This year’s conference is all about connecting, engaging, learning and collaborating within one of the most powerful networks in advancement. To kick off the conference, participants will get to know the CASE Strategic Talent Management faculty and meet their “Accountabilibuddy” (Accountability + Buddy) for Day 1 of the conference.

AI, election anxiety, burnout, retention, incompetent managers, the talent war…all the things that keep STM professionals up at night. We will do a lightning round review of hot topics in talent management followed by a small group activity where participants will take turns sharing an opportunity or challenge they are facing in their shop. Using the collective intelligence of the group, participants will receive advice and guidance on how best to proceed along with actionable takeaways.

Join an engaging session designed to turn feedback into a powerful tool for growth, leadership, and connection. Whether you’re managing up to leadership, coaching staff or your own direct reports, or fostering community engagement, feedback can be your secret weapon for building stronger, more effective relationships. Expect a blend of humor, storytelling, and practical tools that will help you empower yourself and others, making feedback an essential part of your leadership toolkit and engagement strategy.

Employee engagement starts from initial outreach through the employee life cycle. How can we expect employees to share investment in us if we don’t show investment in them? From professional development and cultural opportunities to recognition programs that could provide a little extra “cheddar cheese” we’ll explore how engagement can lead to recognition and beyond.

In our roles, we often play the role of “go between” with senior management and staff, and we are asked to serve as leaders, as well as develop leadership skills in others. Conference Chairs Amy Bronson and Alexis Kanda-Olmstead will discuss leadership in Advancement and walk participants through a personal leadership development activity. Participants also will meet their “Accountabilibuddy” (Accountability + Buddy) for Day 2 of the conference.

In FY24, the Vanderbilt Development and Alumni Relations (DAR) team saw an exciting accomplishment: reduced staff turnover by about 50%. This session will take you through the strategies and unique approaches implemented by our Talent Management team to achieve increased employee retention and satisfaction throughout the employment lifecycle, and how you can do it too. During this session, we will dive into the no-cost approaches that we took, as well as how we created the business case and return on investment for the strategies that required increased budget allocation. First, we’ll explore how prioritizing our employee feedback informed the creation of a flexible hybrid working environment, and the benefits we have seen. Then, we will share about the intentional check-ins we include in our onboarding process to support new hires’ experience joining our team. Further, we will highlight our succession planning and internal promotion process that we created to best fit our team and leaders. Finally, we’ll share how we made the business case to invest in an additional full-time employee dedicated to professional development, as well as the creation of a bonus program for all DAR staff, along with the ROI we’ve seen from those investments. Whether you are a talent management team of one or a larger team, we will share practical and data-driven steps you can take to improve retention and employee engagement.

Diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging are more important than ever, yet DEIB faces a tough road ahead with political divisiveness and sweeping legislative change. A panel of talent management colleagues representing emerging and advanced DEIB programs, along with shops that are facing anti-DEIB backlash, will share their work, discuss their experiences, and reflect on the future of DEIB in Advancement.

Our roles in talent management bring a lot of reward – and a lot of challenge! From recruiting staff with a limited salary pool to managing tough employee relations issues, we are constantly asked to problem solve. Bring the most challenging talent management scenarios to this session and the CASE STM faculty will share their perspectives and brainstorm ideas with participants. Participants will have the chance to workshop the scenarios themselves in small groups, too.

Do you find yourself stuck, spinning your wheels, frozen, and with not enough data? Maybe it's time to clear your recruitment cache and browsing history. Join us for an interactive workshop designed to help enhance your recruitment strategies, both internally and externally. We'll explore ways to power up our minds to possibilities of sourcing candidates differently, refreshing our state of thinking, and caring for our candidates.

How often have your staff come to you to tell you about an inappropriate comment, touching, or other more egregious behavior from a donor, board member or volunteer? Or do you simply hear about it second hand because reporting it means losing a prospect or being told that it's "just part of the job"? Please join the presenters to learn about how some shops are taking concrete actions and practices to prevent harassment and discrimination in advancement, fundraising, and related functions and how you can take these approaches back to your own team, including training to empower and protect staff members, as well as transparent reporting and remediation processes. Through gathering research, developing guidelines, and creating concrete actions and practices to address the problem, and sharing our own journeys, we can all help change the industry to create a safe and respectful workplace culture.