Fiona Robertson

Fiona Robertson's Biography

Fiona Robertson is an expert in organisational culture and leadership who holds an MBA from London Business School and is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (GAICD) and the Institute of Executive Coaching and Leadership.

In her 30-year career she has worked in and consulted to dozens of blue-chip corporates domestically and internationally, with all levels of government in Australia and coached numerous senior executives in large and small organisations.

She is the former Head of Culture for the National Australia Bank, where she spent twelve years in senior executive positions including heading their market research function and several transformation roles. Her tenure as Head of Culture included the introduction of a set of values and the development of a new purpose.

In her early career Fiona spent eight years with Ogilvy Public Relations in London where she specialised in complex multi-country communications campaigns for clients like IBM (35 countries), The Nasdaq Stock Market (8 countries), Oracle (10 countries) and McKinsey & Company (globally).

After returning to Australia Fiona assisted major corporations and local, state and federal governments with the design of organisational structures, advising on sensitive internal and external communications and change management during acquisitions, restructures, off-shoring and down-sizing, executive coaching, career coaching, career transition, facilitation, senior team development and leadership development programs.

Clients in Australia have included ANZ Bank, Telstra Business Systems, the Federal Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, the Victorian Department of Human Services, the City of Kingston, Newcrest, Freehills, the Municipal Association of Victoria, the Australian Wheat Board, Slater + Gordon, RMIT Online, Monash College and the Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM).

She is now an independent culture change coach, speaker and trainer for senior executives and small to medium business owners.

Her first book 'Rules of Belonging - change your organisational culture, delight your people and turbo-charge your results' is published by Major Street Publishing.

The rate of change is accelerating faster than ever. If we can’t get our people aligned and passionate about our purpose, our customers and working well together, we’re simply not going to be able to compete. That’s why creating and managing team and organisational culture has become an essential focus for senior executives, middle managers and people leaders of all kinds.

If your organisation needs to become more nimble and responsive; if your people need to work more effectively together; if your leaders need help to build connected, passionate teams; if your culture and strategy are worlds apart or you want to future-proof yourself, your team or your organisation – you and Fiona should chat.

Speaking Topics Include

The key to culture change? It's the rules of belonging.

Humans want to belong. They want to belong so much they’re willing to do almost anything to ensure they do. When joining a new organisation, they figure out what is successful behaviour in their new group and slowly adopt that behaviour as their own.

That’s why an organisation’s culture is so 'sticky' and can be hard to change. If you want to change your culture, you need to change the rules of belonging.

Designed for people leaders and team members who want to co-create their culture - and have a laugh along the way.

What does your culture need from you?

Though it might not be obvious, there are actually two cultures in your organisation. An employee culture and a management culture. No matter how well-loved, respected or trusted your leaders are, they're not part of the employee culture.

Your employee culture has two priorities, first survival and then psychological safety. If leaders give it what it needs to achieve them, it will give them anything they ask. If they don’t, it will spend all its time trying to earn them and focus only on how to please internal leaders instead of how to please external customers.

Without psychological safety, the employee culture won’t come up with the innovative ideas that are critical to future-proofing your organisation. And no amount of kick-offs, roll-outs or town hall inspiration sessions will change that.

Designed for people leaders and team members who want to understand how to pro-actively manage and change their culture - and have a laugh along the way.