Conference Speakers

Mark McConville Ph.D. is a Clinical Psychologist in private practice in Beachwood, Ohio, specializing in adult, adolescent, emerging adult, and family psychology. Dr. McConville is a senior faculty member at the Gestalt Institute of Cleveland, and has lectured and taught widely on the subjects of child development, parenting, and counseling methodology. 

His book Adolescence: Psychotherapy and the Emergent Self (Jossey-Bass, 1995) was awarded the 1995 Nevis Prize for Outstanding Contribution to Gestalt Therapy theory. He is the author of the Counseling Feedback Report, an innovative and widely used adolescent assessment tool, and is co-editor of The Heart of Development: Gestalt Approaches to Childhood and Adolescence, vols. I & II,(The Analytic Press, 2001). 

He is currently working on a book on the transition from adolescence to adulthood, titled Getting a Life: a Parents Guide to the ‘Failure to Launch’ Syndrome. In addition to his private clinical practice, Dr. McConville serves as Consulting Psychologist to Hathaway Brown School and University School, both in the Cleveland area.

Professor Ernesto Spinelli has gained an international reputation as one of the leading contemporary trainers and theorists of existential analysis as applied to psychology and psychotherapy and, more recently, the related arenas of coaching, facilitation and conflict mediation. He is a UKCP registered existential psychotherapist, a Fellow of the British Psychological Society (BPS) and the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) as well as an accredited executive coach and coaching supervisor. In 1999, Ernesto was awarded a Personal Chair as Professor of psychotherapy, counselling and counselling psychology. Ernesto is Director of ES Associates, an organisation dedicated to the advancement of psychotherapy, coaching, facilitation and mediation through specialist seminars and training programmes.  His most recent book, Practising Existential Psychotherapy: The Relational World (Sage, 2007) has been widely praised as a major contribution to the advancement of existential theory and practice and is currently being prepared for a 2nd Edition.  His previous books include: The Interpreted World: an introduction to phenomenological psychology, 2nd ed (Sage, 2005); Demystifying Therapy (PCCS, 2006); Tales of Un-knowing (PCCS, 2006); and The Mirror and The Hammer: challenging therapeutic orthodoxies (Sage,2001).

Educated in both philosophy and clinical psychology, Donna Orange teaches  at  ISIPSe (Institute for Psychoanalytic Psychology of the Self and Relational Psychoanalysis), Milano and Roma; Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity, New York; and NYU Postdoctoral Psychoanalytic Program, Relational Track, New York.  She is author of Emotional Understanding: Studies in Psychoanalytic Psychology; Thinking for Clinicians: Philosophical Resources for Contemporary Psychoanalysis and the Humanistic Psychotherapies, and The Suffering Stranger: Hermeneutics for Everyday Clinical Practice (2011). With George Atwood and Robert Stolorow she has written Working Intersubjectively: Contextualism in Psychoanalytic Practice and Worlds of Experience: Interweaving Philosophical and Clinical Dimensions in Psychoanalysis. With Roger Frie, she coedited Beyond Postmodernism: Extending the Reach of Clinical Theory.

Mark Fairfield LCSW, BCD, is the Executive Director of The Relational Center, providing leadership support to all project directors and overall mission alignment for all of The Relational Center's work. He holds an MS in Social Work from Columbia University. For six years he was the Clinical Director for Common Ground in Santa Monica. He has also presided over nonprofit boards. Mark has a private practice in the Miracle Mile area where he provides coaching and consulting to a range of clients including executive boards, business leaders and organisational systems in the health care sector, social services, finance and law. Mark has trained and presented internationally and has published in journals and books primarily on the subject of relational practices that confront the harmful effects of isolation and promote collaboration, interdependency and sustainable living and work arrangements.

Judith Hemming is the founder of MovingConstellations and a former director of the nowherefoundation. She is one of Britain’s foremost practitioners and trainers of Constellations and is highly regarded internationally as an expert in systemic approaches.

A UKCP-registered Gestalt practitioner and couples therapist of over 25 years, Judith has trained generations of therapists in the Gestalt model.  For twelve years she was deputy editor of the British Gestalt Journal. In 1991, she trained in constellations work from its founder, Bert Hellinger, among others, and is now a leading figure in this world community of practitioners and teachers. Her previous experience as an English teacher and lecturer in education studies at the Institute of Education allowed her to pioneer this educational work.

For the past fifteen years, Judith has been a leading innovator in this approach, developing work with individuals, couples, organisations, education sectors and communities. Her work has touched a full spectrum of issues, from individuals to governments. She coaches, consults and runs workshops and training programmes in the UK, Europe, the USA, and Japan.

A founding member and teacher at the Centre for the Study of Intimate & Social Systems, now Centre for Systemic Constellations, she has played a lead role in research into the application of systemic solutions in the corporate world, as well as management and learning processes in schools. She has led the development of the constellating process for 'in-tact teams', as an executive coaching process and to support the development of learning cultures. A pioneer of innovation, Judith is dedicated to bringing systemic approaches to family, educational, organisational and wider social systems.

Jeff Young PhD is the Director of The Bouverie Centre: Victoria’s Family Institute.  He is a clinical psychologist and family therapist and has worked, published and presented in the area of Mental Health for over 25 years. Jeff has an interest in responsive and contextually compassionate health services. He has contributed to the development of Single Session Therapy and reflecting teams, understanding blame and conceptualizing change in chronic conditions. Jeff has been the President of the Victorian Association of Family Therapists, President of the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy and a member of the editorial committee for the Dulwich Centre Newsletter. He is currently on the advisory panel for the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy. Jeff developed No Bullshit Therapy which combines honesty and directness with warmth and care. He is married with two children who keep him from taking his family therapy theories too seriously.

Lynda Osborne D Psych, MA, MSc, ECP, UKCP Registered Psychotherapist, has a background in research and education and has been involved in counselling and psychotherapy for 30 years. She is Head of the Gestalt Department at the Metanoia Institute in London (retiring August 2012)  and was the founding Chair of the UKAGP – the National Gestalt Organization.  She is a Teaching and Supervising Member of the Gestalt Psychotherapy Training Institute and a member of the UKCP Training Standards Committee.  Lynda travels internationally training therapists, attending and presenting at conferences, visiting her family and enjoying new countries – in no particular order!

Stephen Schoen is a graduate of Harvard College in English history and taught literature at George Washington University before obtaining his medical degree at Howard University in 1954. He received his psychiatric training from Harry Stack Sullivan, Fritz Perl, Gregory Bateson, and Milton Erickson. His interest in the spiritual values of psychotherapy led to his giving seminars at the Esalen Institute, The C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco, the Naropa Institute, and the Gestalt Therapy Institute of Cologne/Germany. A former president of the Gestalt Institute of San Francisco, he has been a training member since 1970. He maintains a private practice in San Rafael, California. His Book "Presence of Mind, Literary and Philosophical Roots of a Wise Psychotherapy" was published in 1994 by the Gestalt Journal Press.