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Problem-Solving Through Innovation

The community of people with disabilities can offer unique frames of reference that have the potential to redefine how we all collectively engage in work

The community of people with disabilities can offer unique frames of reference that have the potential to redefine how we all collectively engage in work
A look at how people with disabilities are driving innovation in the workforce

The innovations that have led to universally beneficial advancements such as accessible technology, accessible transportation, accessible education, and accessible employment have been driven by employees who have had to work in a world that wasn’t originally designed for them.

When the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) became law in 1990, it expanded disability recruitment and hiring efforts by prohibiting discrimination, but there has been an ongoing attitudinal shift over the subsequent three decades in regards to how we can fully embrace the values of a differently abled workforce.

The community of people with disabilities can offer unique frames of reference that have the potential to redefine how we all collectively engage in work. By viewing workspaces through the lenses of those with different needs, we can be more thoughtful about all employees’ needs – especially as we move to hybrid and remote models.

People with disabilities have long been adapting to a world that wasn’t built for them, and they are often at the forefront of embracing new technologies, and their advocacy for more accessible technologies in turn drives innovation, expands client bases, and helps other underrepresented groups strengthen their own diversity.

If executives and senior management can recognize and incorporate the community’s forward-thinking and problem-solving attitudes, they’ll hold the key to unlocking the future of work.

Disability Awareness is our signature digital series that shines the spotlight on the most innovative initiatives helping to train and re-skill Americans for the most in-demand jobs now and in the future.

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Dana Beth Ardi

Executive Committee

Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.

Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.

Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.

Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.

Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.

Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.