Call us on
(03) 9051 6813
Social Impact Consulting.
We empower organisations to effectively respond to the changing circumstances of their customers experiencing vulnerability and financial difficulty.
Building capability
Training, consulting, focus groups and coaching.
Uniting Social Impact Consulting has earnt an enviable track record in the business and community sector with over 20 years of successful partnerships. We bring the consumer voice to inform our collective expertise and understanding of vulnerability so that you drive better outcomes for your customers and consumers.
Upskill and extend your workforce’s capability to improve financial returns for the business while enhancing your workplace culture and social impact. We provide online and in-person professional development training and coaching.
For better interactions with your customers we use a unique diagnostic approach to assess, understand and map a way forward for your business.
And to bring the lived experience of your customers into your business’ policies and practices, we create and facilitate consumer focus groups, putting your customer at the heart of your business.
Why partner with us?
For the past 20+ years, we have worked across the sectors of banking and finance, essential services, property development, insurance, debt collection and with government regulatory bodies.
Our approach is strengths-based, universal and focused on leading more realistic and effective interactions with consumers. We are valued for our authenticity and insights.
As a community services organisation, Uniting supports those in need including people experiencing homelessness, family violence, mental health issues and financial problems. The work we do is informed by the people we work alongside to drive real, positive social change. That collective expertise and understanding of vulnerability underpins our success.
Benefits
Business culture and staff development:
- Empowered teams with the knowledge and tools to manage complex situations
- Expanded capacity to support people experiencing a range of vulnerabilities
- Increased performance by building staff morale and increasing productivity.
Client retention:
- Improved customer engagement
- Increased customer retention
- Reduced customer complaints.
Brand reputation and business benefit:
- Increased revenue with customer bills paid on time
- Improved net promoter score
- Reduced expenditure related to debt collection.
What we provide
Training development
Diagnostic services
Consulting services
Advocacy
Training development
We design and deliver tailored in-house training to meet your identified organisational needs and aspirations.
All our courses can be provided in house or through remote-delivery.
- Identifying and Understanding Vulnerability
- Respectful Communication Principles
- Dealing with Difficult Situations
- Resilience and Self-Care Principles
- Debriefing Toolkit for Leaders.
Our courses are embedded in the theoretical and practical, ensuring participants have a ready-made toolkit of skills and understanding to apply in their real-world interactions.
Our e-learning modules currently include Understanding Vulnerability and Responding to Family Violence. These modules are an effective way to enact a widescale rollout and ensure uptake across an organisation.
Diagnostic services
Our diagnostic approach provides a powerful transformative tool for your organisation.
Our review provides an in-depth analysis and benchmarking profile, helping the organisation to build on existing strengths and mapping the way forward to better practice and outcomes.
Consulting services
Our team can provide consulting input to assist with the development and integration of new policy and practices within your organisation.
We specialise in policy development and providing support for uptake and embedding practices.
We can review existing policy, frameworks and capability to extend your organisation’s understanding and embed sector-leading practice.
Advocacy
We regularly share our in-depth understanding of consumer vulnerability with other stakeholders.
Our team represents the experiences of consumers experiencing vulnerability to a broad range of consumer consultative panels, customer counsels and industry forums.
The team features engaging speakers and facilitators who inspire insights and ignite discussion.
We regularly facilitate consumer focus groups to inform our thinking and expand our insight into direct consumer experiences.
As one of the largest providers of community services in Australia, we leverage the collective power of our community to continually inform our practice, knowledge and foresight.
Get to know our team
Our team comes from diverse backgrounds in consumer advocacy, financial counselling, academia & training, consultancy, psychology, the law and community outreach. We strive to inspire, inform and ignite.
We have worked with sector leaders, startups, ASX-200 companies, industry regulators and not-for-profits.
We are sought after for our expertise in understanding the real-world experiences of consumers experiencing vulnerability and changing circumstances.
Senior Manager
Megan McAlpine
With a career in both commercial and not-for-profit sectors, Megan McAlpine has a deep understanding of the role corporations can play in positively impacting outcomes Megan leads Uniting’s Enterprise Partnerships team, a group of highly experienced consultants and trainers. The team partners with financial service providers, energy & water, telcos, regulators and policy makers to reduce financial hardship among their customers and meet regulatory requirements. Having worked in the financial services sector and for community service organisations, Megan brings a unique perspective to the role. Drawing on her experience as Head of Customer Vulnerability, Accessibility, and Inclusion at CBA, Megan understands the challenges faced by partner organisations and the potential for improved outcomes for both the customer and the organisation. Like many of us who work in health, disability and community services, Megan feels privileged to have the opportunity to support positive change. A believer in the power of education to change lives, she has completed a Bachelor of Financial Administration (Accounting), a Master of Business and has also completed a
for their customers in vulnerable circumstances.
Master of Public Health.
Manager Consulting & Advisory
Vanessa Herskope
A former lawyer, with 10 years practising in commercial disputes and specialising in financial services regulation, Vanessa provides key insights into the practical application by organisations of legislative and regulatory frameworks and the impact to the lived experience of their consumers.
Vanessa is an established organisational development professional with operational experience across professional services, corporates and most recently the not-for-profit sector. Her expertise includes strategic business partnering, organisational change management, development of learning strategies and the design and facilitation of experiential and reflective learning programs to enhance capability in the workplace. Vanessa is committed to using her experience to work with organisations and industries to achieve socially responsible initiatives and fair treatment for vulnerable consumers.
Consulting Partner
Sue Fraser
Sue Fraser has been at the forefront of consumer advocacy for the past 20 years. Her contribution to understanding consumer vulnerability in the financial sector was recognised in the 2021 Queen’s Birthday Honours with an OAM, adding to her two Prime Minister’s Awards and a Jan Pentland Award from Financial Counselling Australia.
Sue is a dynamic and engaging speaker, regularly sought for conferences and leadership programs. With her grounded and thought-provoking approach, Sue pushes participants to think more deeply and emboldens them to respond from a strengths-based perspective. View Sue’s TEDx presentation.
Training & Development Consultant
Jennifer Marshall
Jennifer is a skilled and engaging trainer with more than a decade working in the university, TAFE and RTO sectors.
Jennifer’s training and consultancy work is informed by wide-ranging experience in the community sector where she has remained connected to promoting a fair and just society in both paid and voluntary roles. She is a University of Melbourne alumni with postgraduate qualifications in public policy. Jennifer has broad based policy and content writing experience, is a critical thinker who focuses on evidence-based understanding of issues and works on solutions for the problem.
Training & Development Consultant
Andrew Arnold
Andrew manages the administration side of the team, including general financial management, managing the cash flows of business activity and account management.
He maintains relationships with key stakeholders, coordinates our e-learn program and facilitates consumer participation activities. Insightful and approachable, Andrew is involved in-call listening and coaching initiatives.
As a member of our Consumer Partnerships Community of Practice, Andrew is passionate that the consumer’s voice be present in everything we do.
Training & Development Consultant
Peter Coburn
Peter has extensive corporate experience in the telecommunications and finance sectors. He brings this knowledge to improve ways in which businesses and consumers can contribute to achieving a safer and more equitable society. As a highly skilled family violence practitioner, Peter has extensive experience training and facilitating in intervention and prevention programs. Peter brings a well–developed understanding of consumer vulnerability, through his work, to engage people to consider the impacts on those with a lived experience of family violence. Peter is committed to applying this lens when working with organisations to understand, recognise and assist consumers experiencing a range of vulnerabilities. Peter is passionate about engaging clients to consider different ways to support those in our community experiencing hardship.
