In-person Pass

Nicole is an award-winning social entrepreneur. As a 2018 People’s Liberty Haile Fellow, she founded Ellequate—a leading data-informed employer certification and cohort-based leadership program for workplace equity. For over a decade she developed design and brand strategy for mission-driven organizations around the globe. Before founding her company, she practiced social innovation, applying the principles of human-centered design to complex challenges alongside those most impacted by inequity. Nicole holds a BS in Graphic Design from the University of Cincinnati and an MA from Suffolk University. She is a member of the Cincinnati Business Courier's Forty Under 40 Class of 2020.

Dr. Victoria Mattingly (Dr. V) is CEO of Mattingly Solutions, a woman-owned diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) consulting firm that uses data and science to improve the human experience at work. She is a professional speaker, adjunct professor, DEI practitioner, and co-author of the globally-acclaimed book, Inclusalytics: How DEI Leaders Use Data to Drive their Work. Dr. V helps her clients take a more data-driven approach to their DEI efforts by helping them better measure and track DEI outcomes. She earned her PhD in organizational psychology, specializing in inclusive behaviors and workplace allyship.

Jeffrey leads the Workplace Dignity Program at Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights. The program reimagines how people should be valued and treated at work, and equips organizations and their leaders with strategies and tools that allow all workers to truly thrive, no matter the work they do or where they do it. 

A former employment lawyer, Jeffrey has more recently led global inclusion and diversity teams at leading finance and tech companies (including Morgan Stanley, Apple and Twitter). In those roles he prioritized centering equity and inclusion across people processes, creating more intentionality and engagement around what an inclusive culture should be, establishing relationships across industries and advocacy groups, and thinking differently about how companies show up outside of the workplace.

Based in San Francisco, Jeffrey is a graduate of Duke University and the Emory University School of Law.

Malcom Glenn is a speaker, writer, and equity advocate. He’s the Founder of MG Equity Consulting, an advisory firm that helps organizations embed equity in everything they do, inside and out. He’s also a Fellow at New America’s Future of Land and Housing program, and a senior equity advisor to the Health Action Alliance.

Malcom was previously the Head of Global Policy for Accessibility and Underserved Communities at Uber, and before that, an executive communications manager at Google. He’s held various roles managing campaigns related to education reform, marriage equality, workforce inclusion, and more. Learn more about Malcom at www.malcomglenn.com.

Karen Armstrong is Director of Penn State Outreach and Online Education’s Office of Inclusion, Equity & Diversity. She is a clinically trained multicultural, LGBTQA+, disability, and special populations counselor with extensive experience in higher education programming and professional development for faculty, staff, and students. She has experience working with higher education leaders to help implement and expand inclusion, equity, and diversity throughout campus organizational structures, policies, strategic plans, and programs.

Armstrong is a graduate of Hofstra University with a master’s degree in counseling from the University of Bridgeport. Armstrong serves on the editorial board of Cases on Leadership for Equity and Justice in Higher Education (CLEJHE) Journal. 

Tamra Fatemi-Badi is the co-chair of the Penn State Outreach & Online Education Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging Council. She has been involved in diversity and inclusion work for more than thirty years, both personally and professionally. Tamra is also the events coordinator for WPSU, the PBS/NPR station for much of central Pennsylvania and is currently in her final year of an M.Ed program in Curriculum and Instruction with focus on Children's Literature.

Alexander Alonso, PhD, SHRM-SCP is the Society for Human Resource Management's (SHRM's) Chief Data & Insights Officer leading operations for SHRM's Certified Professional and Senior Certified Professional certifications, research functions, and the SHRM Knowledge Advisor service. He is responsible for all research activities, including the development of the SHRM Competency Model and SHRM credentials.

During his career, he has worked with numerous subject matter experts worldwide with the aim of identifying performance standards, developing competency models, designing organizational assessments, and conducting job analyses. He was also responsible for working on contract task orders involving the development of measurement tools for content areas such as job knowledge (like teacher knowledge of instructional processes) and organizational climates (like organizational climate forecasting in military health care).

Dr. Alonso received his doctorate in Industrial-Organizational Psychology from Florida International University in 2003. His works have been recognized for their contribution to real-world issues. They include being recognized by the Society for Industrial Organizational Psychology (Division 14 of the APA; SIOP) with the 2007 M. Scott Myers Award for Applied Research in the Workplace for the development of the federal standard for medical team training, TeamSTEPPS; being awarded a 2009 Presidential Citation for Innovative Practice by the American Psychological Association for supporting the development of competency model for team triage in emergency medicine; and receiving the 2013 SIOP Distinguished Early Career Contributions for Practice Award.

Throughout his career, he has published works in peer-reviewed journals such as Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice, Journal of Applied Psychology, International Journal of Selection and Assessment, People and Strategy, Personality and Individual Differences, Quality and Safety in Health Care, and Human Resources Management Review. He has also authored several chapters on community-based change initiatives in workforce readiness, as well as co-authoring Defining HR Success: A Guide to the SHRM Competency Model in Practice.

Dr. Alonso also served as a columnist analyzing major trends in the workforce for The Industrial Psychologist and HR Magazine. In addition, he has served on several professional society boards including the SIOP and the Personnel Testing Council of Metropolitan Washington.

Zac is a former college basketball player for Clayton State University, who only played his freshman year due to a tree falling on his car resulting in a spinal cord injury in the summer of 2011. In a moment, Zac went from being a college basketball player to a C6/C7 quadriplegic. This ultimately shifted the trajectory of his life and career. Zac has been a Certified Rehabilitation Counselor (CRC) since 2017 and has extensive knowledge in assisting people with disabilities enter the workforce. Additionally, Zac has been playing wheelchair rugby since 2012 and had the opportunity to compete in The World Games 2022 for the USA Low Point Team.

Zac began his career as an intern at the Georgia Vocational Rehabilitation Agency (GVRA) where he learned how to assist clients in finding employment through the various services available through community providers. While interning at GVRA, Zac also worked for the Shepherd Center part-time as a Peer Liaison, where he assisted inpatients and outpatients adjust to spinal cord injury.

Upon earning his CRC, Zac became a part-time Vocational Specialist at the Shepherd Center, in addition to his Peer Liaison position. In this role, Zac learned the process of returning people to work. Zac transitioned to work for the Georgia Advocacy Office (GAO), the state’s designated protection and advocacy agency for people with disabilities, as an Employment Advocate. At the GAO, he had
robust training in Social Role Valorization and Customized Employment. With this knowledge, he worked to encourage and increase meaningful employment for people with disabilities. He was responsible for monitoring state and private facilities for compliance with federal and state laws, ensuring that people with disabilities had access to competitive-integrated employment.

After the GAO, he worked for Amy Price of the Price Support Network doing customized employment, where he practiced discovery and saw firsthand the beauty of uncovering individuals’ strengths and gifts. Zac earned an Association of Community Rehabilitation Educators credential in Employment Services with an Emphasis on Customized Employment certification in 2021.
Zac now works at Shepherd Center as an ABI-post acute vocational specialist. He has worked across the continuum of brain injury post-acute services: SHARE Military Initiative, the Complex Concussion Clinic, and Shepherd Pathways, returning people to work with the help of an interdisciplinary team.

Of note, from 2019-2022, Zac served on the board of directors for Citizen Advocacy of Atlanta & Dekalb. This experience allowed him to expand his knowledge of Social Role Valorization and dream big for individuals with disabilities. Zac firmly believes that with proper placement and accommodation, we can truly increase employment outcomes for people with disabilities.

Isabelle is Co-founder and COO of retrain.ai, a Responsible AI-powered Talent Intelligence Platform. She has been recognized for her work by Women in AI North America. Prior to retrain.ai, Isabelle was the co-founder & CEO of Tohar, an Israeli placement company that pioneered how to leverage technology to source, screen, and find the best-fit candidates. She holds an LLB from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, an MBA specializing in Taxation from the College of Management in Israel, and a Masters in Risk Management from New York University, where she focused her research on Identifying Risk in DEI & Artificial Intelligence.

Ragan Decker, Ph.D., SHRM-CP, is an Industrial-Organizational Psychologist and Manager of Executive Network and Enterprise Research at SHRM. She designs and conducts strategic research to support SHRM’s mission as it relates to work, workers, and the workplace. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Connecticut and Graduate Certificates in Quantitative Research Methods and Occupational Health Psychology. Her work has been published in HR Quarterly, People + Strategy Journal as well as Occupational Health Science, Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal, and Annals of Work Exposure and Health.