Dr Paul Donovan

Paul founded The Change Company in 1999 with a mission to transform conversations, enabling leaders and their teams to better envisage and realise their visions.

He specialises in working with senior executive teams, facilitating dialogue that surfaces individual and collective tensions to foster deep learning and more effective decision-making. This approach empowers executive teams to grow and lead their organisations with greater impact.

Paul has delivered coaching, facilitation and tuition services to a diverse range of clients including Mirvac, Aware Super (formerly First Plus Super), IQVIA, University of Sydney, Singapore Civil Service College, Mundipharma Australia, Stockland Property Development Group, Lend Lease, Cochlear Australia, Fresh Hope Communities, Wentworth Community Housing, Novartis Pharmaceuticals, Nestle Purina Petcare, the Australian Institute of Management, TasNetworks and many others.

Paul earned his Doctorate in Education from the University of Technology Sydney’s Centre for Learning and Change in 2014, focusing his research on the implications of ‘undiscussable’ topics in executive team learning and group decision-making.

Paul is the author of Bosses Behaving Badly: How individuals and teams can transform their use of power (2024).

Other publications

Paul has published peer-reviewed articles and book chapters, including those linked below.

• Practicing Power: Undiscussables, Power and HRD
• Leaders Behaving Badly: Using power to generate undiscussables in action learning sets
• Beyond Undiscussables? Why surfacing undiscussables in working groups is more important than ever
• ‘I think we should take this offline . . .’: Conversational patterns that undermine effective decision making in action learning sets

Management journals

• How to be Part of the Executive Decision Making Team
• Executive Games

Qualifications and accreditations

• Accredited in The Leadership Circle Profile and Diamond Power Index
• Accredited in Situational Leadership II (Ken Blanchard), Myers Briggs Practitioner, and Seven Habits of Highly Effective People (Stephen Covey)
• Certified NLP Master Practitioner, Leadership Effectiveness Training Master Trainer
• Extensive training in process-oriented group facilitation and executive coaching methods