Press Resources

Speaker: Dr. Donte Vaughn, DM

Session Title: Your Leadership Culture is Dying: It is Time For “Cultural C.P.R.”

Session Topic: Organizations are struggling to maximize productivity amid resource constraints and changes in market demand. Furthermore, they are challenged when attempting to attract and retain talent in their business. Many stakeholders have asked “what has happened”? Should we blame it on the so-called “Great Resignation”? The COVID pandemic is at fault? Regardless of your rationale, the reality is, your leadership culture is dying! Your employees are disengaged and leaving your organization at an alarming rate. Market leaders are beginning to refer to this mass exodus as “quiet quitting”. The US Employee Engagement Rate sits at only 34%, down from 36% in 2020 among the working population. Since 2000, the average employee engagement rate has averaged 32%. I wonder what this trend means for the remaining 68% of employees in the average organization. Your Leadership Culture is Dying: You need “Cultural C.P.R.” 

Session Purpose: To become an employer of choice and overcome the challenges facing the labor market while maximizing the capacity of your business, you must address how your leaders (top-down) engage, interact, and make decisions in the business daily. Take the first steps in learning how to connect the company culture you desire to specific leadership behaviors that drive better performance outcomes. Learn the “Cultural C.P.R.” approach to “breathe new life” into your leadership culture. 

Learning Objectives:

Performing Cultural C.P.R. is all about breathing life into your leadership culture so that your front-line leaders can improve how they engage and interact with employees and customers to drive a more positive and productive employee experience, faster bottleneck identification and resolution, and enhanced ownership and accountability of performance outcomes for the business. The premise is to ‘operationalize’ your company culture by leveraging your value system as the framework for how your leaders should behave and interact with others. This influences how decisions are made to impact production capacity and daily performance goal-achievement. 

CPR = Consciousness + Practice + Results

1. Create a true “consciousness” (awareness & understanding) surrounding your company values and how they should inform your leadership behaviors – how they engage and interact with your employees to drive optimal performance outcomes. 
2. Adopt specific methods to promote daily “practice” (learning and application) of these leadership behaviors in real-time; to optimize performance in short intervals, every day.
3. Learn how to measure and interpret the “results” (impact and outcomes) of your leadership culture that influences your performance outcomes, and what to do to foster ongoing continuous improvement.

Upon receipt of these foundational cultural performance management best-practices, you will walk away with applicable quick-wins to begin to foster a culture of ownership and accountability surrounding your front-line leadership performance to meet the impending production demands for 2022 and beyond.

Speaker: Dr. Donte Vaughn, DM

Session Title: The “Great Resignation” Myth: Bridging Gaps in Leadership Effectiveness Impacting Talent Attraction and Retention

Session Topic: Everyone’s talking about the Great Resignation - also known as the “Big Quit” or even the “Great Reshuffle” - but I am tired of it! And not because of the recent economic phenomenon that resulted in employees from around the world voluntarily resigning from their jobs. I am exhausted by the constant deflection tactics from organizations attempting to justify their high turnover rates and inability to attract top talent by suggesting “no-one wants to work”, or “it’s the government’s fault”, or “they are asking for too much”, and the list goes on!

The problem rests with none of these things. Let’s look at four illuminating facts. 

1) According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, as of July 2022, the U.S. unemployment rate is at a record low 3.5 percent. Compare this to a 10 percent unemployment rate during the economic crisis of 2008-09. This is in an unprecedented 65% reduction in the number of unemployed even given the brief spike resulting from the COVID pandemic. 

2) In 2010, 15 million people were unemployed in the U.S. compared to 5.7 million today. Less than half the number today and of that working population, over 55 percent represent Millennial or younger generations. 

3) The number of unemployed people has been on a steady decline, while at the same time the unemployment insurance claims in 2022 represent only 30% of the total people reported as “unemployed” and is the lowest number of claims since before 2005.

4) And finally, according to Gallup (2022), the U.S. Employee Engagement Rate (the involvement and enthusiasm of employees in their work and workplace) sits at only 34%, down from 36% in 2020, among the working population. Think about what this trend means for the remaining 68% of employees in the average organization.

So, what do all these statistics combined suggest? I propose that the issues claimed in connection to the “Great Resignation” aren’t rooted in whether the working population, the majority of whom are Millennials or Gen Zers, have an interest in obtaining employment. The issues are rooted in the many organizations who have been unable to foster a workplace culture that establishes them as an employer of choice in their marketplace with the appropriate talent pool.

In other words, it’s not that people don’t want to work; they just don’t want to work for YOU!

Let’s explore how an organization can establish ownership and accountability, starting with its leaders, in regard to how they need to engage and make decisions that will foster a desired workplace culture. We need a system to define, implement, measure, and improve every company’s culture.

Learning Objectives: 

1. Learn the 7 Pillars to the Culture Performance Management (CPM) Methodology: CPM is a behavior-driven system to operationalize company culture and increase employee engagement. Executive leadership must define company culture and understand how to implement it and measure and improve it. 

1. Apply immediate “quick-wins” to your Leadership Culture:  to begin to foster a culture of ownership and accountability surrounding your front-line leadership performance to meet the impending production demands for 2022 and beyond. 

1. Learn the Top 5 Methods to empower your Millennial and Gen Z Employees: To empower someone means they are given the authority or power to do something. If companies seek long-range health, they will begin developing leaders now. Learn the Top-5 most effective approaches to giving more authority to your millennial employee to make decisions, while allowing a safe place for failure while offering support in the process, and guidance as needed.

How will you engage the audience:

I use a variety of audience interactive engagement techniques. From walking into the audience to asking questions, to dividing them into small groups for a quick brainstorm session, I am comfortable with many techniques and happy to discuss additional ideas.