Meet The Team
Highly experienced mental health trainers and accredited counselling practitioners and supervisors, we are passionate about bringing our knowledge and skills to business and organisational environments as a way of enhancing mental wellbeing and productivity.
We are Michelle and Basia, two women passionate about sharing our expertise. We created our mental wellbeing service as a result of having spent many years working for different organisations where we both experienced the centrality of mental health. We forged our working partnership whilst we were counsellors at the University of Leicester, supporting students with their mental wellbeing.
We passionately believe in sharing our therapeutic expertise beyond a traditional therapy setting. Skills such as relationship-building, trust-building, enhancing emotional resilience, maintaining positive boundaries are key to successful organisations and we are here to provide you with the knowledge and skills that you need. We also can provide supervision of employees and managers working within challenging contexts as a way of maintaining their mental wellbeing.
Michelle Overton
Michelle has fifteen years experience of successfully delivering training and is passionate about supporting people to maintain a healthy mental health through education. She is an accredited Mental Health First Aid Instructor Trainer with an operational background in mental health. Michelle is an accredited Counsellor, Clinical Supervisor and has her own private practice. She is a member of one of the major professional bodies The British Association of Counsellors and Psychotherapists (BACP). Michelle has experience of working therapeutically with adults and young people in many different settings, including domestic abuse, supporting people living with HIV and in a higher educational setting.
Michelle has been a member of the board of trustees for the Children’s HIV Association and she was awarded a Talk Talk Digital Heroes Award which recognises people who harness digital technology to bring about positive social change in their communities at the Houses of Parliament.
For the last eight years Michelle has been working in UK universities as a Senior Counsellor and Clinical Supervisor, where she successfully set up and managed a counselling service in a university’s halls of residence for students. Her qualifications include a Diploma Theory and Practice of Person Centred Counselling, Diploma in Counselling Supervision, OCST 1 – Online Counselling Certificate, Certificate in Counselling Studies and Certificate in Counselling Skills.
Sarah Carter
Sarah is a qualified counsellor and yoga teacher. She has more than six years of counselling experience in different settings including the NHS and the University of Leicester. She has supported hundreds of people struggling with anxiety, depression, sexual abuse / violence, trauma, loss, relationships and life. She integrates different approaches depending on each client’s needs and believes the relationship between therapist and client (trust, compassion, empathy, quality of listening) is the vehicle for change.
In addition, Sarah works therapeutically with yoga to support people with anxiety and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. She considers the value of working with the body (the whole of the person) to regulate the nervous system and create resilience. In yoga therapy sessions Sarah combines accessible movement, mindfulness, guided visualisations and psycho-education. She works one to one with individuals and has programmes available for groups including a six week programme for stress/anxiety and a six week programme for PTSD.
Sarah is currently offering sessions online.
Ian Smith
Ian is a former Super League Rugby League Referee for over 12yrs. That, has allowed him to travel the world officiating an incredible sport. The ‘roller coaster’ ride of emotions officiating can bring including the ‘verbal abuse and negativity’ lead Ian down the path of being a passionate mental health advocate.
Ian’s enthusiasm and passion about improving our mental fitness shines through in his deliver of everything mental health related. Ian is a qualified MHFA trainer.
Prof Basia Spalek
Prof. Basia Spalek has worked within wide-ranging contexts in relation to mental and physical well-being. She is an internationally regarded expert, writer and practitioner who is happy to share her insights and experiences as a keynote speaker. She has acted as a trainer and/or consultant to the following organisations: Families & Communities Taskforce Canberra Australia, Equality & Diversity Unit Crown Prosecution Service UK, Institute of Strategic Dialogue UK, United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute, CO-JIT UK, Trondheim City Council Norway, the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences, the Home Office, UK, the Royal United Services Institute, the European College of Policing, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, and the Carnegie Foundation.
Basia has also been a keynote speaker for conferences exploring wide-ranging themes such as victimisation, human rights, security and mental wellbeing in Singapore, Holland, Saudi Arabia, Australia, the US, Austria, Hungary, Turkey, Kurdistan and China.
Basia is also an associate lecturer with the Open University, teaching counselling and forensic psychology. Basia enjoys long distance running, having completed many Marathons, and she is now a United Kingdom Athletics running coach. She is also a Qigong practitioner and instructor. Her qualifications are PhD Victimisation; MSc Criminology, BSc (Hons) Psychology, and Postgraduate Diploma in Integrative Counselling and Psychotherapy.
