NSB Logo Dr. Marie-Hélène Pelletier Dr. Marie-Hélène Pelletier

Dr. Marie-Hélène Pelletier

Speaker Featured

Vancouver, BC, Canada

Leadership Resilience & Burnout Psychologist

Dr. Pelletier is a highly accomplished speaker (50+ speeches/year), merging business management and psychology to champion leadership resilience and workplace health. With extensive experience in corporate, insurance, governance, and public sectors, she offers national and international perspectives on mental health as a key pillar of overall well-being. As a work psychologist with over 20 years of expertise in clinical and workplace psychology, she holds a Ph.D. and an MBA from the University of British Columbia. Dr. Pelletier’s impressive career includes spearheading mental health strategies for Sun Life Financial, where she was also the Assistant Vice-President of Workplace Health. Dr. Pelletier has been coaching executives for two decades and has been featured in Forbes and Fast Company. Her dynamic presentations inspire and educate, making her a trusted authority in the field by Fortune 500 companies, governments and corporations.

Performance & Productivity Business & Workplace Health Innovation & Change Management Leadership Motivation & Inspiration

In the News

Marie-Helene Pelletier in the media January 1, 2023
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier on Burnout | The Dr. Greg Wells Podcast October 19, 2021
Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier on Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace October 5, 2021

Keynote Speeches

Virtual Keynotes & Webinars
Contact us for more information about this speaker & their virtual presentations. Click here for some of the most popular formats for virtual events.
Psychological Safety & Team Resilience: Translating The Big Idea Into Your Actions

Diverse teams have the potential to bring a breath of perspectives and generate innovative ideas. Yet, that potential is not always observed. A key moderator in this equation is psychological safety. While every team is different, most teams need psychological safety to unlock their potential.

In this keynote, workplace mental health expert, psychologist and experienced leader Dr. Pelletier brings together her weekly work as a practicing work psychologist with current research in psychological safety in the workplace to clarify what we know makes a difference in teams and organizations. She highlights how psychological safety connects with resilience and workplace mental health, and the impacts of psychological safety on adaptation to change, action-orientation and other benefits that may surprise you.

  • Understand what team resilience and psychological safety are
  • Distinguish the benefits
  • Learn the actions you can implement now
Resilience and Change: Harnessing the Opportunity of the Moment

In an era of transformational change, workers and the workplace are experiencing the impacts in multiple ways. Some impacts are an acceleration of pre-existing trends. And some are new. But one thing is clear – many of these changes are far-reaching.

In this presentation, workplace mental health expert Dr. Pelletier brings together her weekly work as a practicing work psychologist with current research in workplace psychology to challenge your assumptions and help your organization understand these changes at individual, team and organizational levels.

She highlights the ways that organizations and individuals can both manage these changes and turn them to an advantage. By approaching this moment in time with curiosity, agility and renewed energy and purpose, we can not only adapt to change, we can thrive.

  • Understand the links between your mindset, resilience and mental health
  • Distinguish what factors are contributing to mental agility and health, as well as to fatigue and burnout
  • Reconstruct your strategic plan for the power of resilience based on strategies that work
Building and Protecting Psychological Resilience in a High-Stakes, High-Performance Culture

High performance organizations – where long hours are the norm – are fertile ground for resilience-bending pressures. While the rewards are many, the key to continuing success is the sustainability of employee wellbeing. How can employees and teams maintain their high performance without breaking their much-needed resilience? In this keynote, Dr. Pelletier examines the specifics of psychological resilience in high performance organizations. She outlines the actions that individuals and teams can take to maintain, rebuild and bring even more resilience to their work and personal lives – without sacrificing high performance and its rewards.

  • Recognize the factors within high performance organizations that can impact resilience
  • Predict the risk to psychological resilience with better accuracy – and understand the actions that can help
  • Reconstruct your approach to your own and your team’s psychological resilience
Healthier Workforce: Neurodiversity, and Mental Health in the Workplace

Your team and your organisation already include a probably large but hidden neurodiverse population. This likely leads to even more creativity, innovation, productivity and resilience. A more conscious effort to create and support such diversity would benefit everyone – individuals, teams and the organisation.If you increase your literacy and framework, then you create the potential for positive outcomes. Organizational climates that connect neurodiversity with inclusion and ethical climates do even better. In this talk, Dr Marie-Helene covers what neurodiversity is, how it differs from and intersects with mental health at work and its significance. She guides a research-based reflection on where we are currently at and how to move forward to support even better psychological health and safety for a neurodiverse population. 

  • Define neurodiversity and its connection with mental health
  • Understand how beliefs and literacy impact support of neurodiversity at work
  • Identify actions to start taking now to support neurodiversity
Leadership & Motivation
  • Resilience for leaders and their teams
  • Growth mindset
  • Mental agility
Transformation
  • Resilience and change through challenging times
  • Challenging assumptions
  • Identify protective factors
Resilience, Happiness, Productivity
  • Resilience and change through challenging times
  • Managing increasing demands
  • Growth mindset
  • Compassion fatigue and burnout
  • Getting ahead of stress and anxiety
  • Resilience for leaders and managers
  • Mental health through dynamic events
Masterclass
  • Your individual strategic resilience plan

Platform Plus Presentations

Unique formats and ways to connect with audiences.
Specialized workshops
The way forward is upstream: turn leaders, managers, and co-workers into advocates and mentors for mental health disability management. If there was ever a time for mental health prevention, this is it. Everyone has a role to play, but one that’s not well ingrained and often overlooked particularly as it relates to the most challenging part of the mental health continuum and disability management, is the role of leaders, managers and co-workers. Dr. Marie-Helene will challenge your assumptions and share the latest research and practice experience on the key role that managers, leaders and co-workers can play in supporting workplace mental health. She’ll also explain why now is the time to “raise the stakes” on prevention, with short, targeted training sessions that can provide significant long-term benefits. Key takeaways are: (1) Understand why the role of managers, leaders and co-workers can be effective in supporting employee mental health; (2) Identify the benefits of mental health training for managers/leaders and co-workers; (3) Learn some key signs of employee distress beyond absence or job performance.
Improving the outcome: how to support someone on a mental health disability absence (today, regardless of your role)
Despite the best support efforts of colleagues, teams and organizations, some employees will need a mental health disability absence. That can raise questions. What actually happens during these leaves? What factors are linked to a better recovery? What influence do you have to improve the outcome? Dr. Marie-Helene shares the biggest myths as well as the latest psychology research and practice experience on how you can support someone on a mental health disability absence. Key takeaways are: (1) Understand what contributes to effective recovery when on a mental health disability absence; (2) Identify the biggest myths associated with mental health disability absence; (3) Learn how you can influence the outcome.

Audience reviews:

  • Thank you so much for joining us last week and sharing your expertise with our workforce! We’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback and your words are helping us spur discussion about the importance of investing deeply in wellness. - Senior Advisor to the Director, United States Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA)
  • Marie-Helene is one of those rare experts who truly grasps what it takes for us (both individually and organizations) to achieve goals that we may only dream of. As a colleague I am impressed with her speaking abilities. She inspires participants to take action that leads to results and does this with passion, knowledge, experience and joy. - Medical Doctor and President, Brigham and Associates (U.S.A)
  • Dr. Pelletier recently kicked off our first in-person event in over two years, and we are so glad she did! Her talk on resilience and workplace mental health was so engaging for our audience and very helpful. We are looking forward to working with Dr. Pelletier again in the future. - Director, Stakeholder Engagement, Canadian Partnership for Women and Children’s Health (CanWaCH)
  • Dr. Pelletier is an excellent speaker! She gave a virtual presentation in French for our conference and she was professional and prepared from start to end. She tailored her speaking points to ensure they were relevant to our audience and her presentation was very well received. I felt she did an especially great job of captivating the audience in a virtual environment with her energy and her use of visual aids. Thank you again, Dr. Pelletier, for sharing your expertise at our event! - Manager, Corporate Partnerships and Marketing, Coaching Association of Canada
  • Her style is engaging, her energy is exhilarating, and her content relevant and research-based. I can see why MH is in high demand as a speaker, an advisor, and an educator. - Director, Digital Learning
  • We thoroughly enjoyed Dr. Pelletier's participation in our event. Her professionalism yet approachability was palpable during both the keynote sessions as well as the panel. We should not hesitate in recommending her for similar events, and or asking her back for one of our future events. - Events Coordinator
  • Dr. Pelletier presented a bilingual keynote address at the annual Symposium of the Association of Professional Executives of the Public Service of Canada (APEX) in 2015 (600 executives). To this day, I still put Dr. Pelletier's name forward when asked about compelling speakers on workplace mental health and resilience. Her session was one of the best received of the entire event. - Deputy Executive Director and General Counsel Environment Legal Services
 

Speaker Biography

Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier is an award-winning workplace mental health expert, psychologist, advisor and speaker. Fluently bilingual in English and French, she’s one of only a handful of work psychologists holding both a PHD and MBA. 

Marie-Helene brings a signature mix of business and clinical expertise to the groups she works with. She translates psychology research (about health, resiliency, and overcoming challenges) into strategies professionals, business leaders and their teams need to thrive.  

  1. Provides expertise for boosting performance. Marie-Helene shares what psychologists know but other professionals and business people may not. She has a robust understanding of the intersection between business success and strong workplace mental health. She led workplace mental health strategy in senior leadership roles at several companies, including Sun Life, one of the world’s leading financial institutions. 
  1. Builds leadership and organizational resilience. Through her speaking engagements and workshops, Marie-Helene provides business leaders with concrete steps to prevent fatigue and burnout – and gain energy, even in tough times. She can help your leaders and their team members shift perspectives and regain and retain their passion.
  2. Helps your organization manage change. Marie-Helene provides business leaders and their team members with the psychological tools needed to adapt to, and embrace, transformational change. She equips them to respond quickly, make good decisions, and maintain stamina for ongoing productivity.
  3. Combines style with substance. Marie-Helene is a dynamic speaker and workshop facilitator. She has an engaging style, exhilarating energy, and a warm sense of humour. With this relatable approach, she brings the latest research and proven best practices to her talks, inspiring participants to take action and get results.

In her presentations and workshops, Dr. Pelletier draws from what clients call a “clear mastery of the subject matter.” She speaks with authority to engage and inspire participants with passion, knowledge, expertise, and joy. And she shares this expertise in many ways, from keynote speeches, to panel moderator roles, to more informal fireside chats.

Over the course of her career, she has participated on the boards of the Canadian Psychological Association and the International Association of Applied Psychology. She has also been an active member of the Global Clinical Practice Network of the World Health Organization, a role that she continues to this day. 

She’s been featured in publications like Forbes and Thrive Global and her work has been published in academic journals such as Behaviour Research and Therapy, Journal of Anxiety Disorders, and Organizational Dynamics. Marie-Helene is currently working on a new book to redefine and guide new strategies for resilience and mental health in workplaces.

She has won numerous academic and industry awards, being described as a top industry leader with “credentials that make her uniquely suited to help guide the continued evolution of psychological health in the workplace”.

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