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Speaking
Keynotes, presentations and off-sites that move people and systems.
Dr Hayley Squance is a globally recognised expert in animal emergency management based in New Zealand. With over two decades of experience in leadership and crisis environments, she has spoken with audiences across the globe, combining her own experiences, case studies, and the most up-to-date research to create and deliver engaging, thought-provoking talks that help organisations lead adaptively, connect across silos, and unlock potential.
Here’s a selection of topics Hayley regularly speaks about:
The Invisible Interface: People, Animals, and the Environment in Crisis
What happens when we ignore the interdependencies, and what’s possible when we don’t.
Using stories from the field, Hayley explores how ignoring the connections between people, animals and the environment creates blind spots in emergency management and resilience planning. This keynote highlights integrated approaches that are more humane, effective and sustainable.
Who it is for:
Cross-sector forums, conferences and workshops
Emergency Management audiences
Policy leaders in climate, health or disaster resilience
Community development organisations
Educators and students in integrated systems
Why it matters
Emergency management systems often silo roles, but communities don’t live in silos. This keynote brings visibility to what’s usually overlooked.
The Neuroscience of the Stress Response
Why understanding the brain in crisis changes how we lead, communicate and recover.
This keynote explores how stress affects decision-making, communication, and behaviour. Using neuroscience to unpack the physiological and cognitive responses to crisis, Hayley offers practical tools for leaders and front-line teams to shift from reactive to strategic thinking under pressure.
Who it is For:
Emergency leaders and IMT/EMC personnel
Veterinary, Public Health and Health Care Professionals
Government departments and community organisations delivering services under pressure
Boards and teams working through change
Educators wanting to build capacity in emotionally intelligent leadership
Why it Matters:
A better understanding of the stress response enables teams to function more effectively, reduces burnout, and enhances coordination, particularly when the stakes are high.
Shifting the System: Unlocking Potential in Unexpected Places
When you see the whole system, the overlooked becomes essential
In complex environments, the best solutions often come from unexpected places, and so does leadership. Drawing from decades of experience in crisis leadership, cross-sector collaboration, and systems thinking, Hayley helps audiences uncover the hidden interconnections and untapped potential already present in their work.
This keynote invites leaders and teams to shift their perspective: from seeing complexity as a problem to viewing it as a source of opportunity, from ignoring the margins to understanding that real transformation begins at the edges. Whether you’re leading a business, shaping policy, or building resilient communities, what you overlook could be your most powerful lever for change.
Audience Takeaways:
Reframe complexity as a strategic advantage
Spot blindspots that limit your impact or innovation
Identify overlooked contributors and unexpected leaders
Understand how lived experience can unlock new insights
Strengthen interconnection and trust across your organisation
Who it is for:
Business and sector leaders navigating change
Interdisciplinary teams and programme innovators
Change managers, HR Professionals, and culture leaders
Learning and development teams
Boards and governance group
Why it works:
Too often, systems reward what’s visible, qualified, or familiar. But real change emerges when you notice the unseen. The ideas, perspectives, and people outside the usual frame. This keynote creates a powerful shift in how organisations think about leadership, talent and transformation.
Workshops & Masterclasses
Engaging, practical, and grounded in real-world experience, these sessions are designed to help teams and leaders navigate complexity, lead adaptively, and drive meaningful change.
Whether you're working in emergency management, government, business, or community leadership, these workshops and masterclasses blend systems thinking, reflective practice, and applied strategy to spark insight and build capability.
Tailored to your needs:
We regularly work with organisations to design bespoke sessions that respond to your unique context, challenges, and goals, from leadership development to program design, crisis response to capability uplift.
Below are examples of workshops that Hayley regularly delivers across sectors. These can be run as short masterclasses, half- or full-day sessions, or integrated into multi-day leadership programmes:
The Complexities of Animal Emergency Management
Navigating the messy interface of animal, human and environmental emergency management
Drawing on Hayley’s PhD research and frontline leadership, these sessions explore what happens when systems designed for humans include animals as part of the framework. Learn how to integrate animals into established emergency management systems and work across silos, manage stakeholder tension, and create more adaptive and ethical approaches to animal-inclusive emergency management.
This workshop introduces the complete training programmes available for teams working in animal emergency management, designed to provide the training I wished I had when leading national and regional animal emergency management coordination roles. These programmes build confidence, capability, and cohesion in a space where the stakes are high and the system often unclear.
Who it is for:
Emergency management professionals, animal welfare organisations, veterinary professionals, rural leaders, and government agencies.
The Online Animal Emergency Management Complexities Masterclass Series is now open for registration, with the first online masterclass scheduled for Wednesday, September 3, 2025. For full details and registration, click here.
From Barriers to Possibility: A Systems-Based Approach to Change in Complex Environments
Transformational change through systems-based leadership
Based on Hayley’s whitepaper and fieldwork, this workshop unpacks what’s required to lead in environments where traditional levers no longer work. Participants gain tools for mapping systemic barriers, designing interventions with ripple effects, and building momentum for change that sticks.
Who it is for:
Organisations facing systemic challenges and change, policy leaders, senior advisors
The Invisible Interface: What Are You Not Seeing?
Reframing blind spots and hidden interdependencies in complex systems
This workshop explores the value of what often goes unnoticed, the spaces between roles, disciplines and responsibilities. Through real-world systems thinking and dynamic facilitation, participants learn how to uncover overlooked interconnections that could be the key to unlocking resilience, innovation, and strategic breakthroughs.
Who it is for:
Leaders, change agents, and cross-sector teams (any sector)
The Power of Champions: Unlocking Potential and Hidden Leadership
Building enduring capability through trusted local leaders
From community champions to government departments, champions often emerge in the most unexpected places. This session explores how identifying and empowering these champions can build momentum, shift culture, and sustain change, especially in complex or resource-constrained environments.
Based on case studies and grounded in systems thinking, participants will learn how to design for influence, foster distributed leadership, and unlock potential already sitting within their team and communities, hidden in plain sight.
Who it is for:
Project leads, resilience coordinators, change agents, community engagement teams
Holistic Consequence Management: Beyond the Obvious
Seeing the second- and third-order effects across people, animals, and the environment
Traditional consequence management often focuses on what’s most visible or measurable, but the real risks often lie just out of sight. This session introduces a holistic lens for consequence management that accounts for cascading impacts, system interconnections, and overlooked vulnerabilities. Participants will walk away with tools to uncover and respond to the consequences of the consequences, supporting more ethical, strategic, and integrated decision-making in high-stakes situations.
Who it is for:
Government agencies, strategic leaders, policy advisors, emergency management and resilience professionals.
Calm in the Chaos: Support for Leaders
On call when it counts.
In fast-moving, high-stakes environments, it’s easy for leaders to feel pulled in multiple directions, reacting rather than leading. This service provides on-demand strategic support, helping decision-makers slow down, see the system, and move forward with clarity.
Whether you’re navigating a complex emergency, managing organisational change, or dealing with the uncertainty of long-tail recovery, Hayley becomes a thinking partner and trusted advisor, not just another consultant.
This monthly retainer service gives leaders and organisations priority access to:
Real-time advice and perspective during pressure points and uncertainty
High-trust sounding board to test decisions, strategies, or dilemmas
Strategic insight grounded in decades of experience in emergency leadership, complex systems, and organisational transformation
Debriefs and reflections to make sense of what’s happened and what’s next
Tailored input across project phases
This is not a mentoring programme, it’s embedded, responsive support for those who carry responsibility in complex, high-stakes environments. You don’t need to weather the storm alone. With Hayley in your corner, you can lead with calm, clarity and confidence, even when the path ahead is unclear.
Mentoring
Leadership that makes a difference, not just decisions.
This mentoring offering is designed for leaders, change-makers, and boundary-crossers working in complex, high-stakes environments—those navigating challenges that don’t fit into boxes or simple solutions.
Whether you’re holding responsibility in emergency management, government, animal welfare, the veterinary profession, sustainability, or systems leadership, this is not traditional career coaching. It’s a deep partnership to help you:
Shift from linear to systemic thinking
Build personal and professional resilience
Lead through complexity with confidence
Navigate ethical dilemmas and competing priorities
Make sense of uncertainty and act with intention
I work with individuals and organisations who are committed to thoughtful, responsible growth — those who understand that actual impact supports people, communities, and the planet.
Formats available:
One-on-One Mentoring
Tailored, confidential support focused on your context, challenges, and leadership journey. Ideal for executives, team leads, and specialists in roles where complexity and responsibility converge.Group Mentoring
Small, facilitated cohorts that create a shared space for reflection, challenge, and insight. Designed for peer learning, systems-level exploration, and building a support network across sectors or within organisations.
Whether you’re stepping into a new leadership role or seeking a trusted thinking partner to sustain your work, this mentoring space is designed to help you lead with purpose, not just drive outcomes.
The Results
The Ripple Effect