Tropical Storm Harvey shuts down Houston and its workforce

August 28, 2017

The rains of Tropical Storm Harvey continue to pelt Houston and southeast Texas, as torrential floods have entrapped and shut down a city counting 7 million residents, the fourth-largest metro area in the U.S.

The historic weather event is stretching into a multi-day catastrophe with record flooding. It will take more sleepless hours for its residents and first-responders to endure as the storm meanders slowly through the region. Officials say that nine people have been killed as a result of Harvey and they expect more loss of life. The storm damage estimates are reaching in the tens of billions of dollars and could surpass Hurricane Katrina in 2005 as the costliest storm in U.S. history.

Though economists have an optimistic outlook for Houston’s recovery, an immediate concern must be paid to its workforce. Months could go by before workers see their next paycheck. The Texas Workforce Commission has shut down offices in 54 counties through Tuesday, but it has updated its website with a link for workers to apply for unemployment benefits.

Reuters reports that millions of dollars will go back into the local economy as the city rebuilds, but there is a worry that there may not be enough construction workers, which could prolong the recovery. Texas Gov. Greg Abbot said that it could take years for the region to deal with the storm’s aftermath.

The petrochemical industry, centered in Houston and spread throughout surrounding counties, is expected to rebound quickly. However, 40 percent of small businesses will not survive an event like Harvey, Joint Task Force Katrina Commander Russel Honore told Fox Business on Monday.

Over at Inc., you can read about how local businesses are dealing with the immediate impact of Harvey, as companies are mounting efforts to rescue their own employees.

But as much as Harvey is affecting Houston, attention is now being directed at its impact on Louisiana. ABC News reports that New Orleans, 12 years removed from Katrina, is already experiencing flooding as nine inches of rain have fallen in the state, with more on the way. Gov. John Bel Edwards said Monday that the worst may yet to come for his state as the storm moves north.

The worst may yet to come for the Gulf region, but its people banded together after Katrina as Houston took in many displaced Louisiana residents. Unfortunately, many of these people are reliving the same tragedy. The people of Texas and Louisiana have shown incredible resiliency before and are showing it again.

To find out more on how you can help the victims of Harvey, click here.

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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.