PODCAST · business
Work Life by Design
by Melissa Marsden
Welcome to Work Life by Design a podcast for People & Culture leaders, C-SuiteExecs, Entrepreneurs, Designers and anyone who is interested in elevating theirexperience of work!I'm your host, Mel Marsden, the Founder, and Director of COMUNiTI a WorkplaceStrategy and Design Studio focused on collaboratively, re-imagining and designinghigh-performance workplaces for our clients across Australia.Over the last decade I have refined my workplace toolkit to create our signaturestrategy offering, the Workplace Dynamics Blueprint, exploring the 5 pillars thatunderpin every high performing workplace.1. Reimagining the Future2. Brand &Culture3. Values & Behaviours4. Wellbeing5. Employee ExperienceThis process has seen my clients' employees achieve results of; 84% employees feeling more productive 91% with increased job satisfaction 100% of employees feeling more collaborativeI believe that our environments have the power to positively influence our behaviourand our performan
Episodes
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Learning to Listen to the Wisdom of Your Body with Keri Krieger
When was the last time you really listened to your body? So often, we've been conditioned to push through — to ignore the subtle whispers of discomfort, fatigue, or restlessness. We convince ourselves we'll slow down after the next deadline, once the project's done, or when things feel less busy....
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The Secret to Unlocking Your Authenticity with Courtney Tyssen
So often we're chasing goals, ticking off to-do lists, and striving for that next milestone without stopping to ask—are these dreams really mine? The truth is, without a deep connection to our bodies and our hearts, it's hard to know if the life we're building is truly aligned with who we are…
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The Cost of Burnout - What I Wish I Knew with Shae Giles
Creating a retreat doesn't happen without the incredible support of so many people behind the scenes. One of those people is the talented Shae Giles. If you've followed me for a while, you've no doubt seen Shae's stunning photography scattered across my socials. She's not only been my creative…
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Trusting your Intuition with Filly Bellette
Have you ever had that gut feeling about a decision in your business… but second-guessed yourself, over-analysed it, or went searching for someone else's advice? I know I have. For me, the turning point wasn't about strategy or experience—it was about reconnecting with myself and learning to…
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Expanding Your Capacity with Heidi Lampard
Burnout can creep up on even the most high-performing women — sometimes we don't even realise we're on the edge until our bodies start screaming at us. In this episode, I'm joined by the incredible Heidi Lampard — Yoga Practitioner, Holistic Wellness Mentor, Tea Ceremony Facilitator, Retreat...
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Exhale the Retreat | My 'why' and why YOU need it.
This retreat has been born out of my own experience and journey from body burnout to thriving. For years, I thought the only way I could find the peace I craved was to burn it all down, close my business, walk away from everything, and start fresh. I know I'm not alone in this. So many ambitious...
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Season 7 | Thats a Wrap!
Season 7 has been one of the most personal yet—an honest reflection of a year filled with growth, insight, and powerful conversations. In this wrap-up episode, I'm sharing the key themes and lessons that emerged across the season: How personal transformation fuels professional fulfilment Why...
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Following awe and wonder in our lives with Meg Hooper
When was the last time you let yourself be swept away by the sheer beauty of the world around you? Maybe it's the sun sinking into a golden horizon or the way light dances through trees. These moments remind us of the profound joy that's available — if we pause long enough to notice. In this...
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Master your Focus in a world of Distraction with Angela Lockwood
In a world where distractions rule and our attention is constantly hijacked—how do we reclaim our focus and find clarity? In this powerful and practical episode, I sit down with Angela Lockwood, occupational therapist, author, speaker, and the brilliant mind behind The Focus Formula. With a…
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Maximising Northrop's Investment Opportunity with Stephen Fryer
What if your next office move wasn't just about real estate, but a radical reset for your entire business culture? In this episode, I sit down with my client Stephen Fryer, Greater Sydney Leader at Northrop Consulting Engineers, to explore how a lease expiry sparked a workplace transformation…
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A return to community with Amber Hawken
In today's episode, we explore something deeply human yet often overlooked in business: community. When we shift focus from the bottom line to the broader picture—our people, our values, and our environment—we open the door to more meaningful success. I've welcomed Amber Hawken, a thought leader…
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Body Burnout: Know the signs and what you can do with Filipa Bellette
Burnout isn't just feeling tired—it's your body waving a red flag. I know because I've been there, pushing through exhaustion until my body forced me to stop. That's when I found Filipa Bellette, and everything changed. As co-founder of Chris and Filipa Functional Medicine, she's helped thousands...
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7 Things I've Learned from Being in Business
The past year could be described as the ultimate paradox. A year that was both deeply challenging and incredibly transformative. It reminded me that there cannot be light without darkness. In this episode, I'm sharing 7 key lessons I've learned in business and leadership—insights that have shaped...
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Creating a Neuroinclusive Workplace with Mariane Power
Creating a workplace that celebrates neurodiversity isn't just the right thing to do – it's the smartest business move you can make. In my latest episode, I sit down with Mariane Power, a clinical psychologist and neurodiversity specialist, to discuss how businesses can better support...
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My health journey and what it taught me
I'm pulling back the curtain on something deeply personal in this week's podcast episode - my journey through burnout, adrenal fatigue, and the hard-won lessons that led me back to myself. For too long, I ignored the exhaustion, the brain fog, the emotional overwhelm, until my body finally said,...
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What's on my heart & mind + how Mastery is guiding me in 2025!
This season of Work Life by Design is deeply personal. Inspired by Brené Brown's reflections on "what's on my heart and mind," I'm bringing you honest, unfiltered conversations about the challenges, insights, and lessons that have shaped both me and the work we're doing at COMUNiTI over the past...
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Season 6 - Wrap Up
When I kicked off this season it was with the intent to reconnect to the roots of our namesake COMUNiTI, and it has not disappointed! This season was to encourage us to take a broader look at what we should be focusing on to encourage people back to our workplaces. After first answering the...
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Building Community with SMART Work Design - with Sharon Parker
The role that our workplaces play in encouraging and enabling our relationships at work, was largely taken for granted, until they were taken away from us. A silver lining of the pandemic, we realised the impact of our workplaces and the role they play in our establishing and supporting the…
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Using place to connect to the hearts, bodies & minds of your people
Using Place to connect to the Hearts, Bodies and Minds of your People Often when we look at our workplaces, we think of them as property. As real estate. And sadly, often as a balance sheet liability. But they have the potential to be so much more than that! Your work place is an underutilised...
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Shifting Culture with Everyday Actions - with Meredith Wilson
How can we create workplaces where our people are empowered? Where they are given autonomy and choice? It all starts with culture. Now that might sound overly simply, but at the grassroots of this, it's the everyday actions that leaders take that shift and create culture in their teams and...
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Corner Offices don't build Community | The Evolution of the Workplace
Over centuries work has evolved from a labour some, back breaking manual task to what today some of us refer to as a "cushy office job"! And we have the invention of machines and technology, a few key players and a pandemic to thank, as the catalysts for this change. However, some things have…
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Creating Memory in Place through Community - with Imelda Miller
Curating a community is not a passive activity. It takes conscious effort, care, and a respect for the people that you are embracing in this community. But when you bringing together a community with no traditional "place" how can you engage with a place temporarily and make it your own? This is...
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The Art of Gathering, a placemaking perspective
Hey! Have you read Priya Parkers book, The Art of Gathering? If you haven't yet, I highly recommend you do, it's a good read! In her book Priya shares: "gatherings in our lives are often vague & unproductive" And I would argue that our workplaces are in fact a place where we gather, rather than...
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Working your M.A.G.I.C at Work - with Sharon Darmody
"When work starts to work again, it becomes a place where people want to be" Creating a thriving workplace where people want to be, voluntarily, requires us to take a different perspective to the "productivity" approach that our workplaces once swore by. Today's guest is Sharon Darmody. With a...
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It's not about RTO Mandates. It's about Fostering Community
If we're still talking about getting people back to the office, we're having the wrong conversation". I don't know about you but I'm getting frustrated with all this RTO talk! I think those that are stuck in this vortex, are completely missing the point! What we should be talking about, is what...
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Season 6 Fostering Community
🎉🎉🎉 Welcome back for SEASON 6!!! 🎉🎉🎉 As I hit record for this episode, #138, I had a nostalgic moment as I reflected on how much the world has changed since I first started the podcast back in July 2020. We were all living in limbo, as we were very much still in the midst of adjusting to…
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That's it for Season 5! The highlight reel from 48 episodes
Well, that's it for another season! After kicking off season 5 back in November last year, I think it's well and truly time to switch off the mic for a while! This season has definitely taken on a life of its own and it really snuck up on me that we've been going straight for 48 episodes, almost…
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The Art of Focus in a World of Distraction with Angela Lockwood
The art of focus in our modern worlds has become just that. An art. With books like Johan Hari's Stolen Focus and past guest Dr Kristy Goodwin's, Dear Digital we need to talk, the constant disruption, distraction mulit-tasking and task switching that we are all succumbing to is impacting our...
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Why you need to guide your people through change
One of the biggest misconceptions about "a new office" is that it is simply that. A new place for us to conduct our business from. A design and construction project. This could not be further from the truth. "A new office" is a whole of business opportunity and at its core it is actually a...
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The Pilgrim's Guide to the Workplace with Dr Agustin Chevez
Is the workplace really just a 'task' place? This is one of the thought-provoking questions that today's guest poses, for us to ponder about our reality of work and the workplace. Dr Agustin Chevez is the author of The Pilgrim's Guide to the Workplace. It was after reading a book on the diversity...
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What I Thought Everyone Knew But Doesn't
One of the reasons that I first started exploring this idea of Workplace Strategy was because I am fascinated by how businesses tick. What makes one business a roaring success and another flounder? And one thing that continues to fascinate me is the gap that I see emerge in almost every…
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To own a Desk or not to own a Desk? What you need to consider when adopting desk sharing with Dr. Jenna Mikus
With more of us embracing the opportunity to work from home, it's leaving our workplaces underutilised as occupancy levels in the workplace drop. The impacts of this vary from workplace ot workplace depending on the design style and approach ranging from limited variety in the spaces available…
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Mindwandering, Flow and Spaciousness - the key to innovation and creativity
The end of financial year is a great time to check in and see how we are tracking against our goals. As someone who loves to set myself up at the beginning of each year with a number of intentions and an overarching word to keep me on track, it's a great opportunity for me to check and readjust…
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A Community Approach to Building a Company, Culture & Employee Experience with Damon Klotz
Establishing a strong and purposeful employee experience in your organisation can take an incredible amount of time, dedication, and invested energy. So, if you could find all the People tools and resources that you needed packaged up in one platform, backed by science and data, how much easier...
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How a Journey Map Can Design Your Employee Experience
Imagine having the ability to curate the entire experience that your employees take when they come to your workplace. To influence each touchpoint of their journey. The things that they see, hear, do... the things they feel. In episode 127, I shared how you can use an Empathy Map to consciously...
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Building your Leadership Capability with Rebecca Christianson
No doubt throughout the course of your career, you've experienced moments where you've questioned yourself and your ability to lead not only your team through the next transition, but also leading yourself. Stepping up into a new role, guiding your team through a new project or perhaps you've…
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4 Ways to Redesign Work with Empathy
Reimagining your next workplace is the perfect opportunity to take a step back and take a fresh look at your whole business. One of the ways that I encourage leaders to do this, is by embracing "Shoshin". Shoshin is a Buddhist concept meaning "beginners mind". It is about approaching a situation…
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Permission to Pause | The impact of one simple action with Dr Ali Young
In last weeks episode I spoke about wellbeing rhythms in the workplace and the need for us all to be building in moments of self-care. I then read an article in the Harvard Business Review by author Greg McKeown, who's written two of my favourite books and are recommended reading at COMUNiTI;...
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Wellbeing Rhythms for Work & Life
As we cross the halfway mark of the year, this is the perfect time to look back, check in with your intentions for the year and adjust the sails ready for the second half. One of the tweaks that I'll be making as I set myself up for the home stretch is to recalibrate my selfcare regime. As a busy...
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Pyschosocial Risks at Work with Dr Meg Hooper
In April this year, the Managing the risk of Psychosocial Hazards at work Code of Practice 2022 came into effect. As someone who runs a business and employs people, naturally I was interested to learn more about what this means for me and for the projects that I work on. To help me understand the...
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COMUNiTI Turns 10!! 🥳 On the Couch with Dr Meg Hooper
On the 1st July 2023, my business COMUNiTI celebrates its 10th year of business. Reaching this milestone in business does not come without both its highs and lows and I could not think of a more fitting way to celebrate this milestone than accepting the offer of my friend and colleague Dr Meg...
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Rehumanising the Workplace with Deanne Boules
As we approach the mid-point of the year, I would hazard a guess that you're already feeling like the tank is near empty! And you are not alone! Thanks to the events of recent years, COVID, lockdowns, floods, new ways of working, to name a few, what's resulted is a lack of physical and emotional...
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What is your workplace telling your people is important?
In my book The Next Workplace: Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential, I share a story of a client expressing their concern, that their current workplace was having a detrimental impact on the business. It was not supporting the behaviours that the employees were told were...
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Redesigning Work Before Place with Dan Mottau
As organisations are navigating this new landscape of "hybrid" work, a conversation that is happening more and more, is one that centres around "how do we work?" and "how do we want to work?", before we start talking about, "what does our office look like?". Today's guest, Dan Mottau, did just...
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Use Your Space to Tell Your Story
If I asked you to describe your Brand, I'd wager that the first thing you tell me is what colour your logo is! Whilst colour and our mark are important factors in defining our brand, they are only one very small component of your brand and cannot begin to communicate the complexity of your brand...
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Two Common Creatives
If I brought you together in a room of your peers, and asked one simple question, "Who here would call themselves a Creative?", chances are you're unlikely to raise your hand. As my guests today describe, we often mistake creativity for artistry, the ability to draw or paint. However, many of us...
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Three Ways to Elevate your Workplace Experience - The Book Launch Wrap UP!
It's time to change the conversation! There has been so much talk about the organisations that are struggling to get the workplace dynamic right, but very little highlighting those that are! Launching my book The Next Workplace; Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential, was an...
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The Next Workplace / Sydney Launch Conversations Part 2
This is our FINAL episode in the 6-part series bringing you all the conversations from my book launch events in Brisbane, Melbourne & Sydney, as we celebrated the release of The Next Workplace: Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential. Today is Part 2 of our Sydney event...
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The Next Workplace / Sydney Launch Conversations Part 1
The last few weeks have been quite the adventure as I've been celebrating the release of my book The Next Workplace: Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential. Hosting events in Brisbane, Melbourne & Sydney, each of these events were held with the purpose of starting a...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Welcome to Work Life by Design a podcast for People & Culture leaders, C-SuiteExecs, Entrepreneurs, Designers and anyone who is interested in elevating theirexperience of work!I'm your host, Mel Marsden, the Founder, and Director of COMUNiTI a WorkplaceStrategy and Design Studio focused on collaboratively, re-imagining and designinghigh-performance workplaces for our clients across Australia.Over the last decade I have refined my workplace toolkit to create our signaturestrategy offering, the Workplace Dynamics Blueprint, exploring the 5 pillars thatunderpin every high performing workplace.1. Reimagining the Future2. Brand &Culture3. Values & Behaviours4. Wellbeing5. Employee ExperienceThis process has seen my clients' employees achieve results of; 84% employees feeling more productive 91% with increased job satisfaction 100% of employees feeling more collaborativeI believe that our environments have the power to positively influence our behaviourand our performan
HOSTED BY
Melissa Marsden
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Work Life by Design have?
Work Life by Design currently has 165 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Work Life by Design about?
Welcome to Work Life by Design a podcast for People & Culture leaders, C-SuiteExecs, Entrepreneurs, Designers and anyone who is interested in elevating theirexperience of work!I'm your host, Mel Marsden, the Founder, and Director of COMUNiTI a WorkplaceStrategy and Design Studio focused on...
How often does Work Life by Design release new episodes?
Work Life by Design publishes regularly with 165 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to Work Life by Design?
You can listen to Work Life by Design on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Work Life by Design?
Work Life by Design is created and hosted by Melissa Marsden.
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