David DeLong

David DeLong’s keynote presentation shows how innovative employers today are accessing new sources of labor among the formerly incarcerated, those with disabilities, immigrants, economically disadvantaged single mothers and unemployed youth. No one pretends that employing marginalized workers is easy. But the payoffs for your business and company culture can be tremendous. This engaging talk provides a framework for practical action to tap these
overlooked talent resources.

David is the author of the forthcoming book: Hidden Talent: Lessons From Training and Employing Marginalized Workers. The book is based on more than 20 new case studies of employers who have committed to hiring, developing and retaining talent that has historically been overlooked. For more information see www.SmartWorkforceStrategies.com.

Businesses face a wide range of impacts from the Covid-19 disruptions. And these changes lead to a lot of false assumptions about the future of your organization. This motivational talk, tailored for each audience, covers five critical success factors for navigating the radical uncertainty facing leaders today. Practical action steps include how to:

• Make the best decisions in the face of soul-crushing uncertainty
• Manage workforce challenges in 3 different phases of the Covid-19 recession
• Solve critical skill shortages that aren’t going away
• Build a more resilient workforce
• Adapt the motivating secrets of leaders who’ve overcome incredible obstacles

Leading an aging and changing workforce in the era of Covid-19 creates more difficult knowledge transfer and retention issues than ever. Baby Boomers are retiring with critical know-how, more new hires are working virtually, and the trusting relationships needed to encourage knowledge-sharing are harder to build. How do you create an organization and culture that sustains knowledge transfer in a world where sharing skills is trumped by safe distancing? What practical tools can Millennials and Gen-Zs use to accelerate their own learning to increase productivity and preserve technical and process knowledge essential for improving performance? This talk, customized for your industry and target audience, provides tools and tactics that can be used immediately to solve the most pressing and vexing knowledge transfer challenges.

Despite the Covid-19 recession, many industries today still struggle with the challenges of recruiting, developing and retaining the skilled workforce needed to sustain and grow operations. This keynote session delivers practical solutions for tackling your audience’s most critical short term and future talent problems. Specific learning outcomes from this program
can include:

• The ability to identify and prioritize specific skills & capabilities at risk that threaten business performance.
• How to apply three new tools that improve recruiting for critical jobs.
• Four specific tactics that will enhance employee retention to reduce the costs of critical knowledge loss.
• Leading edge practices for transferring and retaining essential know-how from retiring Baby Boomers

Is your business hiring and developing workers with the skills to leverage the latest automation and artificial intelligence technologies? We’re now in a race between education and technology. Upskilling and reskilling are profound challenges facing leaders today.

But shaping your future workforce is much harder than it looks. What are the specific decisions and actions you should be taking to build your future talent resources? This program provides frameworks and tactics for defining the capabilities, culture, and processes needed to transition to a more technology-intensive workplace. It provides practical insights to manage the complex changes essential for transforming your business by deploying automation, robots, and artificial intelligence.

You know your organization is facing critical workforce and leadership development challenges. You may even have an idea what the solutions are. But you can’t implement these initiatives successfully unless you know how to apply essential organizational change strategies and practices. This talk provides the latest frameworks and tactics for effectively managing change in the Covid-19 recession to develop and sustain future workforce capabilities.