WIP-Steve-Preston
Goodwill Industries International logo

When you think of Goodwill Industries, your first thought may be of the ubiquitous stores that sell gently-used clothes and household goods. While that is the very public-facing image of the company, it is not their primary mission.

In their own words, Goodwill works to enhance the dignity and quality of life of individuals and families by strengthening communities, eliminating barriers to opportunity, and helping people in need reach their full potential through learning and the power of work.

A few weeks ago, I had the chance to talk about Goodwill’s many work training programs with their CEO Steve Preston at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation’s national workforce conference Talent Forward 2019.

Preston explains that Goodwill gets involved with helping prepare people for work at many stages of their lives. “Sometimes people come to us in very difficult situations, and we work with them to make them workforce ready to get that first job,” says Preston. “And then we give them opportunities to move sort of through the progression through enhanced services.”

Goodwill CEO Steve Preston delivers keynote at Talent Forward 2019 (Photo: USCCF)

The results are impressive. “(In 2018), 38,000 people got credentials through us. In the first year-and-a-half of the launch of our new digital program, 70,000 people have gotten jobs. We’re overwhelmed by the numbers.”

To hear more about Goodwill training programs and their results, listen in on our conversation on this Work in Progress podcast, available wherever you get your podcasts.

To learn more about the Talent Forward 2019 national conference on workforce development, visit their website.

Episode 113: Steve Preston, CEO, Goodwill Industries Intl.
Host: Ramona Schindelheim, WorkingNation Editor-in-Chief
Producer: Larry Buhl
Executive Producers: Joan Lynch, Melissa Panzer, and Ramona Schindelheim
Music: Composed by Lee Rosevere and licensed under CC by 4.0.

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.