The New England District’s Leadership Development Program (LDP) hosted its fourth annual Industry Leader Panel, Aug. 22 in the District Theater.
The event was a Q&A style discussion, where program participants asked leadership-centric questions to a panel of senior leaders from external agencies and corporations, who in turn offered experiential insight gained over the course of their careers.
Current LDP participants, their mentors and the District Leadership were all invited to the event, themed “Leading Healthy Teams.”
Col. (ret.) Alonna Barnhart, Federal Emergency Management Agency; Col. (ret.) Barton Barnhart, U.S. Department of Energy; Anjna O’Connor, Border Infrastructure Program Management Office, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Southwest Division (who participated via video conference); and Vivian Vitale, Veracode, served as this year’s panelists.
Maj. Mark Gillman, New England District Deputy Commander, and Michael Riccio, LDP Director, welcomed the audience and started the event with opening remarks before turning it over to LDP participant and event emcee, Kiersten Haugen, who introduced the panelists and led the discussion for the afternoon.
Panelists briefly introduced themselves and their general approach to the event’s theme of leading healthy teams, but they spent the majority of the three-hour event fielding questions from current LDP program participants. Program participants came to the event prepared to discuss concepts such as growing and developing team members, managing conflict within teams and fostering an overarching culture of camaraderie and accountability.
“The Industry Leader Panel has quickly become a highlight event within the LDP program year,” Riccio said. “It’s a pretty unique opportunity for employees to engage in a meaningful conversation with senior leaders across the professional spectrum on how to grow both personally and professionally. We’ve been really fortunate over the first few years with who has been willing to participate in the event and the level of experience they’ve brought to the panel, so we’re excited and hopeful to keep it going for years to come.”
After Riccio made closing remarks panelists and program participants were invited to attend an optional, informal networking session off-site. Jessica Rudd, Kiersten Haugen, Brian Balukonis, Mark Anderson and Mike Bachand recruited the panel and coordinated this year’s event.