Category: WIN Summit

If you want a unique perspective on leadership, ask a quarterback.

For football player turned USD Foundation president and CEO Noah Shepard, life on and off the field has provided valuable insight into leading teams and fostering culture.

Shepard, a Colorado native, first stepped into South Dakota for a recruiting visit at USD, which led to four years as the Coyotes’ quarterback and a first job playing football professionally after graduation in 2010. He briefly joined the Green Bay Packers before playing in the Canadian Football League.

Shepard returned to his alma mater in 2021 as a campaign director for the USD Foundation, before being promoted to vice president of development in 2022 and assuming the role of president and CEO earlier this year.

In between, his career took him to Molson Coors in Colorado, where he helped lead a team during a major beverage industry merger, and to Amazon, where he served in management roles during company growth spurts.

“Along the way I gained different perspectives on business from really smart folks and had great mentors,” he said. “I was fortunate and blessed to have the opportunity to work through these growth periods, but my heart has always been here since I left.”

His wife, Abby, is a South Dakota native and USD graduate, and they were eager to raise their three kids here.

“I’m forever grateful for what USD has done for my wife and myself,” Shepard said. “When they reached out to see if I wanted to come back, I said there really wasn’t anything to negotiate because I wanted to be here.”

Shepard will be one of four panelists sharing perspectives on the topic “Microcultures Matter: Tailoring work environments for employee success” at the seventh annual WIN in Workforce Summit, presented by the Sioux Falls Development Foundation. The popular event will be from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Sept. 24 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center. Click here to learn more and register.

Other panelists include:

• Brooke Fitts, First International Bank & Trust
• Karla Santi, Blend Interactive
• Natasha Smith, Sanford Health

The discussion will explore how strategic development of micro cultures can revolutionize talent attraction, development and retention.

“Culture gets thrown around a lot and means different things in different organizations,” Shepard said. “I’ve experienced companies that did a really good job of defining that and instilling pieces of it in their core values.”

While at one point he was a young leader managing people twice his age, “I think if you instill those principles, those core values, you can really start to make some headway,” he said. “But understanding your audience and how it needs to be delivered in an appropriate fashion to sink in is something you have to be in tune with.”

Successful companies also give leaders creative freedom to build micro-cultures, he said.

Shepard with his team at the USD Foundation.

“As a former athlete, everything for me revolves around winning and how we define if we’re winning,” he said. “You don’t have to win every day, but you have to understand where you’re at in the current state and how we continually grow. If you instill a culture and mindset that focuses on continually getting 1 percent better, you can look back and be extremely proud of what you accomplished.”

He now leads a team of about three dozen people and is putting that philosophy into practice.

“We’re reinvigorating with a new and fresh approach and doing it in a way in which everyone in the organization knows what it takes to win at their levels and how their role plays into the greater good,” he said.

Note: Sessions at the WIN in Workforce Summit are eligible for nine SHRM and HRCI recertification credits. The Sioux Falls Development Foundation is recognized by SHRM to offer professional development credits for SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification activities.

If you have questions, email deniseg@siouxfalls.com. Click here to learn more and register.

Here’s a look at the full agenda.

Think about 10, 20 or 50 years ago, and the health care field looked powerfully different.

The ways health care professionals diagnosed and treated patients were more limited, and as medicine has evolved, those working in the field have had to up-skill too.

“Simply considering the evolution of medicine and the resources we use to care for our communities, having a continuous learning and growth mindset is vital in our success,” said Dr. Ron Place, CEO of Avera McKennan, who leads a team of more than 8,200 employees.

“This often means learning to use new tools, techniques or approaches so that we can continue to stay on the cutting edge of care delivery.”

Place will be one of four panelists sharing perspective on the topic at the seventh annual WIN in Workforce Summit, presented by the Sioux Falls Development Foundation. The popular event will be from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Sept. 24 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center. Click here to learn more and register.

Place will be joined by:

• Derek DeGeest, DeGeest Manufacturing.
• Devin McGrew, C&B Operations.
• Anna Jankord, Viaflex.

The panel will take a deep dive into the need to up-skill employees for the future, exploring innovative approaches, personalized learning pathways and fostering a culture of continuous learning.

We sat down with Place for a preview of how his organization is addressing the topic.

How is Avera McKennan specifically addressing reskilling employees? Are you offering additional or ongoing training, or what does that look like in real time?

One item that comes to mind is our virtual communication and virtual care delivery. This requires a significant shift for those used to being physically in the same space as their colleague, care provider or patient. It’s a big shift for some folks to navigate, requiring new skills, but has proven to be very beneficial, particularly in rural areas.

At Avera, our virtual nurses are working in a new care environment, and they’re often “floating” to a variety of care units, rather than a dedicated home unit they may have historically worked in. These nurses are supporting their colleagues at the bedside with really vital tasks like medication verification, documentation and more.

Our transfer center is another area we’re shifting some crucial duties, allowing our referring physicians to devote more time to patient care while our transfer center team is able to serve as the lead communicator and facilitate appropriate transfers between specialties and facilities.

Along with positions requiring specific skills, leaders also need to evolve and enhance their abilities, especially as they are leading a growing organization or find their roles are changing. How are you developing those skills in leaders internally?

Avera has multiple leadership and mission development programs aimed at setting employees and leaders up for future growth and success. Leadership is a skill to be mastered – and giving leaders opportunities in our organization to practice those skills is important. And I think that it’s important for leaders to have their own leadership philosophy, that they write it down so it becomes “real” and they update it as they mature as leaders. We recently held a leadership discussion where I shared leadership lessons in the context of some of my favorite leadership books. Having a full auditorium of leaders show up, ask questions and engage in meaningful dialogue shows just how significant and hungry our leaders are for these opportunities.

How are you partnering with area educational institutions or other trainers to reskill within Avera?

Educational partners are critically important to Avera, and we’re being much more intentional about forming strategic partnerships that develop future workforce. The most recent examples:

• Developed in partnership with Avera Behavioral Health, Southeast Technical College launched a new behavioral and mental health technician associate degree program in the spring of 2024, with scholarship opportunities available. As mental health techs are in high demand in the inpatient setting, this program was very much needed.
• In an effort to support health sciences and future workforce building, Avera gifted its property at 33rd Street and Minnesota Avenue to South Dakota State University to provide them with a permanent home for its Sioux Falls-based programs in nursing and pharmacy.
• Mount Marty University in collaboration with Avera launched a new graduate certificate in endocrinology for nurse practitioners, one of two in the United States and the only one offered in the Midwest. The hope is to enhance access to high-quality diabetes care in rural areas.
• The Avera Academy is a nine-month collaboration between Avera McKennan, Southeast Tech and the Sioux Falls School District. Each year, 24 students interested in the field of health care enter the program from local high schools and visit facilities and departments all across Sioux Falls to see the wide range of career opportunities at Avera. The program has proven to be a great pathway into the field as 96 percent of students who have participated in the program have furthered their education in health care.

Avera McKennan is a large organization with significant resources, but do you have any advice for smaller organizations that also see a need to reskill their teams? Are there some things you do that might be replicable on a smaller scale?

Fostering an environment of leadership development and lifelong learning is something any organization can do if it truly matters to them. But it has to matter as staff quickly figure it out if it’s not really a priority. In addition, finding, reading and discussing leadership books is something that any organization can do. Being open and receptive to feedback is also important – and we can often find opportunities for growth and improvement when we truly listen.

You spoke at last year’s WIN in Workforce Summit. What were your takeaways from that event, and what value did you find in it?

Having recently relocated back to the area, I was surprised at just how big the event was and how hungry the community was for information. From the sheer number, depth and breadth of conversations to the panelists’ expertise and top-notch, plentiful questions, my expectations were wildly exceeded.

Note: Sessions at the WIN in Workforce Summit are eligible for nine SHRM and HRCI recertification credits. The Sioux Falls Development Foundation is recognized by SHRM to offer professional development credits for SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification activities.

If you have questions, email deniseg@siouxfalls.com. Click here to learn more and register.

Here’s a look at the full agenda.

Leaders who bring empathy to their work help create stronger teams.

But how do you go about cultivating empathy and leading with it?

Jennifer Schmidtbauer is passionate about answering that question. With more than 25 years of experience supporting people in publicly traded companies, nonprofits and government organizations, she’s now an owner at Crestcom, a talent development organization that focuses on sustained behavior change using a process that incorporates accountability and ROI measurement.

“It’s a proven approach for helping managers grow their leadership confidence and competency, so I was excited to become a Crestcom business owner in 2023,” she said.

“After many years as a formal leader myself at different professional levels in different types of organizations, I had a strong desire to leverage that experience in helping other leaders grow their management and leadership skills. Through Crestcom, I’m now able to assist companies across South Dakota in elevating team performance for achieving business results.”

Schmidtbauer will be sharing perspectives at the seventh annual WIN in Workforce Summit, presented by the Sioux Falls Development Foundation. The popular event will be from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Sept. 24 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center. Click here to learn more and register.

Schmidtbauer will be joined in her session by Robyn Ewalt, a consultant with Avera Health.

We caught up with Schmidtbauer to learn more about the leadership perspective she’s bringing to the WIN Summit.

The topic of your session is “Empathy-Driven Leadership for High-Performing Teams.” What does empathy-driven leadership actually look like to you?

In business, the job of leadership is to deliver results through your team – teams which are made of people! Empathy-driven leadership is full recognition of this humanity. Our workplaces are much more than simply places of transaction, exchanging wages for labor. Empathy-driven leadership recognizes and prioritizes the various motivators and needs we have as humans – to support and encourage people in achieving company goals. Empathetic leadership is characterized by the quality of relationships. When I see a leader who has high-trust, meaningful connections with colleagues, who expresses genuine concern for others and is responsive to them, I know they are leading with empathy.

Is empathy a skill that can be learned? If so, how do you suggest helping leaders train for it?

Yes! While research has shown the capacity of our cognitive intelligence is difficult to expand upon after age 25, our emotional intelligence has ongoing opportunity for growth! Empathy is a component of EI. It’s aided by self- and social awareness and choosing to manage our behaviors for optimal relationship outcomes. There are several ways to “train” for it, but it begins with recognizing our own emotions, as well as how others might be feeling. You use that knowledge to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and connect meaningfully through listening and nonjudgmental responses. It’s not easy for a lot of us at first, but with practice, it becomes more natural. Empathy asks us to focus our attention on others, resisting the demands of our own ego and impulses.

What are the benefits of empathy-driven leadership for organizations?

We’ve heard the platinum rule is “treat others the way they want to be treated,” and empathetic leadership is about adapting your leadership style to the needs of your team – how you can best support them in the ways they find most motivating. If you go back to “the job” of leadership – achieving results through teams – then the best way to inspire the outcomes you need is to have each person working from a place of personal purpose and fulfillment. When a leader is able to help someone tie their personal success to the company’s success, you have a highly accountable and engaged organization. This is what empathetic leadership can create!

What would you say to leaders who, for whatever reason, see empathy as a potential sign of weakness?

I’d first have a conversation about what empathy is as perhaps it’s being misunderstood. Empathy is not about being “soft” or “not strong,” and it doesn’t neglect the need for accountability. It’s more about acknowledging that people aren’t machines, and if you value productivity, it’s important to set people up for success. Peter Drucker once wrote that it’s much easier to engineer technology than it is to engineer people. Emotions are part of the human software, and we can’t ignore the impact they have on us all day long. If a leader isn’t comfortable with empathy but is willing to learn for their own growth and advancement of their team, there are plenty of great coaches, courses and resources out there to help. The most successful companies are investing in empathetic leadership, and if your organization wants to be competitive, it’s a skill that can’t be ignored.

Formal leadership is a tough job, and it’s a never-ending growth journey. Leaders: Have some empathy for yourself as you navigate your role, and seek out support and perspective from other leaders. WIN will be a great place to do that!

What other “soft skill”-type qualities do you see today’s talent seeking in their leaders?

Many of these qualities are extensions of empathetic leadership. People desire leaders that demonstrate active listening, act on feedback, promote unity and collaboration, acknowledge hard work and who are both personally accountable and able to hold others accountable. All of these attributes require a genuine interest in team members’ lives and challenges at work and understanding their point of view. I see these qualities being in alignment with the work-life balance expectation people have of their employers as well.

Note: Sessions at the WIN in Workforce Summit are eligible for nine SHRM and HRCI recertification credits. The Sioux Falls Development Foundation is recognized by SHRM to offer professional development credits for SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification activities.

If you have questions, email deniseg@siouxfalls.com. Click here to learn more and register.

Here’s a look at the full agenda:

Among the many lessons Ben Utecht took away from his NFL career, this one has formed his future:

“If you build better men, you get better football players.”

Utecht learned and lived that mantra thanks to his Indianapolis Colts Hall of Fame coach Tony Dungy, “the first to win a Super Bowl based on servant leadership,” he said.

“He was probably the most authentic and consistent leader I’ve ever been around. What you see is what you get. People want to be led by him because they can trust that his moral and ethical and corporate self is consistent and scalable.”

Utecht now leverages those and other life experiences in his role as chief culture officer at True North Equity Partners, based in his home state of Minnesota but with multiple business interests in the Sioux Falls area. Its portfolio spans 28 companies across five industries and includes ownership of the Sioux Falls Canaries.

“I always joke in keynotes that in my last career, my job was to hit people first, and now my job is to care about people first,” he said.

“In a company as leaders, you realize you have the opportunity to transform every single person that walks through the door in a way such that they go home a better person. How inspiring is that? If we put the time and intentionality into our culture, not only can we increase revenue but we can improve our people, and they might become better partners and parents and friends because of their work experience.”

He’ll share that message with attendees at the seventh annual WIN in Workforce Summit, presented by the Sioux Falls Development Foundation. The popular event will be from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Sept. 24 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center. Click here to learn more and register.

“We’re thrilled to welcome Ben Utecht as this year’s keynote speaker,” said Denise Guzzetta, vice president of talent and workforce development. “His message empowers organizations to design, deploy and direct culture strategies that not only boost the bottom line but also inspire and uplift employees.”

WIN in Workforce itself is an all-day opportunity “to share best practices in talent and workforce development, network with experts and gain valuable insights that will help you and your business excel,” she added.

Breakout sessions will be structured around talent attraction, retention and current issues contributing to the workforce development field:

• Engage and hear from leaders transforming our region and workforce landscapes.
• Find out how technology is transforming the way and how people work.
• Learn the new playbook for employee retention in the global and diverse workplace.
• Hear from CEOs and seasoned business leaders about where and how they are investing in the workforce to develop and strengthen their organizations.

Beyond the business world, Utecht’s philanthropic focus lies in concussion awareness — a cause close to his heart because of a career-ending brain injury. His journey, chronicled in his book, “Counting the Days While My Mind Slips Away,” sheds light on memory, relevance and resilience.

As an award-nominated singer, his talents extend beyond business — performing for presidents to serenading Muhammad Ali.

At WIN in Workforce, he describes his message as “The Champion’s Creed,” a creed being a set of beliefs that guide behaviors and actions.

“The mission is how to build high-performing, championship culture within your organization built on the practice of an objective value and belief system,” he explained. “My goal is not just to be an inspirational speaker but to help businesses understand culture more objectively and, more importantly, how to practice culture and develop their people to help achieve their business goals.”

Attendees will leave with practical, actionable advice for incorporating culture into hiring, onboarding, training, talent development and employee engagement, he said.

“How are you hiring toward your culture and then developing team members toward the beliefs of the organization and holding them accountable?” he said. “And then as leaders, you also want to be listening and learning from employees because they are going to be honest and tell you what your culture needs are.”

Utecht also will be sharing insight with high school students attending the event as part of the Sioux Falls Development Foundation’s Career Connections program.

“Where I think this is great for high school listeners is that it should inspire emotional intelligence development,” Utecht said. “We’re talking about things in an inspirational way that provides clarity for them to begin thinking about their strategic plan for life. Decisions about college or what to study are connected to their belief system, so my hope is that there’s crossover in how you create culture and strategy in business and how you can apply that individually in your life.”

Note: Sessions at the WIN in Workforce Summit are eligible for nine SHRM and HRCI recertification credits. The Sioux Falls Development Foundation is recognized by SHRM to offer professional development credits for SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification activities.

If you have questions, email deniseg@siouxfalls.com. Click here to learn more and register.

Here’s a look at the full agenda:

In a matter of weeks, Dakota State University President José-Marie Griffiths will speak to U.S. senators about workforce and economic disruption.

But you can hear her thoughts on the topic sooner than that in Sioux Falls.

Griffiths will help lead off the WIN in Workforce Summit on Nov. 1 as part of the panel Talent Talk: Get To Know the People Changing Our Workforce Landscape. The annual event will be held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Sioux Falls Convention Center and will bring together thought leaders such as Griffiths for a look at what the future holds for talent development, attraction and retention.

“Clearly, we’ve got to talk about the role of technology, both the positive and negative, what you should and should not do with it,” said Griffiths, a leading authority on artificial intelligence and cybersecurity.

“It’s important to educate everyone about how these technologies work, and it’s becoming more important as AI is playing a role in so many people’s lives. The whole conversation around it has completely changed in the last six months. Many businesses are using AI without necessarily even realizing they’re using AI, and some are still thinking AI just began when actually it’s been around since the 1950s.”

The landscape is rapidly changing, however, and workforce will be disrupted because of it.

“Certainly within five years, maybe in three. It’s going to move quickly,” Griffiths said. “Everyone is concerned about it replacing jobs and how we’re going to retrain people who lose their jobs to something else. Some of these jobs will be doing very different things, and we’ll be learning how to work with technology rather than away from technology.”

While there will be the need to upskill in areas, Griffiths said the “power skills” – or what you might think of as soft skills – are going to be just as critical in facing the future.

“Your ability to communicate and adapt and work well and learn while doing, ask questions and be curious will be key,” she said. “It’s not about looking at your job as something with finality but looking at it as something with context and being open to working with different technology and systems and approaches. We’re all doing it right now. We’re just going to have to become a little more comfortable with change.”

For her own workforce needs at Dakota State, Griffiths said she has found success by casting out her recruitment efforts beyond her traditional geography.

“We’re targeting areas with people who have the qualifications we need and going beyond our normal range of locations,” she said. “Most recently, five of six people we brought in for interviews are from areas we wouldn’t have touched before. And additionally, we’re working closely with the Governor’s Office of Economic Development and sending people to trade shows related to cybersecurity, so we have a presence together and can both talk about the benefits of locating in South Dakota.”

She also has a message for business leaders looking to hire DSU graduates: Get engaged early and often.

“We have career fairs, but we also have employers regularly visiting campus. They might visit a couple classes and talk about the interesting things they do or host a pizza reception for students to meet them and chat,” she said. “It’s not enough to pitch them a job. We have to pitch them a career. We have to talk about the opportunities available to advance and the pathways that exist to do interesting things.”

It’s the kind of insight attendees can expect all day at the WIN Summit, said Denise Guzzetta, vice president of talent and workforce development for the Sioux Falls Development Foundation.

“Dr. Griffiths is the perfect example of the thought leadership and actionable advice you’ll take with you at this event,” she said. “Even in the last year, the conversation around AI has completely evolved, and it’s critical to tap into what forward-thinking leaders are doing today to get ready for tomorrow.”

About the WIN in Workforce Summit

Sessions at the WIN in Workforce Summit are eligible for nine SHRM and HRCI recertification credits. The Sioux Falls Development Foundation is recognized by SHRM to offer professional development credits for SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification activities.

Space is limited for this transformative event, so register soon here to reserve your seat.

Olympic figure skater and author Nancy Kerrigan knows what it takes to achieve big goals and career growth.

She’ll bring that message to Sioux Falls for the WIN in Workforce Summit, produced by the Sioux Falls Development Foundation, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Nov. 1 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center.

Kerrigan’s keynote address, “Stronger Than You Think You Are,” will inspire and challenge the crowd to tackle talent attraction, retention and development with a fresh perspective.

We caught up with her for a preview of what you can expect.

What’s the core message you plan to deliver at the WIN in Workforce Summit?

Preparation and perseverance allow you to keep pressure in perspective and deliver maximum performance.

As you travel the country speaking, what are some of the needs you see businesses facing in terms of talent attraction, development and retention? What are some things leaders can do to address that?

The most important thing in creating an environment that allows for preparation and performance is a strong support system. Putting people in place to provide the tools necessary for success and showing how that works in reality is critical. Have a good team around you and trust them.

Many in the workforce today and tomorrow will find they must continually upskill to evolve their career. You also have evolved your career multiple times and likely continue to look at new avenues. What are some strategies you’ve found to be successful in positioning your own career for the future that might be helpful to others?

Letting go of the past and having curiosity. While I will always be “the skater” to the rest of the world, for me, I have to evolve to keep growing. So putting the past in perspective and being curious about new things is very helpful.

In addition to your professional life, you’re a mother of three children navigating their middle school, high school and post-college lives. What are some generational characteristics you’re noticing in them related to education and career, and how have you been guiding them?

All the technology that they have access to means they interact with people in a different way than past generations. But face-to-face communication is still critical in my opinion. So I try to counsel them in the area of interpersonal skills, which I still think is the most important thing we can learn because we still have to live with each other.

Your career will be remembered for many reasons but certainly for your resilience – a critical element for success in the workplace today. What advice would you give to those looking to address their own resilience or lead others toward stronger resiliency?

When you fall down, which we all do, get back up. I have been told that an elite skater falls 40,000 times in their career, which means they also get up 40,000 times! We are all stronger than we think we are, so if you prepare well, you can handle just about anything.

About the WIN in Workforce Summit

Sessions at the WIN in Workforce Summit are eligible for nine SHRM and HRCI recertification credits. The Sioux Falls Development Foundation is recognized by SHRM to offer professional development credits for SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification activities.

Space is limited for this transformative event, so register soon here to reserve your seat.

Despite a workforce of more than 20,000, every team at Avera Health essentially comes together in the same way every day.

It’s called Daily Line-Up, a daily huddle with a central topic, a question to get people talking and a daily prayer to provide a moment of fellowship.

“It’s a chance to come together, communicate and be reminded of our shared mission,” said Julie Lautt, interim CEO and chief financial officer. “But even traditions like these are being reimagined by hybrid departments as they look for new ways to engage both remote and in-office employees in these conversations.”

The simple practice – and how it’s evolving – captures the spirit of workforce development today. It’s a blend of lifting up best practices while acknowledging even they often must evolve with the workplace’s changing landscape.

“Health care can be very hard work,” said Dr. Ron Place, who became CEO of Avera McKennan Hospital & University Health Center earlier this year. “We saw during COVID, locally and nationally, some people with long-term careers in health care chose to leave the profession. We need to think innovatively to support our workforce and harness technology to extend our workforce, especially in rural areas.”

Both Lautt and Place will share some of Avera’s strategies at the upcoming WIN in Workforce Summit, produced by the Sioux Falls Development Foundation. The event will be from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Nov. 1 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center, featuring speakers from a range of industries.

For Avera, those strategies are a long list that starts with the system’s mission.

“We hope to show just how important it is to fully walk the walk when it comes to our people being the vital piece of our organization they truly are, as well as how we strive to live and breathe our mission every day,” Place said.

Other approaches Avera plans to share include:

• The streamlining of HR processes, from simplified interview scheduling to reducing barriers for job applicants.
• Working with education partners on creative ways to fill critical needs.
• The creation of an internal staffing organization aimed at filling jobs and improving retention, with opportunities to place both temporary workers and traveling nurses.

Avera leadership also plans to address communitywide issues impacting workforce, including affordable housing, transportation and building bridges for new American, immigrant and refugee populations to access career opportunities.

“I see that new doors are opening all the time in working with our diverse populations, but that’s an area of challenge,” Place said. “At Avera, we want to be the employer of choice for diverse populations.”

At the WIN Summit, Lautt will be part of the opening session titled Talent Talk: Meet the People Changing Our Workforce Landscape.

“Leading in health care takes innovative thinking. Avera also has a unique approach because of our dedication to rural health and workforce,” she said. “We had the foresight to raise our minimum wage to $17 per hour and to improve benefits, despite national health systems shifting in the other direction. We could see this people-centered industry needed a workforce investment, and it’s that kind of thinking that has made Avera a leader for over a century.”

It also has helped with retention. Avera has more than 1,300 employees who have been part of the organization for at least 25 years, and many spend entire careers there.

“We will have critical workforce areas we are focusing on for the future,” Lautt said, adding some of the strategies being brought forward include streamlining the hiring process and partnering with university and technical schools to ensure students choose and understand areas of opportunity.

“Leaders will need to focus both on culture-building of people in the office with them and for remote employees,” she added. “This will take fresh ideas and a continual focus to keep remote employees engaged with a mission that will need to stretch beyond our facilities.”

Place will be part of a panel called New Leaders, New Rules, New Culture that will allow him to share the leadership philosophy he brought to Avera McKennan.

“I challenge my leaders to build, sustain and know their high performers and foster individual development,” he said. “It’s important to empower employees to encourage creativity. Strong leaders give credit for success, yet they take on responsibility and ensure accountability for failure.”

They also underpromise and overdeliver, he added.

“Outcomes matter. While our intentions are important, it is our actions that are critical,” Place said. “I encourage my leaders to challenge assumptions. Things don’t have to be the way they’ve always been, and, in fact, it’s impossible to keep everything the same and continue to experience success and sustainability. It’s why standardization and innovation are both key.”

About the WIN in Workforce Summit

Sessions at the WIN in Workforce Summit are eligible for nine SHRM and HRCI recertification credits. The Sioux Falls Development Foundation is recognized by SHRM to offer professional development credits for SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification activities.

Space is limited for this transformative event, so register soon here to reserve your seat.

Here’s something Mayor Paul TenHaken thinks doesn’t gets talked about enough:

“It’s the fact that we’ve had a record number of people move here in the last two to three years, and we also are met with record low unemployment, and those two things don’t jive,” TenHaken said.

“Why is that?”

That’s among the many big questions leaders will ask and begin to help answer at the upcoming annual WIN in Workforce Summit, produced by the Sioux Falls Development Foundation.

The event will be from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Nov. 1 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center and will bring together thought leaders such as TenHaken to address the state of workforce development today and tomorrow.

He will help lead off the day on the panel Talent Talk: Get To Know the People Changing Our Workforce Landscape.

“It’s great that we have so many jobs available, and Sioux Falls is a great place to live and work, but we have a lot of employers struggling as a result of that. Anything we can do to shine a light I want to do it, and that includes summits like this.”

Employers should remember that many people in the record number who moved to Sioux Falls in recent years are still working for employers not based here.

“It’s created a new step that needs to happen with workforce,” TenHaken said. “It’s not just getting people to move here for a job or getting people to move here and then hopefully they work here. We have remote employees here who could become employees for Sioux Falls businesses if they took an intentional approach to connecting with them.”

But first, “we also have to realize we’re losing people to jobs all over the country that are still in Sioux Falls,” he continued.

“They’re using the trail system, they’re living here and enjoying the quality of life but working for a company out of Denver or Austin or Nashville, and that’s very much a thing. I think we can put our heads in the sand and ignore it or realize we have to look at ways to attract people who want to come live here but not necessarily work here. The end goal is let’s get them to live here, to keep working for their employer and eventually they want to switch jobs, and they’re in our market and have a good chance of filling a local job.”

TenHaken also sees workforce issues from the perspective of an employer.

“The city is absolutely not immune from this discussion, so when people ask us about what we’re doing in government to help with workforce, it’s very personal because we have the same challenge the private sector is having,” he said.

“We’ve tried to keep pace with the private sector in terms of compensation but also offer things like time off to volunteer and help get our employees active in the community.”

The city also has invested in office environments and equipment that make it more appealing for employees to be in the workplace and is beginning a marketing campaign next year to highlight itself as an employer of choice.

“We need to do a better job of telling our story and what it means to be a public servant,” TenHaken said. “We want to deepen even more what it means to be a public servant in Sioux Falls.”

The city offers some work-from-home options “when it makes sense,” he added. “It is a tool in our toolbox we can use in the right situations, but there’s also just a culture of being accommodating and flexible if you have to come in at 8:30 a.m. because you can’t drop your kid off until then.”

Despite the workforce challenges, “I’d much rather be in our situation than other communities,” TenHaken continued. “We’ve made the right investments in everything from quality-of-life assets to our police force and the right infrastructure. So if people give Sioux Falls a look, they’re hooked for the most part. People fall in love with this community once they’re here and even more once they’ve left and realize what they’ve left. So one of our biggest focuses is how do we continue to make this a very attractive and viable community.”

About the WIN in Workforce Summit

Sessions at the WIN in Workforce Summit are eligible for nine SHRM and HRCI recertification credits. The Sioux Falls Development Foundation is recognized by SHRM to offer professional development credits for SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification activities.

Space is limited for this transformative event, so register soon here to reserve your seat.

When it comes to “the future of work,” you might say Steven Tims lives the topic daily.

“We’re rapidly changing to a more technically focused workforce,” said Tims, the chief operating officer of Viaflex, a Sioux Falls-based leading manufacturer of innovative polymer film and sheeting solutions for agricultural, construction, energy, geomembrane, industrial, telecom and installation services.

“We have a lot of industrial manufacturing shifting to automation, which leads to new jobs for automation technicians, engineers and in business intelligence. We’ve focused a lot on modernizing our business, and we’re starting to recruit talent to support it.”

Tims will share his experience on a panel called, appropriately, “The Future of Work” at the upcoming WIN in Workforce Summit produced by the Sioux Falls Development Foundation.

The event will be from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Nov. 1 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center and bring together cutting-edge leaders such as Tims to share actionable insight around addressing workforce opportunities and challenges.

“I’m planning to talk a lot about ChatGPT,” Tims said. “We’ve embraced it fully. We’ve educated our team about where and how to use it. I use it daily, and we now have a council around AI at Viaflex that we’re beginning to use to ensure we’re taking full advantage of the technology available.”

Viaflex also has started to use virtual reality in employee training, leveraging that technology to save thousands in training and de-risk at the same time.

“You can virtually start up a machine very safely and simulate things,” he explained. “We can even use it to do a virtual plant tour, which is a great thing to have at a recruitment booth.”

With 450 employees and six locations across the U.S., the business that began as part of the former Raven Industries still has “a lot of startup energy,” Tims added. “We’re just trying to break through, and it takes awhile to change culture.”

He plans to discuss that at the WIN in Workforce Summit too.

After trying traditional advertising for job openings, Viaflex doubled down on referrals – tripling its referral bonus for employees, “and it’s going really well,” he said. “It’s really where our best talent is coming from.”

The company isn’t shy about its drive to recruit and retrain top talent either.

“We don’t do reductions in force; we do performance management,” Tims said.

“We do ‘A’ player salaries, but you have to perform, and we don’t care if we’re known as a company where every year the bottom 10 percent drop. We want it to be hard to get in here. We do great things for our team, we’re kindhearted people, but by dealing with people who aren’t pulling their weight, everybody else’s game goes up a little bit. So it’s this great recipe for success.”

Viaflex is a perfect example of the sort of business sharing its experience at the WIN Summit, said Denise Guzzetta, vice president of talent and workforce development at the Sioux Falls Development Foundation.

“This company truly blends a focus on people with a commitment to leveraging technology, and that’s why they’ve seen impressive growth and will continue to do so,” she said. “When you come to the WIN Summit, you’re going to experience an entire day of hearing from leaders like Steven who will challenge you to think differently, invest in new ways and see workforce gains follow.”

About the WIN in Workforce Summit

Sessions at the WIN in Workforce Summit are eligible for nine SHRM and HRCI recertification credits. The Sioux Falls Development Foundation is recognized by SHRM to offer professional development credits for SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification activities.

Space is limited for this transformative event, so register soon here to reserve your seat.