WIlbur-Ross

President-Elect Donald Trump has selected billionaire investor Wilbur Ross as his choice for Secretary of Commerce.

Ross confirmed his selection Wednesday during a joint interview on CNBC with Trump’s pick for treasury secretary, former Goldman Sachs executive Steve Mnuchin.

Ross has been a front-runner for the position since the two met on Sunday, Nov. 21 and, according to Ross, had a great conversation. Trump told reporters before the meeting that Ross was “what we’re looking for” in a commerce secretary.

“Wilbur Ross is a champion of American manufacturing and knows how to help companies succeed,” Trump said in a statement announcing his choice. “Wilbur knows that cutting taxes for working families, reducing burdensome government regulations and unleashing America’s energy resources will strengthen our economy at a time when our country needs to see significant growth.”

As commerce secretary, Ross would serve as the voice of U.S. business and oversee trade and investment issues.

On paper, Ross is exactly the kind of person that would fit right into what Trump wants to accomplish in the labor and trade arenas. On the campaign trail, Trump vowed to revive the steel and coal industries, two industries Ross made his career helping to restructure while chairman of WL Ross & Co., an investment firm that specializes in corporate restructuring. He was also highly critical of U.S. trade deals, deals Ross has also been outspoken against. Ross is also against government regulation when it comes to investing and business.

As the country’s next commerce secretary he will most likely have to step down from a number of companies by either selling his investments or putting them in blind trust.

It is expected he will reverse a lot of what the current Department of Commerce has accomplished over the past eight years. Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker, who has held the role since 2013, has been an advocate for free trade and clean energy partnerships and the Trans Pacific Partnership deal, two things Trump campaigned hard against.

One area Pritzker and the department was expanding its focus for the first time was in skills and workforce development. Through its “Skills for Business” agenda, the department was fostering a conversation between employers and job creators to define precisely what they are looking for in prospective employees. The department has also been working with educators and trainers to ensure they provide the skills demanded and joined forces with labor and social service organizations to strengthen the safety net for workers. Hopefully, this agenda continues under the Trump administration because it’s a huge step towards filling the skills gap issue in this country and revolutionizing our the education system to help the working class.

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.