90percent Consulting

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90percent Consulting

We help leaders create healthier workplaces through coaching, strategy, and practical tools that support people, not just policies. Why 90% and not 100%?

NT-based and trauma-informed, we focus on reducing burnout, building trust, and helping teams stay and thrive. Because perfection doesn't leave room for continuous improvement.

14/06/2026

The longer I work with leaders and organisations, the more I’m reminded that healthy, high-performing workplaces are built on a few simple principles.

Here are 8 that I keep coming back to.

12/06/2026

A person can be affected by trauma without ever experiencing what most people would call a ‘traumatic event’.

Think about someone who has spent years feeling like they’re never quite doing enough.

The workload keeps growing. Expectations keep changing.
Feedback only comes when something negative happens.

Every time they catch up, another problem lands on their desk.

Individually, none of those experiences seem traumatic.

But over time, living in a constant state of pressure and uncertainty can affect how a person thinks, feels, and responds to the world around them.

One of the biggest misconceptions about trauma is that it always involves a single, significant event.

Sometimes it does.

But sometimes it’s years of carrying too much responsibility.

Sometimes it’s exposure to other people’s distress, day after day.

Sometimes it’s staying through constant restructures and uncertainty.

Sometimes it’s working in environments where you’re constantly on alert, unsupported, unheard, or expected to keep going no matter what.

Trauma can be cumulative.

It can be subtle.

It isn’t always about what happened.

Sometimes it’s about what happened repeatedly.

And often, the behaviours we see in workplaces make much more sense when we stop asking:

“What’s wrong with this person?”

and start asking:

“What has this person experienced, adapted to, or been carrying for a long time?”

11/06/2026

As the rest of Australia braces for the cold weather, the Northern Territory comes to life.

Cooler mornings, markets, music, outdoor everything. It's the reason many people choose to live and work here.

But I want to ask leaders something directly:

Are your people actually getting to experience it?

Because here's what I see in organisations across the Territory every dry season: workloads that quietly peak, flexibility that shrinks, and a culture where "take some time off" gets said, but never modelled.

And there's now a legal dimension to this too.

Since August 2024, most Australian employees have a legislated right to disconnect - to refuse contact outside working hours unless that refusal is unreasonable.

But legislation alone doesn't change culture.

The real question is whether your team actually believes they're allowed to switch off.

If you're sending emails at 9pm, taking calls on weekends, and arriving visibly exhausted - the message your team receives isn't "we support work-life balance." It's "this is what commitment looks like here."

That gap between what leaders say and what they model is a psychosocial hazard.

It creates an unspoken rule that rest is theoretical.

So what does it actually look like to model it?

-> Leave at a reasonable time (yes even at busy times)
-> Talk openly about how you spent your weekend
-> Protect your own leave and make it visible
-> Resist the urge to send that message tonight (it can wait)

The dry season is short.

If your people can't access the lifestyle that makes the Territory worth living in, they'll notice.

And that decision has consequences that follow you well into the wet.

What's one thing you could do differently this week to show your team that disconnecting is genuinely okay?

21/05/2026

Only 22% of Australian employees believe their managers are equipped to effectively support mental health in the workplace.*

Supporting people well isn’t something leaders should have to guess their way through.

And yet, many still are.

Here are 6 simple, evidence-informed ways leaders can better support employee mental health:

1. Hold regular 1:1 meetings - genuinely get to know your team members. What are they interested in? How connected do they feel to their community?

2. Honest and supportive feedback: What has the leader seen them do well? What have their colleagues appreciated? What learning opportunities might the company be able to offer?

3. Seeking team members' perspectives: What ideas do they have to improve company operations? What's going well? What risks need to be addressed?

4. Start the day with 10 min team check-ins to align priorities, celebrate progress, and offer support. What's on each person's plate today?

5. Set aside 15 min drop-in times so employees feel welcome to seek clarification, guidance, or support.

6. Encourage solutions-focused thinking by asking team members to bring possible solutions alongside challenges.

Psychologically safe workplaces are shaped through consistent leadership behaviours - not just policies.

*SuperFriend Indicators of a Thriving Workplace Report, 2023

19/05/2026

My understanding of trauma didn’t start in a classroom.

It started on 9/11 in NYC, resulting in PTSD that took over 20 years to recover.

Part of that journey led me to understand how people carry trauma.

During my MProfPsych studies, a classmate mentioned The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk.

In 2023, I finally read it and was struck by the use of EMDR, particularly in supporting Vietnam veterans where other treatments had been ineffective.

This led me to complete EMDR Level One training in Darwin with Dr Sarah Domingues.

At the time, I was working with clients managing PTSD symptoms and, while we were making steady progress, traditional approaches were only getting us so far.

When I asked if they were willing to try EMDR, they all agreed, and reported significant improvements very quickly.

Through that work, I realised there were still residual symptoms from my own experience, so I sought EMDR treatment with Annette Trikilis.

Within 3 sessions, I experienced a profound level of relief as the trauma was finally reprocessed.

When I first encountered PTSD, my research told me only 1/3 of people could be expected to recover. I resolved at the time to be amongst that third, but EMDR changed what I believed was possible.

I now use EMDR alongside other evidence-informed approaches.

In my work across organisations I continue to see how often trauma has a workplace context - particularly where people are exposed to psychologically unsafe environments.

And whilst we’ve come a long way in supporting recovery, I’ve come to believe just as strongly that we should be creating workplaces people don’t need to recover from in the first place.

PTSD robs people of their quality of life.

There are many things workplaces can do to reduce risk for trauma-exposed staff.

That’s where 90percent Consulting can help.

17/05/2026

Fortune 500 companies consider executive coaching their 'best-kept secret' with an average ROI of 7:1 for leadership and executive coaching programmes.

As International Coaching Week comes to a close, one thing remains true: investing in people changes workplaces.

By focusing on strategic self-awareness, curiosity, and intentional growth, I make sure every coaching interaction is a targeted investment in your organisation's most valuable resource - its people.

Learn more here: https://www.90percent.com.au/leadership-coaching

16/05/2026

Western logic tells us that to fix a problem, we must analyse its causes.

But the work of Steve de Shazer and the Milwaukee group flipped this - they found that dissecting the past isn’t nearly as effective as architecting the future.

This is Solution-Focused Thinking 🧠✨

It’s a mindset that trusts the person in front of you already has the resources they need; they just haven't accessed them yet.

Instead of being an 'expert' who provides answers, a coach acts as a catalyst for discovery - encouraging small, incremental shifts toward a specific outcome.

I recently saw this play out with a workplace facing nearly 100% staff turnover and deep burnout.

As part of our leadership coaching, we asked everyone to pair their feedback with a solution-focused lens.

We stopped looking for who to blame and started looking for what would work.

18 months later, the stability and performance of that team have transformed.

It wasn't about finding a magic fix from the outside - it was about trusting the team to identify their own path forward.

[de Shazer, S. (1991). Putting Difference to Work. Norton.]

Happy International Coaching Week 🌱

A reminder of the power of a well-placed question.

15/05/2026

In 2002, the Sydney Swans were a team in crisis.

The team was underperforming, morale was low, and the club was searching for answers. Most people thought they needed bigger names and star talent to turn things around.

Then came the turning point: Paul Roos.

He brought three important principles to the team:

1. Culture > talent. The right culture can elevate a good team to greatness.

2. Clarity and buy-in. Every player understood their role and contribution to the bigger picture.

3. Shared accountability. Leadership became a team standard, not the responsibility of one or two star players.

That shift became known as 'The Bloods Culture.'

Three years later, the Swans won their first premiership in 72 years.

The turning point wasn’t better talent.
It was coaching the existing team towards a better culture.

The same is true in workplaces.

Most high-performing teams don’t suffer from a lack of capability; they suffer from a lack of alignment.

Good coaching helps leaders see what’s difficult to recognise from inside the system. It strengthens self-awareness, improves team dynamics, and creates healthier, more accountable workplace cultures.

You can hire the best talent in the world and put them in the same jersey - but without the right environment, great people don’t always operate as great teams.

📷 Photo credits: Sydney Swans - https://www.sydneyswans.com.au/news/1622429/hall-of-fame-bio-paul-roos

14/05/2026

Resources are just a starting point, the workplace environment determines if hiring talent actually turns into business results.

Coaching helps leaders bridge that gap by focusing on the human side of the equation.

🌱🧠📈

It’s International Coaching Week. Have you considered what coaching could unlock for your workplace?

13/05/2026

What if leadership coaching isn’t a support strategy…

but a business performance strategy?

For a long time, coaching has been misunderstood as something leaders access when things are going 'wrong'.

But the most effective organisations invest before this.

Because leadership capability influences every part of the workplace.

In practice, leadership coaching is one of the few spaces where leaders have time to think strategically - not just operationally.

To reflect.
To challenge assumptions.
To strengthen self-awareness.
To lead more intentionally.

And the ripple effect is enormous:

→ stronger team engagement
→ improved retention
→ healthier workplace relationships
→ reduced psychosocial risk
→ clearer decision-making
→ more sustainable performance

At 90percent Consulting, we see coaching as an investment in both people and systems.

Because when leadership capability grows, so does the workplace.

Address

Darwin, NT
0835

Website

http://www.90percent.com.au/

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