Social Impact

Maggie White

Western dreaming stories tell of Hercules the ancient Greek hero. It is not just his famed strength that is remembered. Hercules underwent strenuous trials - at least twelve - and through them he removed major obstacles for other people. Maggie White’s consultancy, Herculeia, works with the same objectives:

  • To help people find their preferred future as organisations, communities, groups or individuals.
  • to support healthy connections between people in a wide variety of contexts
  • to strengthen social, economic, and cultural bonds

Maggie White established Herculeia in 2006. She was born in the UK and raised in Uganda, but Perth in Western Australia has been her home since 1992. She has university degrees in Business Leadership, Family Therapy, and History. Using her ability to span the humanities, social science and business disciplines, Maggie applies her specialist skills of leadership development and recovering from adversity within her broad understanding of human functioning. She's passionate about generating creative solutions to complex situations—whether personal or organisational, social or economic.

Examples of Maggie’s work:

Community well-being: Maggie has been working with the leaders of remote communities in the North-West of WA for several years now, to help them work together to overcome major barriers to community well-being (including excessive use of alcohol and other drugs, high levels of family violence and mental distress) in order to rebuild their communities and develop the necessary basis for peace and prosperity.

Long-term Recovery: When a disaster hits, the adrenaline starts pumping and we do extraordinary things. Such events change us in profound ways even as life seems ‘normal’ again. Maggie works with people and communities after these events, to help them rebuild their everyday lives in ways which endorse the experiences and feelings called up by the disaster.

Youth leadership: Maggie works with young people who may be struggling to make that transition into adulthood. She designs and runs group programmes and camps that dare young people to rely on themselves and their peers and discover their own ingenuity and creativity. The programs use a mix of media and problem solving activities to strengthen pro-social behaviours and increase young people’s sense of optimism for an attainable future.

Social Business: Maggie has a long interest in setting up and supporting businesses that are self-funding and meet particular social needs. These businesses often go on to become community hubs which nurture further entrepreneurship.

Process Leadership Training: Maggie has a passion for enabling people to take hold of their lives with purpose and confidence. Process leadership gives them the skills to be successful in the face of any challenge.

Maggie is described as:

  • A good communicator and an even better listener.
  • Insightful and considered; tenacious and enthusiastic when passionate.
  • Innovative and creative; an independent thinker who is skilled in mobilizing communities of people and gaining commitment to the task at hand.

Significant influences include:

Hercules, who demonstrated that true freedom lies in the state of mind you bring to your challenges;

Virginia Satir whose deep understanding of the necessity of human ties gave rise to the discipline of systemic family therapy;

Margaret Wheatley, whose book ‘Leadership and the New Science’ has inspired a quiet revolution in people-centred leadership practices;

The many Ugandan people in her childhood who showed her how socially enriching cultural and economic diversity could be.

And above all, Rudolf Steiner, Austrian philosopher and educator, the most significant integrated thinker of the 20th century.

Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them to become what they are capable of being.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe