Our Team

Collins-Donnelly Consultancy’s friendly team of professionals come from the fields of psychology, counselling and psychotherapy, social work, youth work, education, criminal justice and training.

We are highly experienced in working with individuals from a wide variety of backgrounds, and businesses and organisations from many different public and private sectors. All our team particularly specialise in working with children, young people, their families and their schools.

Our team members pride themselves in maintaining Collins-Donnelly Consultancy's excellent reputation by providing high quality, professional, client-centred and supportive services delivered in a relaxed, flexible, adaptable and friendly way.

Please find our team members' profiles below.

Maria

I am a Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) Registered Counselling Psychologist (MSc, BSc, Dip.Counselling, Dip.D.A.S, Dip.psyth, Dip.anger.m.con, NLP.Dip, Dip.crim, MBPsS, MSFTR). I am also a member of the British Psychological Society (BPS) and its Divisions of Counselling Psychology and Occupational Psychology and its Psychology of Education Section. I am guided by both the HCPC and BPS Codes of Conduct. I have SDS Accreditation in Clinical Supervision Level 1 and am working towards my full BPS Approved Certificate in Clinical Supervision and have a BPS Approved Certificate of Assessed Academic Competence in Trauma Treatment.

My work within Collins-Donnelly Consultancy is multi-faceted and includes managing the Consultancy with my colleague, Kate.

My main area of work is providing cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), integrative counselling and psychotherapy, mindfulness-based therapy, family therapy and neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) for individuals, groups, couples, families and children and young people on a wide range of issues, including stress, anxiety, panic, OCD, depression, anti-natal and post-natal depression, anger, low self-esteem, addictions, relationship issues, bereavement, child abuse, sexual abuse, domestic violence, bullying, suicidal ideations, sexual issues, trauma, PTSD, eating disorders, gender identity issues, work-life balance and work-related issues, assertiveness, coping with illness and terminal illness, self-harming, ADHD, ASD, paranoia, psychosis and personality disorders. I work with clients who self-refer as well as with staff and service users who are referred by a wide variety of organisations within South Yorkshire, Derbyshire and further afield, including councils, schools, occupational health departments.

One of my specialisms is working with children and young people and their families providing therapeutic support for pupils and their families, psychological assessments of pupils and psychological reports, and advice and training for education professionals through our Steps4Ward programme for schools.

I also provide medico-legal treatment and reports for clients referred by solicitors and insurance companies and psychological assessments.

I also work across the following service areas for Collins-Donnelly Consultancy:

• Training consultancy – including design and delivery of training courses on topics related to emotional and psychological wellbeing, personal and professional effectiveness and psychological disorders. I particularly specialise in training and talks for the education sector.

• Occupational wellbeing consultancy – including advising and training managers on emotional wellbeing within the workplace and proactive processes that can be implemented to help maintain positive emotional wellbeing in the workplace.

• Change management consultancy – including advising and training managers on the implementation and management of change in the workplace and providing support mechanisms and training to help staff members cope with change.

• Critical incident management consultancy – including providing critical incident stress management training and advice, debriefing and defusing services, and one-to-one therapeutic support for staff undergoing traumatic responses to critical incidents. This work has built on Maria’s experience as a hostage negotiator and her completion of a BPS Approved Certificate of Assessed Academic Competence in Trauma Treatment.

• Professional development and supervision consultancy – including running a series of Professional Development Groups for professionals from the Education sector and providing supervision/debriefing for professionals working with children, young people and their families, including learning mentors and safeguarding officers.

• Business coaching services – including individual or group coaching for managers on a wide range of personal and professional effectiveness areas, working with organisations under pressure to help them to work towards effective resolutions, team building work, and working with teams experiencing communication difficulties and conflicts.

• Mediation and conflict management services.

I have worked extensively in the above service areas with public, private and voluntary sectors across the UK. I am particularly specialised in working with:

• Children, young people and family services, including schools, colleges and universities, youth services, social services.

• A variety of health service sectors and their staff, including nurses, doctors, mental health workers and occupational health professionals.

• Private businesses and their senior leaders, managers, customer service staff and sales staff.

• Service users of public and voluntary sectors, including young people who are not in education, employment or training, looked after young people, young parents and young carers.

I also advise the print, TV and radio media on a wide range of psychological issues and am an experienced ‘after dinner speaker’.

Kate

For many years, I provided the following services as part of our team:

• Therapeutic work (predominantly CBT and mindfulness) with adults, children, young people and families on a wide range of emotional issues, including but not limited to: anxiety, stress, anger, low self-esteem, assertiveness, low mood, phobias, trauma, body image, bullying, eating and sleeping difficulties, eating disorders, substance abuse, domestic violence, criminal and anti-social behaviours, relationship issues, parenting issues, ADHD, ASD, attachment issues and behavioural issues. I particularly specialised in work with children and young people and their families.

• Research consultancy of both a quantitative and qualitative nature and on a wide range of research topics. My research consultancy work has included research project design, project management, production of funding bids, design of research tools and methodologies, service evaluations, delivery of research methods, report production and editing, journal articles.

• Training consultancy, including training design, facilitation and evaluation for clients across a wide range of sectors, including the public sector (e.g. schools, children, young people and families services, youth offending, local councils, health sectors, occupational health), private sector businesses, and the voluntary sector. Training consultancy subject areas have included emotional and psychological wellbeing and personal and professional effectiveness and development. Training participants have included children and young people, parents, adults, business sector employees, managers, professionals working with children and young people (including youth workers and teachers).

• Mediation and conflict management services for businesses.

• Literature production, including magazine and newspaper articles, online articles, journal articles, self-help literature and training materials and manuals.

I now manage Collins-Donnelly Consultancy with my colleague, Maria, and am the author of several inspirational books for children and young people, published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Please see the 'Books' page for further details.

Sharon

In my work as a Cognitive Behavioural Therapist at Collins-Donnelly Consultancy, I specialise in providing CBT, family therapy and mindfulness therapy for adults, children, young people, families and couples in areas such as anxiety, depression, OCD, panic, stress, PTSD, self-esteem, anger, anti-natal and post-natal depression, gender identity issues, substance misuse, addictions, domestic abuse, bullying, bereavement, relationship issues, work-related issues, work-life balance, coping with illness and terminal illness, pain management, child abuse, sexual abuse, eating disorders, self-harming, suicidal ideations, behavioural issues, attachment issues, ADHD and ASD. My client base includes those who self-refer and individuals and families who are referred by a wide variety of organisations within South Yorkshire, Derbyshire and further afield. As part of my role, I provide therapeutic support for pupils and their families through our Steps4Ward programme for schools. I am guided in my practice by the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies' (BABCP) Codes of Conduct and Ethics.

As a CBT Therapist, I am also involved in the Consultancy’s occupational wellbeing consultancy work through the provision of support mechanisms for individuals to build emotional wellbeing and resilience in the workplace. I also provide one-to-one therapeutic support for staff undergoing traumatic responses to critical incidents as part of the Consultancy’s critical incident stress management services.

External to Collins-Donnelly Consultancy, I bring many years of experience in working with children and young people at risk of offending and their families, providing targeted interventions and support.

Kim

I am a qualified Social Worker who is registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) and who has a wealth of experience with children, young people and their families/carers. In my work as a CBT Therapist at Collins-Donnelly Consultancy, I specialise in providing CBT and family therapy for children, young people and their families in areas such as anxiety, depression, OCD, panic, stress, PTSD, self-esteem, anger, health-related issues, pain management, substance misuse, attachment issues, domestic abuse, bullying, bereavement, relationship issues, child abuse, self-harming, behavioural issues, ADHD and ASD. My client base includes those who self-refer and children, young people and families who are referred by schools within South Yorkshire and Derbyshire. I am guided in my practice by the HCPC Codes of Conduct and Ethics.

As part of Collins-Donnelly Consultancy, I am also involved in the facilitation of a wide range of training courses that relate to my experience, knowledge and specialist areas. This includes providing training for a variety of practitioners and professionals working with children, young people and their families, particularly those working in the education, youth work, social work and youth offending sectors. I particularly specialise in providing training and advice for education professionals on behavioural management. I also provide training for children and young people on a variety of emotional wellbeing and life skills issues, including anger management, stress management, self-esteem, confidence and assertiveness building, as well as training parents on how to address behavioural difficulties within the home.

I bring a wealth of experience from my social work background to my work at Collins-Donnelly Consultancy. My Social Work career has primarily involved working with:

young people exhibiting challenging behaviours and offending behaviours
young people who present with a variety of emotional and mental health issues, including anger issues, anxiety, depression, conduct disorders, personality disorders, drug and alcohol misuse, self-harm, suicidal ideations and developmental disorders.
young people with ADHD and ASD
looked after young people or care leavers.
young people who present a high risk of harm to either themselves or others.

I am experienced in assessing the appropriateness of varying interventions, designing intervention programmes, developing care plans, delivering evidence-based support programmes and therapeutic activities for individuals and groups, case management of young people with complex needs, child protection issues and multi-agency working.

Lynne

In my work as a Cognitive Behavioural Therapist at Collins-Donnelly Consultancy, I provide CBT, family therapy and mindfulness therapy for adults, children, young people, families and couples in areas such as stress, anxiety, depression, OCD, panic, self-esteem, assertiveness, anger, domestic abuse, trauma and PTSD, bullying, bereavement, relationship issues, work-related issues, substance misuse, health-related issues, pain management, child and sexual abuse, eating disorders, self-harming, suicidal ideations, behavioural issues, attachment issues, ADHD and ASD. My client base includes those who self-refer and individuals and families who are referred by a wide variety of organisations within South Yorkshire, Derbyshire and further afield. I also provide one-to-one therapeutic support for staff undergoing traumatic responses to critical incidents as part of the Consultancy’s critical incident stress management services. I am guided in my practice by the Codes of Conduct and Ethics of the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies' (BABCP).

External to Collins-Donnelly Consultancy, I bring many years of experience of supporting children, young people and their families, especially those facing mental health, behavioural, family and safeguarding-related issues. I have extensive knowledge of working within the education sector, including as a Safeguarding Officer.

Melanie

I am a highly experienced administrator and Data Protection Officer providing PA, administration and data protection-related services for the Collins-Donnelly Consultancy team.