Monique Toohey, Managing Director; Psychologist & Cultural Intelligence Advisor
In her 30 year long career, Monique has worked in schools and tertiary institutions, youth, family and community NGO’s.
In 2005 she founded Nasihah Consulting Group Pty Ltd to deliver psychological services, project management consultancy and training.
She has been a provider of various types of cross-cultural and cultural competence training since the beginning of her career drawing on her own experiences as an Australian Muslim woman and her work with culturally and linguistically diverse and marginalised communities and clients. She has project managed countless education, capacity building, leadership and mental health projects in multicultural communities and provided consultative support and training to various organisations in Australia and abroad.
As a result of her clinical expertise and extensive cultural competence training, she was approached by the Australian Catholic University to authored the curriculum for a new unit in the Masters of Clinical Counselling course, ‘Multicultural Counselling’ and she was lead lecturer for 6 years (Melb & Syd). She continues to guest lecture in Cultural competence in Clinical Psychology masters courses at other universities.
By far the most robust training Monique has delivered to organisations wanting to improve their effectiveness in multicultural contexts is Cultural Intelligence (CQ) training.
In 2007 she became a certified Cultural Intelligence (CQ) facilitator (Advanced) through the Cultural Intelligence Centre (CIC) (USA) and has trained staff from over 360 organisations.
Monique is also known for her TEDx Docklands talk ‘Culture eats individuality for breakfast’ where she unpacks the importance of developing the relational skill set that is cultural intelligence.
She has been a commentator on the psychological impact of exclusion, the psychological impact of lockdowns during the pandemic and racist bullying for ABC news.
She has been seen on the Amazon Prime docuseries ‘Unheard’ (2021), ABC News and Lateline, featured in The Australian, The Age, The Herald-Sun, ABC and 3AW radio.
She was a speaker at the 2016 Melbourne Writer’s Festival and delivered the 2017 Tasmanian Annual Peace Trust Lecture.
Monique has a number of published works, drawing on her expertise in relationships, culture and social psychology.
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
Cultural Intelligence and embedding The CQ model.
Culturally conscious leadership
Culture and Psychology
Wellbeing at work
Harnessing team strengths to build confident teams