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ELE is a peer-powered community where people leaders don't just reframe challenges — they leave with decisions, next moves, and 30/60/90-day commitments to move real work forward.&nbsp;For 22 years, leaders from Fortune 1000 companies have brought their hardest problems here — and left sharper than they arrived.

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This is where people leaders get sharper — and their teams get smarter.ELE is a peer-powered network of people leaders who accelerate business results through shared intelligence and real-work collaboration. Learn more below about why ELE has been the trusted choice for leaders building high-performing teams for over 20 years.

About ELE

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Bring a real talent challenge. Name what's at stake, what you've tried, and why it matters now.

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Signal what matters most. Your vote shapes what your peers tackle next.

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Find the peer conversation that moves your work forward.The right exchange builds better leaders, closes capability gaps, and cuts through what internal meetings can't.

Figure out if ELE is for you. Straight answers on what ELE is, who it’s built for, and how contributing members actually work together. Still have a question? Contact us.

Get answers about how Executive Learning Exchange (ELE) works — peer-powered leadership development that fixes real work issues, reverses burnout, and accelerates business value. No programs. No vendors. In the flow of work.

Where people leaders share what's working, ask what's hard, and learn from peers navigating the same talent challenges right now. Search before you post. When referencing a resource, paste the key insight directly into your response with a link to the source.

Real conversations from people leaders tackling today's toughest talent challenges -- captured live, ready to apply with your teams when it fits your schedule, and connected to what's happening right now.

Insights on Talent Challenges | Captured Peer Conversations | ELE

Welcome

Pick your path — each plan reflects a different commitment to accelerating business value.

ELE Plans — Find your place.

Want ELE to come to you? Propose a local gathering — the community decides what gets scheduled.

Executive Learning Exchange (ELE)

<div style="font-family: 'Calibri', 'Candara', 'Segoe UI', 'Optima', Arial, sans-serif; color: #333; line-height: 1.6; max-width: 800px; margin: auto; font-size: 1.1rem;">
<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 20px 0; padding: 10px 20px; background-color: #f8f9fa; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"There's no way in today's crazy busy schedule that a series will actually have the right people." — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/people/dirk-tussing" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dirk Tussing</a></blockquote>
The real work the ELE community is moving forward isn't a program refresh — it's a structural shift in how peer intelligence gets built and activated. For years, the community ran on a curated calendar: ELE scheduled, ELE sourced speakers, ELE sent the invites. That model hit a ceiling. What's replacing it is an agile, crowdsourced ecosystem where members surface real challenges, self-organize into focused cohorts, and practice problem-solving together — before they need the answer, not after.
This closing exchange made that shift concrete.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 30px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">Moving the start line</h3>
The community has spent years focused on upskilling topics. The reframe in Milwaukee was sharper: stop waiting for training to begin and move the starting point to the live challenge itself.

<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"Training doesn't end when the class ends. All we're doing is moving the start line." — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/people/dirk-tussing" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dirk Tussing</a></blockquote>
In practice, this means a practitioner brings a client situation — collected through the Action Planning Worksheet — into a Design Charrette or AI Practical Lab. The community works it in real time. The practitioner walks away with a peer-sourced 30/60/90-day action plan, not a summary deck or a Gartner citation.
It's a different model for how expertise moves. The community becomes the R&amp;D engine, not a backdrop for a speaker.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 25px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">Shifting from curated to community-built</h3>
The hardest thing Dirk said in the room wasn't technical. It was this: the curator model he'd run for 20 years had become the bottleneck.
Top-down scheduling couldn't reliably land the right five people in the same virtual room on the same Friday morning. So the new model inverts it. A member with a challenge submits it. The community votes. Once five aligned people opt in, they set the time — not ELE. ELE handles logistics and socialization. The cohort handles the work.
The July through September calendar on the ELE website is intentionally empty. That's not a gap. That's the invitation.
Informal meetups follow the same logic. Two or three people, a conversation starter, a venue (Chicago regulars tend to land at Cooper Hawks). No formal agenda. The community decides what's worth the time.

<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"We get caught up in our day jobs and this requires an extra move." — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/people/jane-shlaes" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Jane Shlaes</a></blockquote>
That extra move — submitting a challenge, adding a meetup, showing up to help someone else's problem — is exactly what builds the ecosystem. It compounds. And it only takes five people to start.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 25px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">Renaming the horizon</h3>
Two conference name changes came out of Milwaukee — and they're worth pausing on.
The Milwaukee Conference becomes the ELE Spring Conference. The Chicago event on October 1st at CNA becomes the Fall Talent Intelligence Conference. As Dirk put it plainly: a lot of people in the room aren't from Milwaukee. Geographic names were limiting how the community understood itself and how it showed up to others.
Talent Intelligence is the frame now. Not a location. Not a season. What the community actually does.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 25px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">From automated workflows to reasoning — a live build</h3>
One of the sharpest moments in the closing exchange wasn't planned. Community member Kimberly surfaced that she'd told Chris Olson in a breakout that her action item was to learn how to build an agent — and suspected she wasn't alone. She was right.
Chris Olson, co-founder of Scout, built a functioning AI agent live in the room in under two minutes: a corporate buzzword translator, constructed from a single prompt, with tools selected automatically by the platform.
But the demo's real signal was the distinction Chris drew between automated workflows and agents:

<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"It moves from giving you information to actually doing work for you." — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/people/chris-olson" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Chris Olson</a></blockquote>
Automated workflows are brittle — chain-linked steps that break when one process changes. Agents have reasoning capability. They recognize when something's broken and find another path. They mimic the user's role and permissions rather than operating with unchecked access. They can be evaluated, versioned, and refined over time.
For people leaders watching AI adoption stall inside their organizations, the practical takeaway was direct: start with one repeatable manual task, build a single agent around it, and let it run. The hard part isn't creating it.

<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"The easy part is creating it, but the hard part is managing it." — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/people/chris-olson" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Chris Olson</a></blockquote>
Scout offers a free tier for experimentation. Chris offered continued support to anyone who wanted to keep building after the session wrapped.


<hr style="border: 0; border-top: 1px solid #eee; margin: 40px 0;" />

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-bottom: 15px;">What to try next</h3>
Three moves you can make on the ELE website right now — no event required:

<ol style="padding-left: 25px; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">
 	<li style="margin-bottom: 15px;">Submit a challenge to the voting board. Go to the ELE website and use the top section of the Action Planning Worksheet format: what's getting stuck at work, and why does it matter now. Once enough aligned members vote in, ELE schedules the cohort. You only need five people and a real problem.</li>
 	<li style="margin-bottom: 15px;">Add a meetup to the summer calendar. July through September is open and community-owned. Name one or two people you'd want to think with, add a conversation starter, and submit it. ELE handles the rest. Informal, no agenda required, often involves a bar tab.</li>
 	<li style="margin-bottom: 15px;">Check and update your ELE portfolio. Every Zoom appearance, question, slide, and contribution is already building a public profile on the ELE site — with highlight reels. If you've been active, the profile exists. Check it, share the URL, and consider adding it to your email signature. It's a personal brand asset most members don't know they already have.</li>
</ol>
<div style="background-color: #f1f4f9; padding: 20px; border-radius: 8px; margin-top: 40px; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">
Bring your work into the room
If this connects to real work you are trying to move forward, bring it into the ELE community. Share the challenge, compare signals with trusted peers, and leave with practical next moves you can use.
Submit My Challenge Now: <a style="color: #0056b3; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://www.ele.llc/faqs/share-top-of-mind-talent-challenges">https://www.ele.llc/faqs/share-top-of-mind-talent-challenges</a>

</div>
</div>

What Moves Forward | ELE's Spring Conference 2026 Closing

future of work

Engagement &amp; Culture

Integrated Talent Management

Strategy

Future of Work

Digital &amp; AI

Leadership

dirk.tussing

chris.olson

Talent Strategy

peer-learning

organizational capability

change capability

business speed

wise2026

design charrettes

peer-powered decisions

Signals to Action Planning

insights-wise-2026

workforce challenges

talent models

speed to confident action

practical execution

real-world impact

leadership commitments

strategic choices

execution engine

implementation in action

Lurie Children's

Marquette University

<div style="font-family: 'Calibri', 'Candara', 'Segoe UI', 'Optima', Arial, sans-serif; color: #333; line-height: 1.6; max-width: 800px; margin: auto; font-size: 1.1rem;">
<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 20px 0; padding: 10px 20px; background-color: #f8f9fa; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"The interesting pattern was that nobody talked about technical skills, technology, or tools." — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/people/deepa-kartha" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Deepa Kartha</a>, Journyz</blockquote>
People leaders at the Milwaukee Talent Development Conference came into this working exchange with a shared pressure most haven't named cleanly yet: how do you anticipate the capabilities your workforce will need before the gap becomes visible — and expensive? The real work wasn't about AI adoption. It was about avoiding the trap of overbuilding formal programs around skills that are still shifting, while quietly missing the quieter signals that prove a team's core capabilities are already falling behind. That tension — move too fast and you waste resources, move too slow and you're exposed — ran through every table in the room.
This was a live, in-person working exchange. No virtual components. All dialogue drawn from the spoken transcript.
Who helped move the work forward
Cecilia Lillegard, Jim Orheim, and Amanda Baker brought this working exchange to life at the Milwaukee Talent Development Conference. Cecilia and Jim co-facilitated the design charrette, keeping the sprint moving while drawing out voices from across the room. Amanda Baker was listed on the agenda and contributed to the collaborative arc of the discussion. The practitioners who filled the tables — people leaders and talent development professionals from across the Milwaukee area — drove the real output: generating, clustering, prioritizing, and stress-testing skill priorities against what they're actually navigating in their organizations today.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 30px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">Catching the weak signals</h3>
The charrette opened with a provocation: imagine it's 2028. Some people are thriving with AI embedded in their daily work. Others are struggling. What's the skill gap between them?
What surfaced wasn't what most expected.
Every table independently prioritized human and cognitive capabilities — adaptability, critical thinking, emotional intelligence, business acumen, coaching. Nobody's top three touched tool proficiency or technical training. That convergence, unrehearsed and uncoordinated, is itself a weak signal worth paying attention to.

<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"These are the human skills that are going to always keep you ahead of AI." — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/people/jim-orheim" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Jim Orheim</a>, Marquette University</blockquote>
The signal isn't that technical skills don't matter. It's that a room of experienced talent leaders, asked to look two to three years out, reached past the obvious answer and landed on something harder to build and easier to neglect. If your current workforce readiness investment is weighted toward tool training, that gap deserves a harder look.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 25px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">Designing just-in-time readiness</h3>
One of the sharpest tensions in the discussion wasn't about what skills to build. It was about when and how.
The room named a real implementation problem: in-the-flow-of-work learning — long considered the gold standard — breaks down when the tool itself slows performance during the learning curve. Workers under delivery pressure can't also be building new AI capabilities on the same clock.

<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"The only way to get better is to block time specifically to improve your AI skills." — Participant</blockquote>
That's not a personal productivity tip. It's an organizational design decision. Protected practice time, separated from delivery pressure, is the structural condition that makes just-in-time readiness actually work. Without it, adoption becomes performance theater — high token use, low quality output, and a workforce that looks like it's moving forward while the underlying capability stays flat.
The pre/post mortem framework surfaced as a lightweight intervention worth testing: before any AI-assisted workflow goes live, force the team to name what could go wrong. After, debrief what worked and what didn't. It's low-cost, builds judgment, and creates the feedback loops that formal training programs rarely do.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 25px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">Balancing risk tradeoffs</h3>
The most honest moment in the room came when a participant named what many talent leaders are quietly sitting with but not saying out loud.

<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"Are we pushing everyone to use AI? Or are we going to be more strategic?" — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/people/nick-allen" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Nick Allen</a>, CNA Insurance.</blockquote>
The context mattered. Nick raised the concern alongside evidence that doctors lose diagnostic accuracy when over-reliant on AI-assisted tools — and that workers who outsource core tasks to AI risk losing the underlying skill entirely. The question wasn't anti-AI. It was a leadership judgment call: which skills require active human practice to stay sharp, and are we protecting space for that practice — or optimizing it away?
The room didn't have a clean answer. But the practitioners who sat with the question longest arrived at a useful frame: not everyone in the organization needs to experiment with AI simultaneously. Structured pilots with deliberate feedback loops produce better capability outcomes than organization-wide rollouts that ask everyone to learn in public, under pressure, without guardrails.
The risk of inertia is real. So is the risk of building a workforce that's technically capable of using AI tools but has lost the judgment to know when not to.


<hr style="border: 0; border-top: 1px solid #eee; margin: 40px 0;" />

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-bottom: 15px;">What to try next</h3>
Three moves people leaders in the room identified as testable quickly — with early evidence signals:

<ol style="padding-left: 25px; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">
 	<li style="margin-bottom: 15px;">Map your capability exposure before you build anything. Pull your top five roles. For each one, ask: what does this person need to be able to do well in 18 months that they can't do today? If the answer is primarily technical, pressure-test that assumption against what surfaced in this room. The weak signal may be somewhere else.</li>
 	<li style="margin-bottom: 15px;">Run a pre-mortem on your next AI workflow decision. Before any new tool, process, or AI-assisted workflow goes live, block 30 minutes with your team to name what could go wrong. Not as a risk log — as a judgment-building practice. It develops the critical thinking and discernment the room identified as non-negotiable for 2028 readiness.</li>
 	<li style="margin-bottom: 15px;">Protect deliberate practice time at the team level. Don't wait for an L&amp;D program. Identify one hour per week — team-wide, not individually opted-in — where people practice AI skills without delivery pressure attached. Track quality of output, not volume of usage. Slop going in produces slop coming out, and that pattern is already more widespread than most organizations are measuring.</li>
</ol>
<div style="background-color: #f1f4f9; padding: 20px; border-radius: 8px; margin-top: 40px; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">
Bring the work forward
If your organization is sitting with any version of this — unsure which capabilities to build now, caught between tool adoption pressure and program overbuilding, or trying to close a readiness gap before it becomes a performance gap — bring it into the ELE community.
Share the challenge, compare signals with trusted peers, and leave with practical next moves you can use.
Submit My Challenge Now: <a style="color: #0056b3; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://www.ele.llc/faqs/share-top-of-mind-talent-challenges">https://www.ele.llc/faqs/share-top-of-mind-talent-challenges</a>

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Design Charrette | Anticipating Skills Shift

nick.allen

learning design

talent development

critical thinking

workforce readiness

amanda.herche

adaptability

jim.orheim

AI Adoption

deepa.kartha

cecilia.lillegard

capability gap

manager enablement

People Leaders

Skills Anticipation

Human Skills

Judgment at Work

Deliberate Practice

Pre-Mortem

<div style="font-family: 'Calibri', 'Candara', 'Segoe UI', 'Optima', Arial, sans-serif; color: #333; line-height: 1.6; max-width: 800px; margin: auto; font-size: 1.1rem;">
<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 20px 0; padding: 10px 20px; background-color: #f8f9fa; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"If the capability sits outside the work, it will always arrive too late."</blockquote>
The real work on the table: People leaders are being asked to do something most talent models weren't built for: support execution while the work is moving, not after it stabilizes. The stuck point is structural — learning gets designed beside the work, then delivered too late to change what actually happens. With AI compressing decision cycles and roles becoming less bounded by the day, the gap between when capability is built and when it's needed has become a real business risk.
Who was in the room: The day brought together people leaders, L&amp;D practitioners, HR business partners, and executive education faculty at Marquette University on May 21 — practitioners carrying live business challenges across industries, alongside community members who have been building peer intelligence together since ELE's earliest days.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 30px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">The old model assumed a world that no longer exists</h3>
<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"Who here wears one hat in their job? Anybody? Nobody does."</blockquote>
Stable roles. Periodic planning. Learning separated from work. Managers translating strategy after the fact. That cadence made sense when change was slower than the operating model. It doesn't hold anymore.
The room confirmed what most people leaders already know but haven't fully designed around: work is cross-functional, fast, and less bounded than any org chart suggests. The talent systems built for the old world keep producing capability that arrives after the moment has passed. The signal isn't that programs are bad. It's that placement is the problem. Confidence, capability, and clarity have to be built where decisions actually happen — not in a separate track that runs alongside the work.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 25px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">The accountability shift is already here</h3>
<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"Talent leaders are asked to support execution, not just learning. Make it real."</blockquote>
This reframe landed early and stayed in the room all day. The ask from business leaders isn't "build us a course." It's "help us move." That requires a different entry point — and a different first question.
The old first question: What topic should we cover? The new first question: What's getting stuck in the work, and why?
ELE's Signals-to-Action Planning Worksheet — introduced in the opening and used throughout the day's working exchanges — operationalizes that shift. It starts not with a learning objective but with a business gap: what's happening now, what should be happening, and what's in the way. From there, the conversation moves to shared signals, strategic choices, risks and tradeoffs, and 30/60/90-day leadership commitments. That's a different conversation than most L&amp;D teams are used to opening. It's also a more useful one.

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-top: 25px; margin-bottom: 10px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; padding-bottom: 5px;">Doing nothing is a risk decision too</h3>
<blockquote style="border-left: 4px solid #990000; margin: 15px 0; padding: 5px 20px; font-style: italic; color: #555; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">"Most of the time the highest risk is to do nothing."</blockquote>
One of the cleaner reframes from the day: inaction isn't neutral. Organizations pausing on capability-building while AI accelerates the pace of work aren't playing it safe — they're absorbing risk quietly.
The three questions framing the day put this in practical terms. Are leaders able to act without waiting for perfect certainty — confidence? Can people do the work better inside the flow of decisions and tools — capability? Do teams know what matters, where judgment is needed, and how to move with focus — clarity? When the answer to all three is "not yet," the instinct is often to wait. The community signal was clear: waiting has a cost that compounds.
The AI adoption arc playing out inside most organizations right now reinforces this. A community poll shared during the opening found that almost everyone now sees more career opportunity in AI disruption than they did a year ago. That shift in sentiment is real — but sentiment alone doesn't close the capability gap. Action does.


<hr style="border: 0; border-top: 1px solid #eee; margin: 40px 0;" />

<h3 style="font-family: 'Montserrat', sans-serif; font-weight: bold; color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 1.3rem; margin-bottom: 15px;">What to try next</h3>
<ol style="padding-left: 25px; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">
 	<li style="margin-bottom: 15px;">Replace "what topic?" with "what's stuck?" Before scheduling any program or working exchange, surface the actual business issue first. If you can't name what's getting stuck and why it matters now, it's not ready for the agenda. Early signal: your business partners start bringing you problems, not requests.</li>
 	<li style="margin-bottom: 15px;">Run a 90-minute charrette on one stuck issue. Bring the right people, use the Signals-to-Action Worksheet, and move from shared signals → strategic choices → risks and tradeoffs → 30/60/90-day commitments in a single working block. Early signal: the group leaves with a named next move, not a follow-up meeting.</li>
 	<li style="margin-bottom: 15px;">Test the three questions against everything on your current plan. Does it build confidence to act without perfect certainty? Does it build capability inside the flow of real work? Does it create clarity about what matters and where judgment is needed? Early signal: you start cutting initiatives that can't answer the questions, and the ones that remain get sharper.</li>
</ol>
<div style="background-color: #f1f4f9; padding: 20px; border-radius: 8px; margin-top: 40px; font-family: 'Calibri', sans-serif; font-size: 1.1rem;">
Bring your work into the room
If this connects to real work you are trying to move forward, bring it into the ELE community. Share the challenge, compare signals with trusted peers, and leave with practical next moves you can use.
Submit My Challenge Now: <a style="color: #0056b3; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://www.ele.llc/faqs/share-top-of-mind-talent-challenges">https://www.ele.llc/faqs/share-top-of-mind-talent-challenges</a>

</div>
</div>

What We’re Solving Today | Milwaukee Talent Development Conference 2026 Openning

Art Institute of Chicago

Design Charrette | The Art of Strategic Listening Art Institute of Chicago | In-person experience
In fast-moving organizations, better listening is not a soft skill. It is a strategic advantage.
This Charrette is fueled by real-world friction.  We are bringing the insights from the Art Institute of Chicago into a group activity to help you:

<ul>
 	<li data-path-to-node="10,1,0,0">Sense the Noise: Identify the "weak signals" in your matrix organization before they become execution drags.</li>
 	<li data-path-to-node="10,1,1,0">Decide with Clarity: Use peer-exchange to pressure-test your assumptions.</li>
 	<li data-path-to-node="10,1,2,0">Evolve the Strategy: Leave with one practical move to improve trust and alignment.</li>
</ul>
<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-45162" src="https://wp.ele.llc/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/20260424_Action-Planning-Worksheet.jpg" alt="Design Charrette | The Art of Strategic Listening" width="1008" height="612" />
<blockquote>
Open to all attendees: Help shape the agenda by sharing your toughest roadblock.
<a href="https://forms.office.com/r/D5BfchV4Hn" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-45002" src="https://wp.ele.llc/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/Submit-a-Challenge-7.png" alt="Submit a Challenge" width="236" height="97" /></a>
</blockquote>
Using art, observation, and live interactive discussion, this in-person exchange will help leaders:

<ul>
 	<li data-start="655" data-end="682">improve employee engagement</li>
 	<li data-start="685" data-end="722">spot weak signals in disruptive times</li>
 	<li data-start="725" data-end="785">hear multi-gen teams more effectively to improve performance</li>
 	<li data-start="788" data-end="847">listen across matrix organizations during periods of growth</li>
</ul>
<img class="aligncenter wp-image-45180" src="https://wp.ele.llc/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/About-ELE-Real-Business-Challenges.png" alt="Three-step ELE model showing Real Business Problems leading to Peer-Powered Decisions and Implementation." width="753" height="147" />
<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-45276" src="https://wp.ele.llc/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/1-AIC-Selfie-with-Art-Reflection.jpg" alt="A small group of attendees standing in front of a contemporary art piece at the Art Institute, gesturing and discussing their observations to build alignment and trust." width="1920" height="803" />
Together, the room will examine:

<ul>
 	<li data-start="884" data-end="911">where listening breaks down</li>
 	<li data-start="914" data-end="938">what signals matter most</li>
 	<li data-start="941" data-end="985">how flawed assumptions create execution drag</li>
 	<li data-start="988" data-end="1057">how stronger listening improves trust, alignment, and decision-making</li>
</ul>
Participants will leave with:

<ul>
 	<li data-start="1091" data-end="1114">better questions to ask</li>
 	<li data-start="1117" data-end="1163">sharper ways to notice what is said and unsaid</li>
 	<li data-start="1166" data-end="1211">practical insights they can apply immediately</li>
 	<li data-start="1214" data-end="1280">stronger approaches for identifying real business problems earlier</li>
</ul>
Agenda at a Glance
11:30 AM–12:30 PM Networking lunch
12:30 PM–1:15 PM Welcome, purpose, and participant introductions
1:15 PM–1:30 PM Why listening matters here
1:30 PM–2:00 PM Framing the business challenge with the Action Planning Worksheet
2:00 PM–4:00 PM Small-group working exchange on five leadership listening challenges:

<ol data-start="433" data-end="585">
 	<li data-section-id="y47uhk" data-start="433" data-end="462">Signals and sense-making</li>
 	<li data-section-id="1fgqjwe" data-start="463" data-end="498">Assumptions and interpretation</li>
 	<li data-section-id="6zhwua" data-start="499" data-end="527">Trust and team dialogue</li>
 	<li data-section-id="12d6to0" data-start="528" data-end="559">Decision-making and action</li>
 	<li data-section-id="o1w6z7" data-start="560" data-end="585">Seeing the whole scene</li>
</ol>
4:00 PM–4:45 PM Group debrief: opportunities and action planning
4:45 PM–5:00 PM Wrap-up and final reflections
Set inside the Art Institute of Chicago, this extended experience is designed for leaders who want to strengthen judgment, deepen peer exchange, and improve how they listen in the middle of change.
<img class="aligncenter" src="https://wp.ele.llc/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Ryan-Learning-Center-banner.jpg" alt="" width="752" height="322" />

ELE’s Chicagoland cohort brings together senior Talent, Learning, HR, and workforce leaders for ongoing in-person exchange around real business and workforce challenges. Members use these experiences to compare approaches, pressure-test ideas, and build practical next steps with peers facing similar complexity.

<hr />

Hosted by the Executive Learning Exchange (ELE), this experience is part of ELE’s Chicagoland community for senior leaders navigating change, capability, and execution.

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

Design Charrette | The Art of Strategic Listening @  The Art Institute of Chicago

single-event

Talent Executives

Chicago Cohort

chicagoland

ele chicago cohort

deborah.lenchard

informal learning

mickey.mantas

in-person event

action learning

self-awareness

Culture Change

patricia.ouzounian

Personal Development

Listening Strategies

toyia.stewart

Active Listening

employee listening

self-reflection

2Q2025

listening culture

alaska.fu

CNA Insurance

What We're Working Through ...

You already know what good looks like: immersive experiences, peer connection, clear actions and next steps. The hard part isn't designing the program — it's sustaining what people leave with. Everyone knows it. No one has time to fix it. Let's explore how to extend your core programs — new manager, top 100, high-potential — into real work between sessions.
&nbsp;
<h5>Lead the AI Era—From Insight to Action</h5>
The 2026 Fall Conference is built for people leaders navigating culture, capability, AI execution, and organizational change — without adding another program you don't have time for.

<h5>Avoid a too-common blindspot in AI adoption</h5>
AI &amp; Business Intelligence amplifies what's happening now. Human Intelligence is what AI can't replicate — the judgment, adaptability, and resilience that make AI adoption stick.
&nbsp;

<img class="aligncenter wp-image-45866" src="https://wp.ele.llc/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/ELE-OI-HUMAN-INTELLIGENCE-Drives-Value.jpg" alt="Organizational Intelligence model showing how Human Intelligence and AI &amp; Business Intelligence connect to drive better decisions, business value, and sustainable growth at scale." width="671" height="671" />
<blockquote>
"Human Intelligence (HI) is more important than ever. Humans will be needed to focus on managing, advising, decision-making, reasoning, communicating, and interacting with an increasingly mechanized world."
— <a style="font-size: 17.6px; background-color: #ffffff;" href="https://www.ele.llc/people/teri-hart" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Teri Hart</a>, Author of <a style="font-size: 17.6px; background-color: #ffffff;" href="https://www.ele.llc/people/bookshelf/hardwired-to-learn-leveraging-the-self-sustaining-power-of-lifelong-learning" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Hardwired to Learn</a> | ELE Community contributor since 2008
</blockquote>
<h5>Why leadership development matters more as change accelerates</h5>
<iframe style="display: block; margin: 0 auto 1rem; border: none;" title="YouTube video player" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ddUs89rL7Ow?si=_hLCMp0sHJO9QRj-" width="560" height="315" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
AI adoption is about data, tech &amp; people. Leadership development matters
more when change accelerates — not less.

<h5>Leadership Learning Moves Back Into the Work.</h5>
This is not a sit-and-listen experience. ELE builds community intelligence that helps unlock organizational intelligence.
<blockquote>A CENTURY AGO, LEARNING STARTED CLOSER TO REAL WORK
Harvard helped scale real-world business learning through cases and peer discussion. But today’s work is moving too fast to only study someone else’s problem after the fact.</blockquote>
<a href="https://www.ele.llc/calendar/shape"><img class="aligncenter wp-image-45639" src="https://wp.ele.llc/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/1922-2026-From-Case-Studies-to-Real-Work-in-Real-Time.jpg" alt="" width="918" height="612" /></a>
It is a community-powered working experience where keynote insights become real-time discussion, peer learning, small-group application, and practical next moves leaders can bring back to their organizations.
That is the work of ELE’s Idea Exchange: turning shared signals into sharper decisions, practical next moves, and 30/60/90-day leadership commitments.

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-45771" src="https://wp.ele.llc/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/ELE-Leadership-Development-for-Accelerating-Business-Value-Gemini.jpg" alt="Leadership development framework showing five layers — Listen, Name what's broken, Solve it together, Build the 30/60/90 plan, Employees feel it — built on learning in the flow of work." width="1920" height="1072" />
<h5>How the Exchange Works</h5>
<ul>
 	<li data-section-id="c51569" data-start="208" data-end="348">Real talent challenges: Leaders bring the issues actually stalling performance — not abstract trends or someone else's case study.</li>
 	<li data-section-id="c51569" data-start="208" data-end="348">Design Charrettes: Small peer groups work the problem together, challenge assumptions, and shape decisions that move.</li>
 	<li data-section-id="c51569" data-start="208" data-end="348">AI Practical Labs: AI becomes a tool for execution — not another shiny object that adds to the noise.</li>
</ul>
<h5>From Talent Challenges to Business Value</h5>
Most leadership development measures how people feel after the program. ELE measures what moved.

When leaders fix the root-cause problems — the talent challenges left unresolved that burn out your best people — engagement follows. Retention improves. Business value accelerates. Not because of EQ fluff. Because the work that was stuck is finally moving.

Leave October 1 with a 30/60/90-day plan, a peer who's already solved your problem, and a leadership development model that actually fits the speed your organization needs to move.

<hr data-path-to-node="13" />

<h5 data-start="143" data-end="161">What to Expect</h5>
<ul>
 	<li data-start="143" data-end="161">Real executive dialogue: Practical, unscripted exchange with senior leaders working through AI-era leadership challenges and workforce challenges.</li>
 	<li data-start="143" data-end="161">Business-outcome-first framing: Start with the result the business is trying to achieve, then work backward to the skills, roles, tasks, behaviors, and leadership support needed to move it.</li>
 	<li data-section-id="1424amn" data-start="292" data-end="411">Design Charrette work:  Small-group collaboration around real problems, root causes, sharper choices, and practical next steps.</li>
 	<li data-section-id="10c4ynl" data-start="413" data-end="580">AI Working Lab mindset:  Explore where AI can improve work, automate repeatable tasks, and support better decisions — while helping leaders frame the “why” and connect action to business value.</li>
 	<li data-section-id="67hqfu" data-start="582" data-end="705">Peer-powered momentum:  Leave with clearer thinking, useful connections, and practical 30/60/90-day next moves you can bring back to the business.</li>
</ul>

<hr />

<h5 data-start="829" data-end="949">Real Challenges We’ll Work Through</h5>
The agenda will be shaped around the leadership and workforce challenges showing up across the ELE community, including:

<ul data-start="951" data-end="1244">
 	<li data-section-id="1w3nks9" data-start="951" data-end="1002">Building leadership readiness for AI-era change</li>
 	<li data-section-id="1ujy1cy" data-start="1003" data-end="1060">Reducing adoption friction across teams and functions</li>
 	<li data-section-id="1mslx45" data-start="1061" data-end="1113">Strengthening culture when work is shifting fast</li>
 	<li data-section-id="1iw1hr" data-start="1114" data-end="1173">Turning AI interest into practical workflow improvement</li>
 	<li data-section-id="1iw1hr" data-start="1114" data-end="1173">Connecting workforce, skills, and task intelligence to real leadership decisions</li>
 	<li data-section-id="1imnzu9" data-start="1174" data-end="1244">Helping managers lead through ambiguity, speed, and execution drag</li>
</ul>

<hr />

<h5 class="PDq2pG_selectionAnchorContainer" data-start="2738" data-end="2785">Designed for Different Stages of AI Adoption</h5>
Whether your organization is just getting started, scaling adoption, or redesigning work around AI, the day will help you locate where you are and what needs to move next.
Basic: Identify practical use cases and reduce confusion. Intermediate: Improve adoption, handoffs, workflow, and manager support. Advanced: Connect skills, tasks, roles, and business outcomes to larger work redesign.


<hr data-path-to-node="21" />

<h5 data-start="1285" data-end="1314">Who This Is For</h5>
This exchange is designed for senior leaders responsible for leadership, talent, culture, workforce transformation, and execution.

<ul data-start="1448" data-end="1704">
 	<li data-section-id="a3reg3" data-start="1448" data-end="1482">CHROs and senior HR executives</li>
 	<li data-section-id="p5magz" data-start="1483" data-end="1530">Chief Learning Officers and heads of talent</li>
 	<li data-section-id="hxw81e" data-start="1531" data-end="1636">Leaders responsible for leadership development, organizational effectiveness, and employee experience</li>
 	<li data-section-id="x6ehuv" data-start="1637" data-end="1704">Business leaders working through AI-era change with their teams</li>
</ul>

<hr data-path-to-node="25" />

<h5 data-start="1285" data-end="1314">Hosted at CNA Insurance</h5>
CNA, downtown Chicago office, gives this exchange the right setting: a modern business environment in the heart of the Loop, built for practical conversation, cross-company perspective, and the kind of working dialogue leaders need as AI reshapes work, culture, and execution.


<hr data-path-to-node="28" />

<h5 data-start="654" data-end="670">Register Now</h5>
Your leadership development isn't built for the AI era. October 1 is where that changes.
Join people leaders in downtown Chicago — bring what's stuck, work through it with peers, and leave with a 30/60/90-day plan that moves.

Leadership Development in the AI Flow of Work | Fall Conference

engagement &amp; culture

Full-day Exchange

Team Leaders

Your Teams

newton.moore

shweta.srivastava

chicago

katie.mcallister

kim.ludwig

Digital

brady.bair

peter.hogaboam

CHIE2026

annual-conference

ai practical lab

nicole.defalco

leadership agility

Design Charrette

real-time insights

organizational intelligence

ELESUMMIT2026

BARYONS

<blockquote>
“What if your AI learning strategy is failing—not because of the technology—but because you’re designing for the wrong humans?” — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/members/tracey-wik" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Tracey Wik</a>, Co-Founder of Love Sunday Nights.
</blockquote>
<iframe title="YouTube video player" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XcY2TdkIGg8?si=wjp4LrU6NafVzXiJ" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
This real-time exchange offered a clear signal for talent leaders: the biggest gains in capability aren’t coming from new programs or faster rollouts. They’re coming from how learning is designed to show up inside the work itself.
Too many talent experiences are still built around tools, content, or generic personas. But what surfaced in this dialog was something more practical—and more human. Teams don’t struggle because they lack access to learning. They struggle when learning isn’t designed around how people actually think, decide, and work together under real constraints.
Three insights stood out:
These insights didn’t emerge from a presentation—they were shaped through ELE’s Design Charrette approach.

<blockquote>Borrowed from architecture, a design charrette brings experienced practitioners together to solve complex problems quickly.
<ul>
 	<li>Design Charrettes—introduced by <a href="https://www.ele.llc/members/alaska-fu">Alaska Fu</a>, ELE’s Experience Designer—are focused, peer-powered working conversations that help leaders co-create and refine practical approaches in 50–90 minutes.</li>
 	<li>In ELE design charrettes, peers work through challenges using three complementary lenses—internal client, AI learning guide, and real-world skeptic—to strengthen judgment before committing to action.</li>
</ul>
</blockquote>
1) Capability is built through how teams work—not what they consume. When learning is treated as content to deliver, progress stalls. When it’s designed as a shared way of working—grounded in curiosity, experimentation, and problem-solving—capability compounds over time.

<blockquote data-start="1038" data-end="1155">
“Learning isn’t content. It’s an organizational stance—curiosity, experimentation, and shared problem-solving.” — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/members/michael-hruska" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mike Hruska</a>, Co-Founder of BARYONS.
</blockquote>
2) Managers are the real system for learning in the flow of work. AI shows up most powerfully when it augments manager judgment—supporting coaching, reflection, and decision-making in real moments. That’s where confidence grows: not in courses, but in practice, with feedback, under real constraints.
3) Clarity unlocks confidence—and learning velocity. When teams don’t know what’s allowed, experimentation slows to a halt. Clear guardrails, shared expectations, and safe spaces to test ideas are what turn curiosity into real capability.
The throughline is simple—but not easy:
Reskilling isn’t something you deliver. It’s something teams do—together—inside real work.

Design Charrette: Building the NextGen Talent Pipeline with AI Mentors

tracey.wik

azizeh.constantinescu

edward.desrosiers

leadership development

carole.widmer

anton.maletich

matt.donovan

marty.murrillo

tamora.martin

matt.sernaker

Workforce Transformation

susan.c.guest

michael.hruska

actionable insights

AI-enabled learning

cindy.pinkstaffmiller

1Q2026

learning experience design

NextGen Talent Pipeline

AI Mentors

talent experience design

confidence capability clarity

team capability building

human-centered ai

team-based learning

manager led learning

capability over content

real work learning

learning as a system

talent strategy 2026

skills and talent initiatives

peer driven learning

adaptive learning design

baryons.aimentor

Journyz

<blockquote data-start="772" data-end="868">
“Most of what surfaced here has nothing to do with learning—and everything to do with how work is designed.” — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/members/brian-gold" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Brian Gold</a>, Acrisure.
</blockquote>
The ELE Ideation Sprint offered a timely reminder that many of today’s capability challenges do not show up as obvious skills gaps. Instead, they surface quietly in everyday work: in manager workarounds, ambiguous decisions, delayed conversations, and teams absorbing more risk than expected just to keep things moving.

What leaders heard during the sprint was not a call for more training. Managers were not asking for new programs or tools. They were describing work that had changed without being formally redesigned. Roles were stretching beyond their original scope. Expectations were shifting without explicit conversation. Decision rights were becoming less clear.

That friction isn’t noise. It’s signal.
<img class="aligncenter" src="https://wp.ele.llc/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/What-Managers-Actually-Surfaced.jpg" alt="" width="779" height="466" />
What surfaced across manager conversations

As participants compared real manager moments across organizations, a consistent pattern emerged. Reskilling needs are showing up first as judgment, risk, and decision challenges, not as requests for learning. Capability gaps appear as hesitation, uncertainty, and overload long before they show up in performance metrics, engagement surveys, or development plans.

Managers are navigating higher stakes work with faster timelines, tighter scrutiny, and greater system dependence, often without updated guardrails or shared definitions of “good work.” In response, many compensate quietly by stepping in, redistributing work, or softening expectations. Over time, these adaptations normalize risk and hide deeper structural gaps.

This reframes how leaders should think about reskilling altogether.

Three insights felt especially important for leaders designing team-based learning experiences:

First, manager conversations are the earliest capability sensor.
When leaders look across manager input not one story at a time, but in patterns they can detect role drift, uneven adaptation, and system strain early. These signals surface in everyday decisions, not in formal development requests. By the time learning demand is explicit, the organization is often already carrying risk.

Second, many “reskilling” challenges are actually design challenges.
Unclear workflows, broken handoffs, ambiguous decision ownership, and outdated role definitions cannot be trained away. The sprint helped leaders slow down long enough to diagnose whether an issue was rooted in skill, system, or structure and to respond intentionally rather than reflexively. This distinction proved critical for avoiding well-intended but misdirected learning interventions.

Third, learning works best in the flow of real work.
A key shift for participants was learning how to ask open-ended, work-centered questions that surfaced real problems instead of defaulting to one-track training conversations. When L&amp;D leaders resisted the urge to jump to solutions and instead invited managers to describe what felt hard, risky, or unclear, the conversation changed.

Rather than narrowing quickly to “what course do we need,” discussions opened up into a clearer understanding of how the work itself had changed and what kind of response was actually required. This approach consistently elevated L&amp;D’s role with the business.
<blockquote data-start="1289" data-end="1362">
“This gives L&amp;D a way to go back to the business with real value—not just more programs.” — <a href="https://www.ele.llc/members/brian-gold" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Brian Gold</a>, Acrisure.
</blockquote>
A different role for L&amp;D

One of the most important outcomes of the sprint was how it reframed the role of learning leaders. Instead of acting primarily as program designers or solution providers, participants left better equipped to serve as sense-makers and partners in diagnosing change.

Even when the answer was not training, L&amp;D leaders could guide their business partners toward clearer problem definition, better decisions, and more appropriate responses. That shift alone changes the credibility and impact of learning in the organization.

The bigger move is not about faster deployment or better content. It is about designing experiences that help teams see what has changed in the work, make smarter decisions together, and adapt in real time.
That’s the kind of capability-building work that will matter most in 2026.
𝐀𝐁𝐎𝐔𝐓 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐏𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐓: The ELE Ideation Sprint focuses on reskilling closer to real work. Rather than starting with large-scale frameworks or tools, the sprint centers on practical manager–employee conversations and the early signals that reveal where capability is actually breaking down. The goal is not to jump to solutions, but to identify and validate the real problem space worth solving.

𝐐𝐔𝐄𝐒𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍𝐒? Explore the <a href="https://www.ele.llc/faqs/innovation-sprint-reskilling" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ELE Ideation Sprint FAQs</a> or reach the ELE team at help@ele.llc.