Voices from the Edge

Book Review - Thinking fast and slow

A book review of this book by Daniel Kahneman

Book Review - The Black Swan

A book review of this book by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Marc Miles Is The TAE Fit For Purpose

The wonderful Marc Miles, the font of knowledge on all training and assessing matters in the vocational education and training sector helps disect the TAE qualification. An honest, sometimes brutally honest about whether the keystone qualification required for all trainers and assessors in the sector actually is fit for purpose. 

Marc Miles is a career presenter and trainer. He has written a book on Advanced Facilitation Skills, and for over a decade, has taught public speaking skills, and content from the Training and Education Training Package for Australian Vocational Education and Training.

During his time in the Vocational Education and Training sector, Marc has taught the TAE package over 500 times to people all around Australia in various industries. He has a been an instructional designer, training manager, and currently works as a senior facilitator for Spec Training.

Marc’s students know him as a dynamic and engaging facilitator in both the face-to-face and online environments, believing he has set a new standard for how online delivery can be done.
Marc’s book, Creating Transformation: Advanced Training Skills for Workshop Facilitators, was published in 2024. 

Marc has a Masters degree in Applied Linguistics, Natural language processing certifications, and has conducted numerous professional development workshops for various audiences across Vocation Education and Training, corporate and entrepreneurial sectors.

Book Review - Killed by a traffic engineer

Book review of this book by  Wes Marshall

Dr Megan Tranter

Dr. Megan Tranter is a recognized global voice in Health, Safety, and Environment leadership. She is among
the few women who have held top EHS roles  at Amazon, PepsiCo, Novartis, and Netflix.
Megan has extensive experience in global strategy development and implementation, risk management,
cultural change, and Board and CEO-level engagement and coaching.

Originally from Australia, Megan has had an impressive career spanning government, mining, and
academia. As a former lecturer at Central Queensland University and the University of Western Sydney,
Megan taught undergraduate and master’s students in Australia and Hong Kong.
She then moved to corporate roles, starting at McDonald’s Australia and then at Coca-Cola Amatil. After
relocating to the United States, her career took off as she built and led high-performing EHS and tech
teams in global companies, achieving significant results.

Megan’s mission is to spark a safety culture revolution. She now offers leadership development and
consulting services to help companies and safety leaders elevate their impact and create workplaces
where safety is second nature.

Megan brings a unique perspective as someone who has seen firsthand the complexity of safety and the
various ways to make an impact. She uses her refreshing, pragmatic voice to facilitate discussions and
offer keynotes based on her experiences with CEOs, senior leaders, and the front line.
Megan was awarded the NSC Marion Martin Award for the Most Influential Woman in Safety and is a
Certified Industrial Hygienist . She is a published author and holds a Doctor of Philosophy from the
University of New South Wales, a Master’s in Occupational and Industrial Hygiene from Deakin University,
and a Bachelor’s in Occupational Health and Safety from Queensland University of Technology.

Book Review - The Checklist Manifesto

A book review of this book by Atul Gawande

Steve Hearsum

Steve Hearsum has worked for over 20 years as an organisational consultant, coach
and more recently supervisor. He has a keen interest in the human side of change,
which in recent years that has grown into a fascination with how shame and anxiety
drive behaviour in organisations, particularly at senior leadership levels. He supports
and challenges clients to find their ‘edge and stretch’ when what they are after is
more than simply ‘better sameness’, and has been described as ‘the right kind of fly
in the ointment’.

His work focuses on building change capability in three main ways. helping leaders
develop their practice in terms of how they show up and the impact they have;
working with internal and external consultants and organisational change
practitioners of many a hue to develop their consulting skills; and culture work more
generally. He published his first book, No Silver Bullet: Bursting the bubble of the
organisational quick fix, in 2024, is a Council Member of the Tavistock Institute of
Human Relations and former Co-Chair of the OD Network Europe.

Darryl Johnson

Darryl Johnson, Owner and Director of Mental Health Journey Australia, is a Registered Nurse with Post Graduate qualifications in Mental Health Nursing and Occupational Health and Safety. Additionally, he holds qualifications as a Trainer Assessor.

With extensive experience spanning industries like manufacturing, the Australian Army, oil and gas, and mining, Darryl is a passionate advocate for workplace mental health. His belief in the power of education to break the cycle of mental health-related workplace issues drives his work, complemented by his current role as a mental health nurse at Royal Perth Hospital