We have a team of more than 50 professional staff working Australia-wide. Experts across a range of disciplines, our people are our greatest asset. They pride themselves on delivering trusted advice, contemporary services and practical solutions to clients.

Associate Directors

Trish Oakley

Associate Director

trish@elton.com.au

Trish Oakley has more than 30 years of experience providing strategic communications advice in public sector, corporate and non-government contexts. Trish is an expert in high level political communications and stakeholder management, particularly in contested environments.

Before entering consultancy, Trish was Chief of Staff of a former Deputy Premier’s office and managed policy development, media and political strategy in the portfolios of Health, Urban Affairs and Planning, Housing and Aboriginal Affairs. From 1979 to 1990, Trish was a journalist with the ABC, reporting both Federal and State politics.

Areas of expertise:

Strategic communications
Stakeholder liaison
Issues management
Media management
Internal communication strategies
Strategic policy development and implementation

Steve Rossiter

Associate Director

steve@elton.com.au

Steve has more than 15 years' experience of managing social and urban planning projects. This has included researching best practices and developing community facilities and human service strategies for projects in New South Wales, the ACT, Queensland, South Australia and the Northern Territory. Steve has considerable training, research, consultation and facilitation expertise. Using these diverse skills, he has worked with a variety of stakeholders in assessing community need and developing models for sustainable community facilities and services.

With a background in local government, Steve has a practical understanding of planning processes. He has worked on complex projects where a range of different interests are represented. He has facilitated a variety of collaborative and complex forums. Steve has also worked extensively with architects, developing briefs for the design of community facilities.

Steve maintains strong interest and expertise in best practice community facilities planning and the contribution community and cultural facilities make to the social sustainability of communities. As part of an ongoing research project at Elton Consulting, Steve is identifying best practice case studies in community planning. He has also developed guidelines for the planning, design, delivery and operation of new community facilities.

Areas of expertise:

Community planning and needs assessment
Community facilities planning
Social planning input for master planned communities
Design and delivery of complex community and stakeholder engagement processes
Workshop design, facilitation and reporting
Research and analysis
Place making

Chris Manning

Associate Director

chris@elton.com.au

Chris Manning has over 25 years' experience in social planning, community development and social policy, with a particular focus on human services and community facilities planning. She holds an Honours Degree in Social Studies and a Masters Degree in Environmental Planning and has held a number of senior positions in the public sector, responsible for the planning, management and funding of a range of community sector and social housing programs.

As an Associate Director of Elton Consulting for the past 20 years, Chris has taken a lead role in community planning and social infrastructure studies undertaken by the firm, where planning for socially sustainable development has been a key component. These projects have included urban renewal projects, urban release areas, coastal developments and large residential developments in rural areas. Chris has also prepared a number of community facility strategies for councils experiencing population change. In addition to her expertise in community planning and social infrastructure development, Chris is widely recognised for her skills in social impact assessment and demographic analysis. She also has extensive experience in the design and facilitation of community engagement and stakeholder consultation processes, in program evaluation and in research and analysis of social policy issues.

Areas of expertise:

Planning, management and evaluation of community facilities and human services
Community planning and needs assessment, community development and capacity building
Social impact assessment
Organisation and facilitation of community consultation processes
Research and analysis of social policy issues
Assessment of housing policy and housing programs

Brendan Blakeley

Associate Director

brendan@elton.com.au

Brendan Blakeley, an Associate Director of Elton Consulting, is a community and stakeholder engagement specialist. Brendan has extensive expertise in the design, facilitation, analysis and reporting of large scale engagement processes.

He has undertaken complex consultation projects for all levels of government, many of which have occurred in contested or high profile environments. Brendan is a trained mediator, with post graduate qualifications in dispute resolution.

Areas of expertise:

Facilitation of engagement processes
Dispute resolution
Urban strategy and city visioning
Consultation process
Evaluation and review

Kim Houghton

Associate Director

kimh@elton.com.au

Kim Houghton is an economist with a passion for small business and is an accomplished communicator. Kim has a deep interest in small businesses and small communities, having written about the importance of small businesses in regional economies in a book called 'Jobs in Our Regions: Building on the Small Business Base'.

Kim has expertise in creating and running programs that support the growth of micro and home-based businesses and is particularly passionate about the new growth areas in the economy – business services, personal services and ‘the experience economy’.

Prior to establishing Strategic Economic Solutions in 1997, Kim worked at the Australian National University in Pacific economic relations, and in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Kim is well known for presentations and workshops which are entertaining as well as informative, drawing on Kim’s experience as a researcher with a PhD in Economics, his own entrepreneurial experiments, his background in community mediation and his reputation as a performance poet.

Areas of expertise:

Economic analysis and strategic planning
Small business development strategy
Social enterprise feasibility studies and business planning
Employment growth initiatives
Facilitation
Conflict resolution