About Dr Leanne Faulkner
Dr Leanne Faulkner works at the intersection of business ownership and wellbeing and she's changing the conversation about both. For years, the wellness industry has told business owners to work smarter, meditate more, and manage their stress better. Leanne asks a different question: Why don't we give business owners the tools to reclaim control, so they don't feel stressed in the first place?
Her answer comes from lived experience and rigorous research. She built Billie Goat Soap from a boutique brand handmade in her kitchen into a multi-million dollar business sold nationwide and internationally, receiving several prestigious business awards before selling in 2012. Then she stepped back and asked: Why is this so hard? And why does no one talk about the real cost?
That question led to a PhD and a discovery that would reshape her life's work. Her research revealed that the mental health challenges faced by small business owners are structurally different from those of employees. Business owners don't just experience work stress, they experience power imbalances, boundary erosion, and loss of agency in businesses they're supposed to control. They hand their autonomy away to difficult clients, to undercharging, to hustle culture until their businesses control them, not the other way around.
And here's what the research made clear: stress in small business isn't a mindset problem. It's a power problem.
Leanne's work focuses on reversing that dynamic. She teaches business owners and their stakeholders to build what she calls power literacy: the ability to recognise where they've ceded control, reclaim their agency, and make informed choices about how they work, when they work, and who they work with.
This isn't wellness advice. This is structural change.
She doesn't tell business owners to breathe deeper or set better boundaries, she helps them understand the invisible forces shaping their stress, then gives them the tools to redesign their businesses around fairness, dignity, and joy. She works with small business stakeholders too, to help them understand how their role, policies, contracts and relationships make a difference to the productivity and engagement of their small business customers and suppliers.
Today, Leanne works as a small business advisor and keynote speaker. She's consulted with the ATO, Beyond Blue, Everymind, and COSBOA to help them develop support systems for small business owners. She won the COSBOA Small Business Champion award in 2015 for her work in the mental health sector. She's contributed to most of the key mental health resources now available to the small business sector, and has two published research reports on the NSW Government's State Insurance Regulatory Authority (SIRA) website. She's also lectured for the University of Newcastle, teaching small business growth and innovation.
Leanne doesn't just talk about mental health, she reframes it. Her keynotes are transformative, exploring how business owners can harness personal power, regain work control, and lead from a place of clarity and confidence. She's an engaging, authentic speaker who connects with audiences of any size, bringing a fresh way to think about wellbeing at work.
Her understanding of corporate ecosystems and goals means she is able to comfortably bridge the needs of big business with the realities of small business deliverables. Her work as an business consultant enables large organisations and government agencies to optimise their relationships with the small business sector, resulting in a boost in engagement and productivity.
Her philosophy is simple but revolutionary: Power is the new stress-buster. Not ego. Not control-over others. But choice, clarity, and control-of your own work, time, and relationships.
She believes small business should be seen for what it truly is: a human ecosystem where autonomy isn't a luxury, it’s essential. And she's building a movement of business owners and stakeholders who refuse to accept burnout as the cost of success.
Dr Leanne Faulkner holds a PhD in small business owner mental health and has worked with hundreds of business owners, leaders, and organisations across Australia.
She lives in NSW, where she practices what she preaches: running a business designed around power, dignity, and a life she actually enjoys living.
The Billie Goat Soap Story
Many people in the business community might know me as “the soap lady” or the “goat lady”. Our youngest son had suffered from eczema, and in an effort to ease his discomfort I learned how to make goat’s milk soap as a gentle protective skin care alternative.
In 2004, Billie Goat Soap began. It was a humble affair initially and started in my kitchen. By 2010 we had grown to employ 20 people and sold the products in over 2000 outlets around the country, plus several international markets.
Billie Goat Soap was the NSW Business Chamber Business of the Year in 2010, and the Myer Supplier of the Year (general cosmetics) at around the same time. I sold Billie Goat in 2012.
The challenges that came with growing a small business came at a cost to my mental health. Needing support, I was shocked to learn that there was nothing available specifically for me – a small business owner. There were resources available for employees and the general public, but nothing for entrepreneurs and business owners.
Turns out, the gift was never the soap. The gift was the entrepreneurial experience that has now allowed me to help thousands of others who are on their own business journey.
When we work together, we all thrive.
Leanne's work has increasingly been with large organisations and government agencies. She has identified that business partners who understand the realities of small business ownership have a marketplace advantage.
Leanne's research and insights about business ownership help corporates and government to adopt "small business friendly" policies and practices. This is increasingly important due to the shift to flexible project-based work preferences and tight expert talent pools.
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