Leaders Uzair Qadeer of Carbon Health, John Ferguson of NASCAR and more discuss the effects of workplace culture on belonging and mental health.
The SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management) Executive Network and the SHRM Foundation are co-hosting the second annual Visionaries Summit and Tharseō Awards. The Summit will explore how belonging and mental health are vital to a successful, productive workplace. The Visionaries Summit will take place at the Ritz-Carlton in Chicago from October 17-18, 2022 and will feature remarks from a diverse selection of industry leaders, such as SHRM President and Chief Executive Officer Johnny C. Taylor, Jr., SHRM-SCP; Stephen W. Beard of Adtalem Global Education Inc.; and Pat Wadors of UKG.
The Visionaries Summit will convene C-Suite executives and HR professionals to discuss how to drive business success through a thriving office culture. The Summit builds off of insights gained from the recent SHRM Foundation’s Mental Health in America report, which finds that 88 percent of HR professionals believe workplace mental health resources can increase productivity.
“Research shows nearly 1 in 4 workers are feeling down, depressed or hopeless—not sometimes, but often,” said Taylor. “Our goal at Visionaries is to show that cultivating a workplace environment with belonging and mental health is good for employees and the company. It’s more important than ever to build inclusive, empathetic and resilient workplace cultures amid a countrywide mental health crisis.”
The Visionaries Summit creates opportunities for executives to discuss the work they’ve done in their organizations, enabling attendees to share ideas in an exclusive, private gathering of peers. This opportunity is timely. The workplace is rapidly and irreversibly changing after more than two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, and demands are not abating for social justice and dynamic diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) strategies. Today’s executives face challenges—and opportunities—that their predecessors never did. Success demands workplaces that support belonging and mental health.
Hosted with the Visionaries Summit, the SHRM Foundation’s Tharseō Awards Gala will take place Monday night at the Field Museum. Launched in 2021, the Tharseō Awards recognize three leaders who demonstrate the vision, courage and business acumen to transform the workplace and are at the cutting edge of strengthening the connections between employees and company purpose. Each honoree serves as a visionary in their respective organization and furthers the conversation around belonging and mental health in the workplace.
“This year’s Visionaries Summit and Tharseō Awards are a testament to SHRM and the SHRM Foundation’s continued commitment to the future of belonging and workplace mental health,” said SHRM Foundation President Wendi Safstrom. “Since beginning this conversation last year, we have taken this commitment to new heights, but our actions don’t stop here. We aim for attendees to turn these discussions into concrete action—working toward solutions for a better tomorrow.”
Leaders attending this year’s Visionaries Summit will discover that each executive can create change for their employees and company. For more information about the Visionaries Summit and Tharseō Awards, please visit https://visionaries.shrm.org/.
