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Centered on the Edge

A Developmental Coaching Circle for People Helpers

Register your interest ➞

A six-month, place-based coaching circle for community services leaders (and allied sectors) to build the inner capacity to lead well through complexity, emotional load, and change.

 

Small cohort · Place-based · Developmentally informed · Tasmania

Centered on the Edge

A Developmental Coaching Circle for People Helpers

Register your interest ➞

A six-month developmental program for community services (and allied sectors) leaders navigating complexity, emotional load and change.

Small cohort · Place-based · Developmentally informed · Tasmania

Why 'Centered on the Edge' Now?

Community services (and adjacent fields) are being reshaped in real time.

Not only by funding models, compliance, and workforce strain — but by the pressures that live inside everyday work life:

  • Interpersonal conflict under stress
  • The emotional labour of caring for others
  • The mismatch between client needs, organisational capacity, and service design
  • Being stuck between community expectations and what’s actually possible
  • Burnout patterns: over-functioning, carrying too much, quiet resentment
  • Consensus paralysis: staying “agreeable” instead of acting with clarity
  • Uncertainty around authority: avoiding power, or using it too hard when pressure rises

Many capable people helpers are discovering that what used to work doesn’t work the same way anymore.

Not because they’re failing — but because the work has become more complex, and most professional development isn’t designed to build the deeper capacity this moment requires.

Centered on the Edge is a protective, proactive space to grow that capacity — in community.

What makes this different?

Most professional development adds more know-how and information.

Centered on the Edge grows the inner capacity from which you use the tools you already have.

You probably already know what needs to be done.
The challenge is being able to do it — and be it — when it matters most: under pressure, in conflict, in uncertainty, and in the emotional weight of people-helping work.

This circle is built around three integrated elements:

 

Pattern awareness

We use the Enneagram as a map of “automation” — the default personality patterns that can keep people helpers caught in loops such as:

  • rescuing and over-functioning

  • avoiding conflict (or escalating it)

  • carrying too much alone

  • needing agreement before acting

  • losing boundaries in the name of care

  • second-guessing authority — or over-using it under stress

This isn’t about labelling you.
It’s about recognising your pattern in the moment — and returning to presence, choice, and better leadership.

Developmental clarity

We use adult development theory (without formal assessments) to offer a simple, practical map of how leaders grow — not just in skill, but in maturity.

As capacity develops, leaders become more able to:

  • Hold complexity without collapsing into urgency

  • Engage difference without fear

  • Discern ethically without needing perfect certainty

  • Act with clearer responsibility for the whole

In practice, this helps you shift from being shaped by external expectations and group pressure…
to leading from inner authority, with clearer boundaries and stronger discernment.



Integration in community

This is a circle — not a lecture.

We learn through:

  • Witnessing individual and shared growth and insight in real time

  • Sharing real workplace scenarios in a confidential space

  • Deep reflection on your leadership and practice

  • Gentle accountability that supports real change

  • A cohort that helps you feel less alone and more courageous

Community isn’t a “nice extra” — it’s what makes integration possible.

 

Tools and Practices

This circle is practical, grounded, and designed for the realities of people-helping leadership.

Across six months we work with:

  • Enneagram insight (how your pattern runs under stress, and what freedom looks like)

  • adult development lenses (capacity-building, not just competence)

  • coaching as a leadership tool (better conversations, less rescuing, more empowerment)

  • contemplative practice (silence, brief meditation, somatic presencing — accessible and non-religious)

  • facilitation + group leadership skills, including:

    • holding dialogue

    • working with polarities

    • managing difference

    • prioritising decisions

    • leading healthy team life under pressure

These aren’t add-ons — they’re core capacities for leading well in relational work.

 

Care and Capacity

People helpers often carry a hidden belief:
“If I’m struggling, I must be doing it wrong.”

But often the truth is simpler — and kinder:
you’re trying to lead human work inside systems under strain.

Centered on the Edge supports you to:

  • Strengthen self-regulation (less reactivity, more steadiness)

  • Authorise yourself to set clearer boundaries

  • Use power well — without force, avoidance, or guilt

  • Shift from rescuing to empowering (clients, staff, teams)

  • Get unstuck faster (especially in conflict and indecision)

  • Read the room and lead with presence

  • Stay engaged and fresh — without hardening or burning out

This is development as strategy: inner growth that changes outer leadership.

Waking Up

Expanding awareness and presence

This dimension focuses on helping leaders become aware of their inner state and how it shapes perception, decision-making, and relationships.

Core practices and tools include:

  • Conscious Leadership principles to recognise reactivity and return to presence

  • Enneagram exploration to distinguish personality patterns from deeper essence

  • Contemplative practices (silence, centering prayer, awareness of breath, body, and emotion)

  • Guided reflection on inner state, attention, and leadership presence

What this develops:
Greater self-awareness, reduced reactivity, and the ability to pause and respond rather than react under pressure.


Growing Up

Increasing developmental capacity

This dimension focuses on how leaders make meaning — the form of mind through which they interpret authority, faith, complexity, and responsibility.

Core practices and tools include:

  • Developmental stage assessment (adult development / meaning-making)

  • Individual debriefs to identify current centre of gravity and growth edge

  • Teaching on stages of adult development and the evolution of leadership and culture

  • Individual growth-edge coaching to support vertical development over time

What this develops:
Greater capacity to hold complexity, integrate multiple perspectives, and lead without relying on certainty, control, or external validation.

Cleaning Up

Integrating shadow and reactivity

This dimension supports leaders to work with unconscious patterns that undermine leadership impact, particularly under stress.

Core practices and tools include:

  • Enneagram-based exploration of blind spots, defensive strategies, and edge emotions

  • Conscious Leadership tools for working with blame, avoidance, over-control, and responsibility

  • Peer dialogue and reflective inquiry to surface blind spots in a safe relational context

  • Contemplative practice to remain present with discomfort and emotional charge

What this develops:
Emotional maturity, relational freedom, and greater compassion for self and others — reducing the likelihood of reactive leadership patterns.

Showing Up

Embodying leadership in action

This dimension focuses on translating inner shifts into visible leadership practice and cultural impact.

Core practices and tools include:

  • Leadership-in-practice reflection on real, live leadership challenges

  • Individual coaching to integrate awareness, capacity, and action

  • Facilitation and coaching skill development to support growth in others

  • Final integration and prototyping of a leadership practice that embodies formation

What this develops:
Leadership that is grounded, credible, and generative — capable of developing others and shaping healthy organisational culture.

What happens in a Coaching Circle?

Each month we meet in a small, consistent group for a session that is structured enough to be safe and useful — and open enough for what’s real to emerge.

It’s a blend of:

  • Facilitated teaching (short, relevant content on the developmental edge the group is working with)

  • Guided group conversation (where we slow down, name what matters, and make sense of what’s happening in your work)

  • Real-world case reflection (participants bring live scenarios — conflict, stuckness, boundary issues, decision pressure — and we work with them together)

  • Learning group process in real time (I’ll name patterns and dynamics as they arise — how power shows up, where agreement is blocking clarity, where the room is avoiding something, where a polarity is trying to be held)

This means the “curriculum” isn’t a fixed script.
It’s a living pathway that responds to the needs and life of the group — while still being anchored in clear developmental themes.

Structured — with room for emergence

You’ll always know what to expect when you arrive:

  • a clear opening and check-in

  • a theme or focus for the session

  • space for shared reflection and learning

  • a closing that turns insight into action

Within that structure, we stay responsive. Because the real learning isn’t theoretical — it’s what happens when your actual work and leadership edge meets a community that can hold it.

Like professional supervision — with more value

Many people helpers know the value of supervision: a confidential space to reflect, debrief, and stay ethically and emotionally resourced.

This circle offers a similar kind of support — and adds something supervision often can’t:

you learn from the lived experience of others.

You gain perspective not only from a facilitator, but from peers who are navigating different organisations, pressures, and personality patterns — and you start to see your own situation more clearly through their insights.

It’s one of the fastest ways to build capacity:

  • you’re resourced personally

  • you grow relational skill

  • and your leadership expands through collective intelligence

In short: you’re not just supported — you’re developed.

Who this circle is for

This circle is for people helpers who:

  • Work in community services (primary home base)
  • And/or lead in allied sectors: health, education, aged care, disability, social services
  • Are frontline team leaders, coordinators, middle managers, or senior managers
  • Want to grow their leadership from the inside out
  • Want to lead inspiring, healthy teams — not just “cope”
  • Can feel the pressure and want to respond with maturity, clarity, and presence

It’s not for:

  • Quick fixes or “one clever framework”
  • Brand new leaders needing basic training
  • People seeking therapy or clinical mental health support
  • People who aren’t willing to reflect on their own pattern as part of leadership


This is a developmental coaching circle — not therapy. It supports leadership growth, emotional regulation, and relational capacity in the context of work. If you’re seeking treatment for acute mental health concerns, this circle may not be the right support on its own.

Program Overview

Duration: 6 months
Location: The Retreat, Forth Valley (North West Tasmania)
Cohort size: Small and intentional (limited places)

The rhythm

Designed to be immediately resourcing — never just “one more meeting”.

  • Monthly in-person circle gathering (3.5 hours)

  • 4 x 1:1 coaching conversations across the six months (application to real scenarios)

Fee: $240 per month for 6 months ($1,440 total)

Payment pathways: individuals paying personally, or organisations sponsoring staff.

What Outcomes Can Participants Expect: 

Participants commonly leave with:

  • Clearer inner authority and better boundaries

  • Reduced over-functioning and rescuing (without losing heart)

  • Improved conflict capacity and healthier conversations

  • More decisive action without consensus paralysis

  • Increased steadiness under pressure (self-regulation)

  • Stronger facilitation and room-reading ability

  • A felt sense of being less alone — and more resourced

  • Renewed capacity to lead teams that are fresh, grounded, and effective

For organisations, this supports:

  • Healthier team culture

  • Stronger leadership bench strength

  • Fewer relational breakdowns

  • Improved supervision and coaching conversations

  • Reduced burnout risk through proactive capacity-building

Register Your Interest

Places are limited to protect depth and trust.

Registering your interest allows us to:

  • Confirm fit (for you or your staff member/s)

  • Share dates and the circle rhythm

  • Discuss sponsorship options if relevant

Register My Interest ➞

Once you register, I’ll reach out with:

  • program dates

  • sponsorship details

  • what to expect

  • and a short next-step conversation

About Your Facilitator

Ben Pangas is a leadership development specialist, counsellor, and certified developmental coach (Masters level) with more than twenty years’ experience working across construction, education, and community development.

His work integrates professional leadership practice, adult developmental psychology, and contemplative methods that strengthen attention, regulation, and discernment.

Ben’s approach is grounded and practical. He doesn’t offer quick fixes or performative techniques — he supports leaders to grow the inner capacity required to lead with clarity, maturity, and integrity in demanding contexts.

The Retreat

For Transformational Learning

  • Space
  • Solitude
  • Silence
  • Spirit