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Ruth De Souza

Facilitating Conversations in Cultural Safety, Health, and the Arts

Dr. Ruth De Souza is a facilitator, consultant, keynote speaker, writer, podcaster, and researcher, with professional expertise across the health and arts sectors. Ruth’s work focuses on cultural safety, maternity, migration and health, equity and inclusion, self-care, mental health and digital health. Ruth is a Fellow of the Australian College of Nursing, an Honorary Adjunct Professor in Nursing at Auckland University of Technology, and lectures in the School of Art at RMIT University.

Facilitation

Ruth brings decades of experience as an educator, group therapist, facilitator, and consultant, supporting environments of liberation, creativity, and inquiry. Ruth uses methods that support inventive and unique conversations and collective decision-making. She helps people through discomfort by connecting to their dignity and humanity, and using the knowledge and feelings in the room to help to activate pathways to action. Ruth is a trained therapist, skilled at communication, building connections and generating collective energy and skills that enable respectful collaboration and navigation though conflict.

Consulting

Ruth brings her expertise and strategic insight to organisations through her consulting and organisational development practice. Specialising in co-designed evaluation and planning activities toward cultural safety, equity and inclusion, Ruth assists organisations to build flexibility and resilience to navigate uncertain futures in a time of far-reaching global change. Ruth has held a number of governance roles and ministerial appointments, and her wide ranging experience in service co-design integrates broad knowledge of high-level organisation with the nuts and bolts experience as a clinician and practitioner in a wide range of contexts.

Mentoring & Coaching

Ruth is deeply embedded in contemporary leadership practices and is an experienced coach and mentor, both in one-to-one settings and as part of mentoring programs. Ruth helps leaders and emerging leaders to connect to their sense of purpose and find authentic pathways to navigate complex issues and problems, bringing clarity, motivation and inspiration.

Keynote Speaker & MC

Ruth’s work as a public speaker and podcaster makes complex cultural issues understandable and relevant to diverse communities. Ruth brings authenticity, presence and warmth to the room, combining her passion for social justice and inclusion with wide ranging expertise. Ruth’s talks inspire and motivate audiences and leave a genuine and lasting impact. With her broad experience, Ruth is able to connect to specialist audiences across the health, arts and cultural fields as well as the general public.

Podcast

Birthing and Justice with Dr Ruth De Souza

Childbirth is supposed to be empowering, but for many birthing people, it is not. For Indigenous women, immigrant women, and women of colour, birthing within the western healthcare system can be anything but affirming. It can feel unsafe. In this raw and challenging talks series, I host conversations about birth, racism, and cultural safety with changemakers working within the birthing sector to break down the structures built on colonisation.

Click here to visit the Podcast page.

From the Blog

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How is your Central Helping System?

First published in Mindnet Issue 11 – Spring 2007 Recently I’ve come through a series of life changing stresses and learned what true love; friendship and personal strength were about. In particular the words of wise Rabbi Hillel, a Jewish scholar & theologian who lived from 30 BC – 9 AD have been a source […]

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How can nurses truly celebrate cultural diversity?

Editorial published in Kai Tiaki: Nursing New Zealand 13.4 (May 2007): p2(1). American feminist psychologist and theorist Carol Gilligan once said that without voice there cannot be relationship, and without relationship there cannot be voice. (1) How do we have relationships with people who are different from us? How do we and the other person […]

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New spaces and possibilities: The adjustment to parenthood for new migrant mothers

DeSouza, R. (2006). New spaces and possibilities: The adjustment to parenthood for new migrant mothers. Wellington, New Zealand. I recently completed a report for the Families Commission about migrant maternity, based on interviews with new mothers in Auckland and with the help of Plunket and many colleagues (see the acknowledgements in the report). Parenthood and […]

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Testimonials

Ruth was wonderful to work with – responsive, highly experienced, and understood our organisational context very well. Her workshop was very engaging and appropriately challenging. I’d have no hesitation in inviting her back!

The team absolutely loved Ruth’s work and ability to engage with all disciplines and different knowledge levels.