Leadership (Behavioral)

Jennifer Dulski has 20+ years of executive experience including leadership roles at Facebook, Google and Yahoo!, and founder, CEO and president roles at early stage and scaling startups. She is currently CEO and founder of Rising Team, a talent development platform that improves employee engagement and scales talent development with software that equips managers to run deeply connecting, interactive team sessions without an outside facilitator.  

Her lifelong passion is centered around empowering people to reach their full potential. From a very early age she was focused on bringing out the best in others, from her time as a crew coxswain to teaching high school and founding and leading a Breakthrough program to help motivated students be the first in their families to go to college. In addition to her role at Rising Team, she currently teaches management at Stanford Graduate School of Business, serves on the boards of Weight Watchers and Arcadia, and writes about leadership and the future of work as a LinkedIn Influencer. Dulski’s first book, Purposeful, about how each of us can be movement starters, is a Wall Street Journal Bestseller.  

Jennifer Dulski has 20+ years of executive experience including leadership roles at Facebook, Google and Yahoo!, and founder, CEO and president roles at early stage and scaling startups. She is currently CEO and founder of Rising Team, a talent development platform that improves employee engagement and scales talent development with software that equips managers to run deeply connecting, interactive team sessions without an outside facilitator.  

Her lifelong passion is centered around empowering people to reach their full potential. From a very early age she was focused on bringing out the best in others, from her time as a crew coxswain to teaching high school and founding and leading a Breakthrough program to help motivated students be the first in their families to go to college. In addition to her role at Rising Team, she currently teaches management at Stanford Graduate School of Business, serves on the boards of Weight Watchers and Arcadia, and writes about leadership and the future of work as a LinkedIn Influencer. Dulski’s first book, Purposeful, about how each of us can be movement starters, is a Wall Street Journal Bestseller.  

Erica started her career designing and facilitating training for social impact organizations. She quickly realized her calling: arming organizations with the capability needed to evolve. Since joining SHRM four years ago, Erica has held three roles. She began her career at SHRM in Research, then moved onto the founding SHRMLabs team. SHRMLabs explores the intersection of work and technology. Now, Erica oversees the enterprise client experience as the Manager of Solution Architecture.

Erica holds a master’s degree in industrial/Organizational Psychology, with a focus in instructional systems design. She earned her SHRM-SCP and consistently speaks on behalf of SHRM on workplace tech, the future of work, DEIB, and upskilling. Outside of work, you can find Erica tending to her indoor and outdoor garden, and giving her cat, Suki, more attention than she wants.    

Olivia is the Head of Talent & Culture and leads a team focused on design and execution of strategies to attract, retain and develop talent to promote a positive candidate and team member experience and drive the organization’s competitiveness. In addition, Olivia ensures an integrated strategy and approach with other HR and business areas. 

Olivia has a background in Global Talent Management, Learning & Development, IT, Diversity & Inclusion, & Change Management. 

She leads and coaches current teams of Talent Acquisition, Talent Enablement, Team Member Experience, Learning, HR Change Management, & Workforce Planning to ensure superior performance and delivery of the companies talent Ecosystem. 

She is a Mom to Adam and lives with her husband Michael in North West Arkansas and in her spare time loves hosting dinner parties, podcasts, and running. 

George Rivera III serves as the Senior Vice President of Enterprise Solutions at the Society for Human Resource Management.  He is responsible for broadening the awareness of SHRM's mission to enhance workforce development by building and strengthening partnerships with some of the largest enterprise organizations across the globe.  In addition to helping bring to market the top ideas and innovations through outreach, representing all things workplace, workers, and work.     

George is a proven business development thought leader who places a deep emphasis on people, with more than 15 years of experience building and scaling highly productive, results-driven sales organizations.  Prior to joining SHRM George spent over a decade honing his expertise in HCM cloud technology, retirement, insurance, and other employee benefits, as well as HR services and PEO offerings as he led sales efforts of Paychex Inc., a top HR consulting organization.  In addition to business-growth responsibilities, George also led critical cross-functional company initiatives throughout much of the organization including Learning and Development, Marketing and Lead Generation, Finance, and Talent Acquisition, but the most rewarding experience, by far, was his service on the board for the annual United Way Campaign.  

George Rivera III recognizes that strong leaders build strong businesses and strong businesses build strong communities. George is firm believer in focusing on strategic growth for all partners.

When not at work, Rivera serves as Vice President for SHARE International a Non-Profit that aims to support the indigenous peoples of the Amazon in Peru. 

Jean is the founding CEO and President of Virgin Unite, an entrepreneurial foundation that builds leadership collectives, incubates ideas, and re-invents systems for a better world.   

 Over the last 19 years, she has worked with partners to lead the incubation and start-up of several global initiatives, including: The Elders, The B Team, The Carbon War Room (successfully merged with the RMI), The Africa Donor Collective, Ocean Unite (now ORRAA), The Caribbean Climate Smart Accelerator, 100% Human at Work, The Virgin Unite Constellation, and The Branson Centres of Entrepreneurship.  She also played a key partner role in the incubation of many other initiatives such as The Audacious Project.  

As part of her work over the last three decades, Jean has helped corporations put the wellbeing of people and the planet at their core, including working with over 25 Virgin businesses across 15 industries to help embed purpose in all they do.  Jean also served as a Partner in the Virgin Group leading their people strategy.    

Jean spent seventeen years living and working on six continents to start and help lead mobile phone companies in South Africa, Colombia, Bulgaria, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, and the US.  She was the joint CEO of Virgin Mobile in Australia prior to starting Virgin Unite.   

Jean has long explored the overlap of the business and social sectors having worked for the Foundation for National Parks and Wildlife in Australia, and as a VISTA volunteer where she worked with – and learned from - homeless teens in Chicago.   

 Jean holds several advisory board roles, including The Elders, Vintro, Vatican Humanity 2.0, and the Sara Blakely Foundation.  She is on the boards of RMI, The Caribbean Climate Smart Accelerator, Ocean Unite, Unite BVI Foundation, The B Team, Penn State Board of Visitors, Just Capital, and NOVONIX.  She is also honoured to be a B Team leader.    

  She co-founded Plus Wonder to spark more meaningful deep connections and collaborations in the world. She is the author of the new book, Partnering.       

Jean has been on the TED and TEDx stages as a host and speaker and has been the recipient of several awards including the Bernie Glassman Trailblazer Award, FilmAid Philanthropic Leadership Award, Helen Eakin Eisenhower Award, Gerry Susman Sustainability Award, 2021 Beta Gamma Sigma International Honoree Award, ACCR Capital Community Engagement Award, and Penn State Fellows Award.    

Michael Leach currently serves as Special Assistant to the President and was appointed the first-ever Chief Diversity & Inclusion Officer for the White House. Prior to his appointment, Leach served as the Chief People Officer and Head of Diversity & Inclusion on the Biden-Harris Campaign where he led the campaign’s strategic vision, planning, and implementation of HR, staff diversity & inclusion efforts, talent acquisition, and leadership development. Prior to joining the Campaign, Leach worked in Labor Relations and Labor Operations for the National Football League (NFL) Management Council, served in leadership on the NFL Diversity Council, Co-Chaired the NFL Black Engagement Network, and was the Administrative Lead for the NFL Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship Program. Prior to his work at the NFL Headquarters, Leach served as the Assistant to Head Coach for the Chicago Bears. Before joining the Chicago Bears, Leach also worked in media relations for the Miami Dolphins. Originally from Chicago, IL, Leach is a graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and St. Thomas University (Miami, FL) and was recently awarded an Honorary Doctorate Degree (Doctor of Humane Letters) during the summer of 2022.

Lisa set out to build a market where one didn’t exist. She founded Nonprofit HR, the leading talent management firm in the U.S. that works exclusively with the nonprofit sector. Lisa’s goal is to ensure that every Nonprofit HR engagement inspires social sector leaders to strengthen their most important asset: their people. Over the course of her career, Lisa has presented to hundreds of organizations, staff and leadership teams. Today, fueled by the passion of their 100-plus employees and consultants nationwide, Nonprofit HR is helping many of the nation’s most impactful nonprofit organizations get ahead through smart people management strategies.

Thomas Stewart is EVP for Social Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (S-JEDI) at National University. He has over 30 years of K12 and post-secondary experience in education, innovation, and transformation. Before his current position, Dr. Stewart served as President of John F. Kennedy University and Patten University. He has co-founded or led over 20 schools, universities, and non-profit organizations. He has authored numerous publications on school reform, parent involvement, criminal justice reform, and gracefully leading change. Dr. Stewart earned his Ph.D. in Government from Harvard University and a BA in Political Science from the University of the District of Columbia.

From prospect stewardship to strategic alliances and scaling growth, Sidney Abrams’ role sits at the intersection of where organizations are going and the talent capacity needed to get them there. A collaborative thinker and leader with a can-do spirit, Sidney architects solutions for new and existing clients by mobilizing the best and brightest minds with cutting edge people-focused solutions across all Nonprofit HR practices, including Strategy and Advisory, Outsourcing, Search, Total Rewards and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.