Most leadership development programs and efforts focus on helping leaders DO better. They use a form of development called horizontal development. This has led to 75 percent of organizations rating their leadership development programs as not very effective. The most effective leadership development programs and efforts instead focus on helping leaders BE better. They use a form of development called vertical development. In this workshop, the speaker will help attendees understand what vertical development is, provide a framework to gauge the vertical altitude of their organizations’ leaders, and share vertical development practices that can truly help their leaders to BE better and not just DO better.

In this workshop, you’ll learn how to:

• More effectively evaluate the sophistication of your organization’s leaders.
• Improve the quality of your leadership development programming by adding a focus on vertical development.
• Discover vertical development leadership development practices that you can employ in your organization.

Speaker: Ryan Gottfredson, California State University, Fullerton/Ryan Gottfredson
Topic: Leadership and Employee Development
Date & Time: Tuesday, October 10 at 9 a.m.–12 p.m.

Eighty-four percent of Fortune 500 companies have mentoring programs, but how many are delivering the promised benefits? As companies turn to social learning to boost retention and engagement while building a culture of inclusion, it’s tempting to dust off old programs or copy and paste a program and call it a day. But modern mentoring has come a long way, and it’s clear that one size doesn’t fit all needs. In this interactive workshop, you’ll learn five critical steps for mentoring program development and get hands-on experience designing key elements of a mentoring program in a simulated learning experience. You’ll also gain resources to design your own modern mentoring program.

In this workshop, you’ll learn how to:

• Design your own modern mentoring program aligned with talent development and DEI objectives.
• Redesign your current mentoring program using modern mentoring approaches to boost organizational and participant impact.
• Scale mentoring to your organization using new, modern approaches to mentoring program design and development.

Speaker: Jodi Petersen and Mary Schlegel, MentorStrat
Topic: Coaching and Mentoring
Date & Time: Tuesday, October 10 at 9 a.m.–12 p.m.

As disruption abounds, change fatigue and burnout continue to exact alarming physical and emotional tolls. This interactive workshop will offer proven tips, tools, and strategies for reducing the negative impact of change fatigue upon employee engagement, performance, and overall change success. Apply practical approaches for moving your leaders and teams from burned out to built up!

In this workshop, you’ll learn how to:

• Identify risk factors associated with change fatigue and burnout.
• Discover proven strategies for reducing the negative impact of change fatigue.
• Equip leaders with practical approaches for increasing change readiness.

Speaker: Holly Burkett, hb Consulting | Evaluation Works
Topic: Change Management
Date & Time: Tuesday, October 10 at 1–4 p.m.

Employee wellness is a hot topic, but most organizations are ignoring the one thing that can have the biggest impact on overall wellness—disciplined org design. As businesses deal with continuous disruption, layoffs, and restructurings are at an all-time high. In the wake of these changes, companies are finding that they don’t have the right roles or people in place, and employees have increased scope, unclear priorities, and little support. By instituting a practice of regular org design reviews, organizations can purposely plan for both short-term and long-term needs, create meaningful career paths for employees with appropriately scoped jobs, and foster a performance culture that both delivers business results and helps employees thrive.

In this workshop, you’ll learn how to:

• Communicate the connection between effective org design practices and employee wellness to organization leaders.
• Analyze the current state to determine organizational changes needed to support business needs and employee well-being.
• Create a process for ongoing org design checks to address changes in strategy or needs while maintaining employee well-being.

Speaker: Beth Messich, Beth Messich Coaching and Consulting
Topic: Mental Wellness; Emotional Well-Being in the Workplace
Date & Time: Tuesday, October 10 at 1–4 p.m.

The erosion of workplace trust, engagement, and safety for diverse talents significantly affects engagement, retention, and productivity. In this interactive workshop, we will explore safe space principles and how they contribute to a more productive, innovative, and inclusive workplace. You will engage in a real-life, scenario-based simulation for safe and collaborative problem solving. This simulation creates safe spaces, encouraging you to practice, make mistakes, build confidence, and explore your values in action. Through immersive experiences, you will navigate challenges and decisions, gaining profound insights and practical approaches that you can integrate into learning, working, and meeting environments to ensure that employees are heard, seen, understood, and valued.

In this workshop you'll learn how to:

• Explore the challenges and opportunities employees from diverse backgrounds face as they encounter unsafe spaces.
• Learn practical strategies to create a supportive and empathetic atmosphere for all employees, regardless of their background or identity.
• Create an action plan for integrating safe space principles using appreciative inquiry to support DEI.

Speaker: Tonya Wilson, AFC Consulting Group
Topic: DEI
Date & Time: Tuesday, October 10 at 1–4 p.m.