth, and solution focused, and she uses her empathetic style and relationship building talent to lead, influence, and gain credibility at all levels.

Matt Lumsdaine

Matt is a highly experienced, qualified, very practical, professional and grounded coach, trainer, and facilitator (and an entertaining one when appropriate!). He is an accredited mediator with the Institute of Arbitrators and Mediators Australia, and holds a Graduate Certificate in Dispute Resolution. Matt has over 25 years of commercial experience, including 12 years selling technology based business solutions in highly complex and competitive arenas, which makes him an accomplished business professional with a background in management consulting, project management, business development and sales. Matt works well across all levels of an organisation, from new managers to C-suite executives, and has worked with clients from the Private and Public sectors, including CBA and NSW Department of Premier and Cabinet. He is well grounded in the realities of the commercial environment and remains focused on deep behavioural change to obtain highly successful results.

Melinda Brown

Merryl Semple

Merryl has over 20 years experience delivering strategies, programs and courses which support leadership development. Her particular areas of expertise include: leadership development facilitation; high performance executive coaching; performance management; change management; resilience coaching and training; management and leadership development strategy. Merryl has extensive experience in facilitating leadership development workshops for a range of public and private industries, including transport, housing, health, manufacturing, legal, and financial services. As the former Manager Management and Leadership Development at the NSW RailCorp Organisational Development Unit, Merryl was responsible for the design, development and delivery of integrated programs of leadership capability, change management, and performance development. She facilitated executive workshops and senior team meetings, establishing a capability development framework for work based learning and development for 1500 supervisors and 400 middle and senior managers. She developed a range of management and leadership development skills programs in leadership, business results, graduates, mentoring, and coaching.

Milena McKenzie

Milena’s business experience spans 20+ years, and she brings a broad base of experience and skills, across a range of industries, including Aviation and Tourism, Telecommunications, FMCG and Membership Services, holding both line and strategic HR and Organisational Development roles. In her last corporate role as Head of Talent & Capability – People & Organisational Capability, Milena played an important role in shifting the culture from one of apathy, to an engaged, aligned, and driven organisation. As part of this transformation, Milena partnered with the CEO and Executive Leadership Team, to acquire key talent, and coach, develop and mentor a number of these individuals and their direct reports, which resulted in and increased capability and achievement of their key strategic goals. Milena specialises in organisational development and leadership solutions, and she has been instrumental in facilitating and driving organisational change projects, developing and implementing organisational performance management strategies, successfully establishing coaching cultures, overseeing high performance benchmarking projects, and developing, delivering and managing a broad range of leadership development solutions across Australia.

Paul Barry

With over 35 years at the Reserve Bank of Australia, Paul combines a wealth of deep public and banking/finance sector experience at C-level Management, Executive, and Board level, with high-level study and skills in coaching, psychology, counselling, economics and finance. He has exceptionally well-developed leadership, communication and analytical skills, with a deeply pragmatic, people-based approach underpinned by an extremely well developed Emotional Intelligence and underlying empathy. His approach to coaching is underpinned by a deep-seated belief in the potential of people to grow and develop in their working and personal lives. In his capacity of coaching he facilitate this by providing empathic, challenging, and pragmatic support. His experience and analytical, management, and communication skills are especially effective in the areas of navigating challenges in interpersonal relations, including staff management, communication skills, conflict resolution, motivation and effective team performance, building self awareness, and work-related and personal goals.

Rinske Geerlings

Rita Holland

Rita has a wealth of leadership development and behavioural change skills, and has worked with various state departments, including the Department of Planning, Treasury, State and Regional Development, the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, Tourism, and the State Transit Authority. Rita also has extensive experience with Federal Government departments, which include the Australian Taxation Office, Attorney General’s Office and CSIRO/Food Science Australia. Rita has high industry experience and knowledge within the banking and financial services, professional services, media, logistics, pharmaceutical, and FMCG sectors. Rita passionately engages with individuals and teams through structured, practical, and proven coaching methodologies. She is very goal directed and focuses on the solutions and required outcomes of each coaching program. Rita has great empathy and connects with her coachees. One of her strengths is the ability to encourage and drive the individuals to focus on the results for change.

Simon Smith

Trained as a coach by international neuroscience specialist Dr David Rock, Simon has over 30 years-experience in leadership, coaching and consulting, including Chair and Panel Judge at the Australian Leadership Excellence Awards. Awarded as the International Coach Federation Australia Coach of the Year (out of approx. 18,000 coaches), he has also been awarded Owner/Manager of the Year NSW State Finalist in consecutive years in the Australian Institute of Management Excellence Awards. Southern Cross Coaching & Development has been honoured as Regional Finalists for Excellence in Business Ethics for 4 consecutive years in the NSW Business Chamber Awards. Simon is also a long-standing Fellow of the ANZ Institute of Managers and Leaders. A qualified and deeply experienced coach, team coach, facilitator, speaker, and trainer accredited on a wide range of psychometric and 360° leadership and emotional intelligence assessments, Simon has authored, led, and personally delivered an extremely diverse suite of leadership development, organisational development, learning and development, organisational and localised change management, cultural change, and performance improvement solutions. His experience also includes consulting on and facilitation of organisational adaptive restructuring.

Sue Rosen

With more than 25 years experience in a diverse range of challenging corporate environments, Sue has achieved an enviable track record in delivering workplace success both in Australia and overseas. Sue has a genuine passion for maximising human potential in every type of business challenge. Whether it’s delivering strategies for growth, taking flourishing businesses through public listings, or fostering innovative workplace cultures that translate to the bottom line, Sue has real-world experience that counts. As a chartered accountant and with a strong grounding in the technical field of finance, she has a pragmatic approach, and a special interest to help people in this specific area to make the transition from pure technical roles, to positions of leadership with broader responsibilities, including strategy and employee engagement.

Tim Sprague

Tim is an organisational psychologist with extensive experience as a coach, facilitator, trainer, mediator and consultant. He is accredited in a range of psychological assessment tools and is completing a master’s degree in coaching psychology. Tim is an experienced executive and consultant who has worked across both the Public and Private Sectors, and has worked as a Human Resources practitioner for over 25 years. He has held roles as Director of Human Resources at the Australian Graduate School of Management and at Macquarie University, a C-suite executive and a Board Member. His business experience and deep understanding of psychology and research based coaching practice provides a mix of proven behavioural techniques and practical interventions, to challenge preconceptions and affect lasting behavioural change. His coaching practice builds relationships, rapport and trust, creating a base from which to challenge clients to think in new ways, and apply insights and techniques in professional environments. His facilitation skills focus on the development of practical skills that can improve individual effectiveness and group performance.

Be Pannel

Dr Be Pannell provides executive coaching and leadership development programs in Corporate, Government and Academic sectors. With expertise in senior management, business, academia, coaching psychology and applied neuroscience, she brings over 20 years of experience working with thousands of people in the field of adult leadership development and coaching. An engaging facilitator, Be’s academic work focuses on managing and developing coaching and leadership programs across a number of disciplines. Her approach uses evidence-based methods that are targeted, practical and measurable, and her research investigates how coaching psychology can enhance workplace cultures, performance and wellbeing.

Clare Edwards

Clare specialises in the neuroscience of leadership and change offering clients a deeper insight into why they do what they do from the perspective of the brain. Clare spent 10 years in front of house management in the hospitality industry then transitioned into corporate tech companies thanks to her determination to learn Dutch. A 13 year management career ensued I support services, customer management and corporate development. A highly experienced facilitator, trainer, speaker and coach, Clare’s approach is one of guiding participants to uncover the solutions and answers for themselves, accelerating ownership and implementation back in the workplace. When she’s not working, Clare loves nothing more than to immerse herself in nature, go camping in secluded beauty spots and play a terrible game of tennis!

Nicola Morgan

With over 20 years consulting experience, Nicola delivers consulting services to a diverse range of business sectors including IT / Telecom, Pharmaceutical, Energy, Retail, Government and Not for Profit. Her consulting career has primarily been focused on helping both local and international clients define and implement strategies to enhance individual and team performance with a particular emphasis on Leadership and Business Coaching. She has been actively involved in the design and delivery of executive level Assessment and Development programmes, Facilitation of Leadership, Team and Sales Management workshops and Customer Perception Analysis both in Europe, USA and across Asia Pacific.

Ruth Beran

Ruth Beran’s passion for career coaching is backed by a solid understanding of both sides of the recruitment process. As a headhunter, her clients were employers and as a university career consultant she helped job seekers secure employment. Ruth is a Professional Member of the Career Development Association of Australia and volunteers as a career coach for Dress for Success Sydney. Ruth loves helping people find their ideal jobs, and enjoys passing on knowledge from her own experience pivoting from working as an environmental lawyer to a science journalist to scoring her dream job as a career coach. Ruth believes that confidence and good communication are the keys to career success. She loves helping people shine by mapping their career aspirations, clarifying their goals and values, improving their storytelling and strengthening their personal brand.

Stephanie Hampel

Stephanie is a vibrant and passionate business professional who specialises in performance coaching. She helps clients to achieve specific goals, gain new perspectives and build the confidence required to work through difficult decisions. Before joining Southern Cross Coaching & Development as a consultant she achieved considerable success as a leader and coach at senior levels in large organisations. She has held various management and executive roles in the UK and Australia. As well as offering coaching and mentoring services, Stephanie presents on topics such as resilience, engagement, organisational culture and customer experience. Stephanie holds a Master of Organisational Coaching from The University of Sydney, a Graduate Diploma in Performance Counselling from the Australian College of Applied Psychology and a Graduate Diploma in Banking and Finance from Sheffield Hallam University. She is a member of the Beta Gamma Sigma Honour society, the University of Sydney Coaching and Mentoring Association and the International Coach Federation.