Related COA Accreditation standards: Governance (GOV)

The diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) landscape has shifted dramatically, leaving organizations and leaders grappling with uncertainty. Rollbacks, resistance, and new federal mandates have challenged traditional approaches, creating a sense of urgency to redefine how inclusion and equity manifest in the workplace. Despite the challenges, one thing remains clear—fostering trust, collaboration, and accountability is critical for thriving workplaces. This workshop is designed for leaders, practitioners, and advocates who are looking to navigate this new era of inclusion with purpose and precision. It will provide a roadmap for moving beyond the limitations of traditional DEI frameworks into Human-Inclusive EQ (HI-EQ), a practical, human-centric approach that aligns inclusion efforts with compliance to create measurable, lasting impact.

Participants will gain actionable insights into:

This session isn’t about abandoning DEI; it’s about evolving it into something purposeful, compliant, and effective. You’ll leave equipped with tools like the Lever Mapping Worksheet and Metrics for Success Guide to immediately apply in your organization, ensuring your efforts drive both cultural and business outcomes.

Through an interactive format, we’ll explore how to navigate resistance, foster alignment across differing perspectives, and create inclusion strategies that work for everyone. Participants will also engage in hands-on exercises to personalize the concepts ensure they leave with a clear action plan tailored to their unique challenges.

As leaders and decision-makers, participants will leave with:

This workshop will empower participants to lead the next evolution of inclusion work, ensuring their organizations remain resilient, effective, and aligned with the broader goal of social impact. Whether you’re a seasoned DEI leader or new to navigating inclusion challenges, this session will offer fresh perspectives and actionable solutions for charting the path forward.

Join us to explore how inclusion can thrive in a post-DEI world where purpose, compliance, and meaningful action converge. Together, we’ll define what purposeful work looks like and build a future where everyone belongs.

Learning Objectives

Presenters

Kelly Blackmon
Founder/Consultant
B.E. Consulting

Related COA Accreditation standards:

Electronic health records systems (EHRs) are the essential systems/tools for health and human services organizations seeking to ensure regulatory compliance, improve operational efficiencies, and transform into fully data-driven organizations. Effective data governance and organizational change management are critical for the long-term success and maintenance of your EHR system. These processes ensure data integrity, streamline system changes, and enhance overall business and health outcomes.

Learning Objectives

Presenters

Tina Kirkpatrick
Senior Director of EHR Strategy and Customer Success
EHR Edge

Theresa Yera
Senior Director of EHR Strategy and Customer Success
EHR Edge

In a world filled with uncertainty and challenges, finding moments of joy can become increasingly challenging. Yet, the research on the importance of joy in our lives is quite clear. Joy is paramount to our collective health and wellness. This thought-provoking and engaging presentation will explore the profound impact of joy on our mental and emotional well-being. Through inspiring anecdotes, research-backed insights, and practical strategies, this presentation will delve into the transformative power of joy in fostering resilience and cultivating hope.

Participants will explore the “science of joy” and how the intentional act of collecting joy can increase our personal resilience, as well as the resilience of those we are working with. Participants will be empowered to embrace joy as a catalyst for resilience, hope, and positive change in their lives and communities, as well as in the lives of individuals they are caring for. Join this session and discover the profound impact of joy in fueling a brighter, more resilient future.

Learning Objectives

Presenter

Christopher McLaughlin
Owner & Lead Consultant
Inspired Consulting Group, LLC

The human services sector is facing an existential crisis, with devastating funding cuts, regulatory uncertainty, and rising operational barriers threatening essential programs. Millions of individuals and families rely on these services, yet recent policy shifts have placed them at risk. This public policy briefing will dig into the most pressing challenges, their real-world impacts, and the urgent actions needed to protect the sector. Join Social Current’s Senior Director of Government Affairs Blair Abelle-Kiser, Ph.D., for a crucial discussion on navigating this turbulent landscape and mobilizing for change.

Learning Objectives

Presenters

Blair Abelle-Kiser
Senior Director of Government Affairs
Social Current

Related COA Accreditation standards: Governance (GOV)

An effective board is a cornerstone of organizational success. By focusing on role clarity, strategic planning, and fostering a collaborative culture, leaders can unlock the full potential of their boards to drive impactful results.

This session will equip participants with the knowledge and tools needed to achieve these goals and elevate their governance practices. This session aims to provide board members, executives, and organizational leaders with actionable learnings and strategies to enhance board effectiveness.

Key themes include:

Role Clarity:

Strategic Direction:

Board Team and Culture:

Effective Meeting Practices:

Committees and Crisis Management:

Learning Objectives

Presenter

Christina Gullo
Owner/Partner
True North Executive Solutions

This session will demonstrate how project management practices, principles, and tools can be adapted to organizations of various sizes, using the case study of Devereux’s successful project management office. A well-structured project management function can streamline processes, improve project delivery, and ensure that projects align with the organization’s strategic goals. Whether you have many or few resources at your disposal, scalable project management techniques can help you put your strategy into action.

Learning Objectives

• How to translate strategies into tactical success using project management, no matter the organization’s size or resource availability
• Train and develop new project managers who are skilled in the art and the science of managing projects
• Develop and refine traditional and agile project management approaches to support an organization-wide project management function
• Consider how the project management office will strategically fit within the organization and act as a thought partner to senior leadership

Presenters

Sarah Boone
National Project Manager
Devereux Advanced Behavioral Health

Creating a trauma-informed, healing-oriented organization is a complex process that requires more than just understanding trauma. Organizations must go beyond that and foster a culture of healing that enables communities to flourish. To create transformative, trauma-informed, and healing-oriented environments, organizations must not only train their workforce but also embed it into the culture, practices, and external partnerships. This is a challenging task, especially in the face of changes in the social sector, the aftermath of the pandemic, and the growing pressures on the workforce.

Successful organizations understand the importance of connecting trauma-informed transformation to equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives. They foster values and competencies that empower leadership at all levels and facilitate the healing process within the communities they serve. Rather than settling for a trauma-informed culture, they strive to make healing the core of their trauma-informed culture within the organization.

Creating a healing-oriented culture has many benefits, such as increased employee satisfaction, improved client outcomes, and better community engagement. However, organizations might face challenges when trying to create such a culture, such as resistance to change, lack of resources, or difficulty measuring progress.

Empowering your staff to take the lead in driving and maintaining the trauma-informed movement and ensuring its long-term viability is crucial. We will share our experience of implementing and sustaining this change for over five years, and provide you with the best practices we learned for keeping this transformation alive and dynamic. Our experience has shown that it is essential to connect trauma-informed transformation to equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives to create a healing-oriented culture.

Learning Objectives

Presenters

Corina Casco
Chief Program Officer
Children’s Bureau

In this intimate, informal workshop, panelists will work to initiate reflection and conversation among participants on how to create meaningful change in their organizations and communities. This session will focus on strategies for getting this work started, building champions and meaningful strategic partnerships, sustaining momentum, and navigating barriers given the current political landscape.

This will be a safe, welcoming space geared at those at the beginning of their EDI journey. Presenters and participants will work together to identify helpful resources, clear action steps, and networks to support forward progress.

Learning Objectives

Attendees will learn:

Panelists

Kelly Blackmon
Founder
B.E. Consulting

Lucia Garcia
Business Development Manager
Hillsides

Michelle Naples
Chief Integration Officer
Lutheran Social Services of WI and Upper MI

Sarah Hollstrom
Special Projects and Volunteer Manager
Family Forward

Facilitator

Emily Merritt
Senior Manager of Corporate Partnerships
Social Current

Do family support strategies make a difference? This workshop will begin with an update on Family Resource Centers (FRC) located across the U.S. and then highlight a wide range of FRC outcome and cost-benefit findings. Presenters will share the results of a new meta-analysis study that examined the impact of FRCs across key child welfare outcomes, including the rates of accepted child protective services referrals, substantiated child protective services referrals, and child placements in out-of-home care. After reviewing what we know about the cost-benefit of FRCs, presenters will close with information about the most promising funding streams to consider to pay for FRCs.

Learning Objectives

Presenters

Peter Pecora
Managing Director of Research Services
Casey Family Programs

Brenda McChesney
Co-Founder & Associate Director
National Family Support Network

Janica Lockhart
Chief Impact Officer
AKIN Family Services

Congreso de Latinos Unidos, a multi-service organization in Philadelphia, is using human-centered design (HCD) to engage funders and policymakers in the service design process—reimagining human services for its largely Latino population. Specializing in “last mile innovation,” Congreso uses its homegrown design toolkit to empower staff at the end-user client level to redesign their programs to generate data-rich insights leading to:

Congreso’s incorporation of design has created a powerful “feedback loop” between policymakers, funders and Congreso’s clients, ensuring the design of services is equitable and human centered. In taking ownership of the full feedback circuit, Congreso has positioned itself as a key link between policymakers and the end-user experience, ensuring future policies, funding, and service contracts account for the nuanced needs of its target population and greatly enhancing the impact and value that government funding seeks to provide.

As a recipient of multiple government funding streams, Congreso recognizes the disconnect between how services are conceived at the policy level and the actual experience of staff and clients in those programs. Often, services conceived of at the policy level don’t fully account for the nuanced experiences of the end-users, causing attrition, low utilization, and inefficient outcomes. Congreso uses HCD tools to shift this paradigm by bringing the two together, leading to improved client experience and outcomes, increased staff empowerment to influence change and the ability to perform data-driven funder advocacy to influence how policies and RFPs are crafted and implemented. 

This session will cover how Congreso utilizes HCD techniques to understand and improve upon the client experience in its programs, including investigating pain points, inefficiencies, and inequities, and how staff leverage those insights to influence change at the funding/policy level.

This session will cover: 

Learning Objectives

Presenters

Brendan Conlin
Chief Program Officer
Congreso de Latinos Unidos

Jamie Hughes
Vice President of Programmatic Development
Congreso de Latinos Unidos