HOPE Global Forum 2024 The Future of Work Lab curated by WorkingNation

HOPE Global Forum: The Future of Work

WATCH: What does the future of work look like, especially as more employers are using AI in the workplace?
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There is widespread concern among employees – especially lower-income workers – about AI and automation replacing jobs. That concern – whether it is warranted, and potential solutions if it is – were the topics of a special panel at the HOPE Global Forum in December in Atlanta – The Future of Work Ideas Lab.

Joining me onstage to explore the impact of AI on the workforce of today and tomorrow were Chike Aguh, senior advisor to the Project on Workforce at Harvard University; Debbie Dyson, CEO of OneTen; and Rodney Bolden, executive director of Morgan Stanley at Work.

In the panel, we discussed how many employers are still trying to understand how to best implement AI and are unsure the appropriate use cases and guardrails. The outsized risk to lower-income workers and those in low-wage jobs was also top of mind.

Overall, the conversation also emphasized the need for collaboration between employers and workers, especially those from underrepresented communities and the need to help those at the greatest risk of being kept from AI jobs of the future develop the skills they need to leverage AI technologies.

While at HOPE Global Forum, I sat down separately with each panelists to do a deep dive into the topics. You can watch those interviews here, as well as the full The Future of Work Ideas Lab panel discussion.

Chike Aguh: Here’s How Employers Are Implementing AI Today and Tomorrow

Millions of Jobs at Risk? The Truth About AI and Work

Opportunity, equity, and productivity-these are the pillars that will define the future of jobs in an AI-driven world. At the HOPE Global Forum, Chike Aguh, Senior Advisor to the Project on Workforce at Harvard University, joins Ramona Schindelheim, Editor-in-Chief of WorkingNation, for a powerful conversation about how artificial intelligence is transforming work, and what it means for both employers and employees.

Rodney Bolden: Giving Workers a Voice in How AI Is Being Used in the Workplace

How Employers Can Rebuild Trust in the Age of AI

AI, workforce trust, productivity, and employee engagement-these are the urgent themes driving today’s workplace transformation. In this compelling conversation from the HOPE Global Forum, Rodney Bolden, Executive Director at Morgan Stanley at Work, sits down with Ramona Schindelheim, Editor-in-Chief of WorkingNation, to unpack how employers can earn back employee trust in an era shaped by AI, automation, and uncertainty.

Debbie Dyson: Worker Upskilling Is Important Now More Than Ever

What Happens When Employers Focus on Skills, Not Credentials?

Skills-based hiring, jobs, credentialing, economic mobility, and workforce development are at the center of this powerful conversation about the future of work and who gets access to opportunity. At the HOPE Global Forum, Debbie Dyson, CEO of OneTen, joins Ramona Schindelheim, Editor-in-Chief of WorkingNation, to explore how shifting focus from traditional credentials to proven skills can transform the way companies hire and promote talent.

HOPE Global Forum: The Future of Work Ideas Lab

The Future of Work

Automation, artificial intelligence, and robotics are revolutionizing industries and reshaping the future of employment. As machines take on tasks once performed by humans, new roles are emerging that require different skills, such as digital literacy, creativity, and problem-solving.

Learn more about the HOPE Global Forum 2025 and register here.

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.