WIP Joanna Smith-Ramani

Democratizing access to wealth to improve economic equity across our country

A conversation with Joanna Smith-Ramani, co-executive director, Aspen Institute Financial Security Program
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In this episode of Work in ProgressJoanna Smith-Ramani, co-executive director of the The Aspen Institute Financial Security Program (FSP), and I discuss how we, as a society, can improve financial security and democratize access to wealth to improve economic equity across our country.

Every day, more than 50 million Americans live in or near financial crisis. Financial instability has gone mainstream, threatening our economy and our democracy.

Last month at the Aspen Ideas Festival, I sat down with Smith-Ramani to discuss the FSP’s new report, The New Wealth Agenda: A Blueprint for Building a Future of Inclusive Wealth.

The report offers “a goal that is equal parts ambitious and achievable: by 2050, we must increase by ten-fold the wealth of households of color and those in the bottom half of the wealth distribution in the United States.”

The New Wealth Agenda identifies eight objectives that the organization believes are the most effective path forward for reaching that goal. 

One objective we discuss is supporting young adults on their pathway to a lifelong career, one that could change their financial future forever.

Here is some of what Smith-Ramani tells me.

“In our country, when you are 18-to-25, your job should be to invest in yourself. And that means either traditional college, or it could be a training program, apprenticeship, or vocational school. There are lots of options, right? But the reality is, as a country, we have to say whichever option is yours, we are gonna support you doing that.

“We’re gonna sort of bubble wrap you and insulate you so you have what you need. That could be everything from ensuring that our public benefit system provides the basic needs for students who are studying. It also means making sure there are housing subsidies so they can live stably and know they have a home to go to, to study in and then get to class the next day. The biggest part is that they need non-labor income.”

Also in the conversation, we talk about the other seven objectives, preconditions for building sustainable wealth, proven wealth-building strategies in need of greater scale and refinement, and emerging innovations.

Our conversation was originally recorded for the Aspen Ignites series.

Episode 279: Joanna Smith-Ramani, Co-Executive Director, Aspen Institute Financial Security Program
Host & Executive Producer: Ramona Schindelheim, Editor-in-Chief, WorkingNation
Producer: Larry Buhl
Executive Producers: Joan Lynch and Melissa Panzer
Theme Music: Composed by Lee Rosevere and licensed under CC by 4
Download the transcript for this podcast here.
You can check out all the other podcasts at this link: Work in Progress podcasts

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.