Developing West Virginia's Future Leaders: A Look at the Four Generations at Work
For the first time in history, four distinct generations are working side by side in the workplace. With differing values and seemingly incompatible views on leadership, these generations have stirred up unprecedented conflict in the business world. The future of your organization and the success of our state depend on the four generations getting along, communicating, and learning from each other as each generation phases out, phases in, or transfers leadership from one to another. Effective management of this generational divide is vital to every organization’s longevity and success. What are each generation’s core values? What do they expect of their leaders and how do they define success? Participants will learn how each developed its core values, how that manifests in the workplace, and why they can all not only operate alongside each other, but do so with extraordinary success.
You’ll walk away knowing:
- the common generational characteristics, specific leadership needs of each generation, the new definition of company loyalty, and fresh guidelines for team building
- a better understanding of each generation and how to manage, recruit and retain them to your business and to our state
- how we might strengthen our capacity to entice the best and brightest back to West Virginia to play a role in our economic future
- best practices across industries and why they work
Following the keynote presentation, we've arranged for the author, Cam Marston, to lead us in a break-out session designed to take his ideas and research into an active discussion of how the knowledge can be applied immediately back into your organization to achieve the desired results. Cam will come prepared with table discussion topics that range from workplace implications to what this means for the State of West Virginia and how we can proactively plan for the challenge.
Cam Marston
Cam Marston has spent more than a decade studying workforce dynamics, with a keen focus on how generational biases play out from the stock room to the boardroom. One of a handful of experts dedicated to conquering the generational divide, Cam has shared his insight with hundreds of organizations eager to make sense of the changing business landscape.
Through relevant presentations that capture and maintain audience interest, Cam shares his personal experience, research findings and proven strategies for successfully navigating a multi-generational business world. His powerful message of generational context promotes understanding and motivates leaders to adapt their management styles to meet the needs of the rising generations in the workforce - while staying true to their own values.
Since 1996, when he began revealing the effects of generational bias in the workforce, Cam has created a strong following as clients repeatedly bring him back to reach further and deeper within their organizations. His message of understanding and respect resonates at all levels.
Clients such as General Electric, American Express, Food Marketing Institute, Professional Convention Manager's Association (PCMA), and US Army have engaged Cam to inform both management and staff about the importance generational views have on sales, hiring, retention and overall performance - the core issues companies tackle on a daily basis.
His insight has also been shared through worldwide news channels and publications including: Good Morning America, BBC, Chicago Tribune, Philadelphia Inquirer, New Zealand Herald, Entrepreneur Magazine, Business Week, Fortune Small Business (FSB), Money Magazine, HR Management Today and Edward Lowe Report, as well as numerous trade journals and city business journals throughout the United States.
Cam's presentations are continually met with rave reviews, due to Cam's engaging style and ability to tailor the message to a specific industry or organizational dilemma. With a professional background in sales and research, Cam understands the reality of business from many angles - and his presentations demonstrate this understanding with action-oriented solutions to recurring business problems.
His book, Motivating the "What's in it for me?" Workforce: Managing Across the Generational Divide, demonstrates the individual characteristics and motivating factors each generation brings to the workforce and is accompanied by management tactics applicable to any business setting.
Through large group presentations, intimate workshops and his published works, Cam gives his audience a series of lenses that enable them to see the business world from each generation's perspective. Along with this understanding, he delivers tactical guidelines that help individuals and organizations improve the performance of all generations in the workforce today.
For more information contact:
Generational Insight
PO Box 81118
Mobile, AL 36689
Cam Marston
cam@generationalinsight.com
Phone: 251.479.1990
Fax: 251.341.0114
Additional Speakers
The Honorable Gaston Caperton, President of the College Board
B. Keith Fulton, President - Verizon West Virginia, Verizon Communications
Michael S. Garrison, President of West Virginia University
Lisa A. Marsh, Director, Health Services - Mountain State Blue Cross Blue Shield
The Honorable Luke Ravenstahl, Mayor of Pittsburgh
Charles Ryan, Dean - Graduate School of Business, University of Charleston
Gaston Caperton
Gaston Caperton, a former two-term governor of West Virginia, is the eighth president of the College Board, a not-for-profit membership association founded in 1900 that consists of 5,000 of the nation's leading schools, colleges, and universities. Among its best-known programs are the Advanced Placement Program® (AP®) and the SAT®.
Since his appointment in 1999, Caperton has transformed the College Board into a resolutely mission-driven, values-oriented organization that takes bold steps to connect greater numbers of students to college success and opportunity while raising educational standards. In his successful effort to expand equity within programs that foster academic excellence, he has more than doubled the size of the College Board's staff, modernized its management structure, and established collegeboard.com, the nation's predominant comprehensive Web site serving nearly 4 million students a year as they plan their paths to college.
Under Caperton's leadership, the College Board dramatically changed the SAT, the nation's premier college admissions test. Most significantly, it added a new writing section that has begun to elevate the importance of writing on the nation's education agenda. Addressing concerns over the writing skills of high school graduates, Caperton made the new section a required part of the test, saying, "Good writing is not optional." Higher-level math was added and more critical reading passages were introduced to replace analogies. According to Time magazine: "[I]n a historical sense, Caperton's ambitious agenda for the big test is appropriate: 77 years ago, the exam began life as a tool of social change." Time called the new SAT "another great social experiment," adding: "This time, the idea is that the test's rigorous new curricular demands will lift all boats—that all schools will improve because they want their students to do well on the test."
Caperton also deeply believes that the high standards found within the College Board's Advanced Placement Program courses transform schools and change lives. Soon after his arrival at the College Board, USA Today, featured him as the "Education Crusader" and quoted him as saying, "The single most un-American aspect of our great society is the lack of truly equal educational opportunity." USA Today added, "Caperton thinks he can help change that. That's why he crisscrossed the USA in the spring, trying to get the board's Advanced Placement courses into more schools."
Fueled by Caperton's philosophy, the College Board launched ambitious AP teacher training programs and Pre-AP® courses in middle schools. During his six years as president, the number of low-income students taking AP courses tripled. The rigor of the AP Exams has held steady, yet student performance has improved. Today, students taking AP Exams are demonstrating ability levels equal to and higher than any previous generation of AP students.
Caperton envisions another important role for the AP Program, that of catalyst for a greater appreciation of globalization's influence on education in the United States. His campaign to initiate a new series of AP world language and culture courses has launched with the development of AP Chinese, Italian, Japanese, and Russian. These join AP World History, Human Geography, and Comparative Government as a series of offerings to prepare students to participate in a global community.
In September 2004, Caperton initiated the creation of College Board Schools, laboratories of learning aimed at preparing underserved middle and high school students to get into college and graduate. The first two schools debuted in New York City's public school system, with the support of the Gates Foundation and the Dell Foundation. Plans for other College Board Schools in low-income neighborhoods are under way. Caperton believes that by participating in College Board academic programs that are led by well-trained teachers, students can achieve academic success no matter what their personal circumstances.
Improving education is not new for Caperton. As governor of West Virginia from 1988 to 1996, he developed a comprehensive plan that emphasized the use of computers and technology in the public schools, beginning with kindergarten through sixth grade, and later expanding to include grades 7 through 12. His aggressive school building program resulted in $800 million in investments that benefited two-thirds of West Virginia's students. He raised teachers' salaries to thirty-first in the nation from forty-ninth and had more than 19,000 educators trained through a statewide Center for Professional Development.
As the state's thirty-first governor, Caperton brought West Virginia back from the brink of bankruptcy with more than $500 million in debts, and transformed it into a state that could boast of a $100 million surplus. Under his leadership, West Virginia's unemployment rate dropped from 9.8 percent to a low of 6.2 percent. This was accomplished by creating more than 86,000 jobs. The sound financial management approach that he initiated led Financial World magazine to call West Virginia the most improved state in the nation.
Leaving the statehouse, Caperton spent the spring of 1997 teaching as a fellow at the John F. Kennedy Institute of Politics at Harvard University. He then taught at Columbia University, where he founded and managed the Institute on Education and Government.
Caperton began his career as a businessman in his home state. After graduating from the University of North Carolina, he went to work for a small insurance agency in Charleston, West Virginia. He soon became the company's principal owner. Under his leadership, the company grew into the tenth-largest privately owned insurance brokerage firm in the nation.
Gaston Caperton has received numerous state and national awards and special recognition, including eight honorary doctoral degrees. He was chair of the Democratic Governors' Association and served on the National Governors Association Executive Committee. He also served as chair of the Appalachian Regional Commission, Southern Regional Education Board, and the Southern Growth Policies Board.
Paul Daugherty
Paul Daugherty is the Director of Development, Major Gifts for the West Virginia University Eye Institute. He has over seven years of professional fundraising, foundation, and philanthropic relations experience. Daugherty along with a group of other young volunteer leaders from across West Virginia have been volunteering for nearly three years to create regional young leader/professional groups focused on retaining, attracting, and advancing young talent, those 21 to 45 years of age and those young at heart, in the Mountain State to combat the “Brain Drain.” He has been personally involved in the creation of the Parkersburg based Young Emerging Leaders of the Mid-Ohio Valley and serves on the Advisory Board for Generation Morgantown lead by Ashley Hardesty.
During the past year, the regional groups have come together to create a statewide consortium called Generation WV. He is a proud West Virginia native who grew up in Doddridge County and received his Bachelor of Arts Degree in Communication Studies and Political Science from West Virginia Wesleyan College. He has had the fortunate opportunity to work with a diversity of people from all different generations through his professional career and local and statewide volunteer and community service involvement.
B. Keith Fulton
B. Keith Fulton is president of Verizon West Virginia, where he oversees the company’s operations and financial matters in the state and has responsibility for Verizon’s public policy, external affairs and regulatory matters in the state. Verizon is the prime player in West Virginia’s competitive telecommunications market, with more than 2,200 men and women dedicated to providing customers with quality service, broadband and innovative products. Keith’s work builds on the strengths of Verizon’s employees and reputation to meet the communications and broadband needs of West Virginia. Verizon Communications is the country’s largest telecommunications provider.
Fulton joined Verizon in 2004 as vice president of strategic alliances and corporate responsibility, where he led a Washington, D.C.-based team that worked with more than 100 national organizations on communications related public policy issues. Prior to joining Verizon, Fulton was a senior policy analyst for the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Office of Policy Analysis and Development (OPAD), supporting the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s role as principal adviser to the President, Vice President, and Secretary of Commerce on telecommunications and information policies. At Commerce, Fulton focused on Internet, broadband, VoIP, wireless spectrum and wireless broadband issues.
Fulton also spent several years as vice president of the AOL Time Warner Foundation and as vice president for Time Warner’s Corporate Relations division, responsible for managing and developing domestic and international programs that promoted digital opportunity. Fulton also worked on communications and policy issues that advanced the AOL Time Warner business. Previously, Fulton founded and directed the Technology Programs and Policy office of the National Urban League, where he was responsible for crafting and guiding the League’s strategic technology vision on behalf of the national office and its 115 local affiliates.
Fulton is best known for his efforts to bring critical thinking, resources, and thoughtful public policy together to help bridge the digital divide. Key projects included: building hundreds of “Digital Campus” community technology access centers; the Digital Divide Network - an online clearinghouse of information about the digital divide; the Education Technology Leadership Institute - which helped teachers to gain skills to use technology effectively; PowerUP.org - a collaborative public/private venture organized to bring technology resources and skills to over 250,000 youth per week; and Peace Packs - which equipped Peace Corps volunteers with computers and Internet access in over 70 countries.
Fulton has served as a board member of Virginia State University; the Virginia Tech Alumni Association; Per Scholas; Gifts in Kind International, Howard University’s School of Communications, and the Partnership for 21st Century Skills – a consortium of blue-chip companies working to elevate the information and communications technology skills of America’s youth. He is a member of the board for the American Association of People with Disabilities and the National Caucus of the Black Aged. In West Virginia, Keith is a member of Vision Shared, the Governor’s 21st Century Jobs Cabinet, the West Virginia Center for Professional Development, the West Virginia Business Roundtable, and the Discover the Real West Virginia Foundation. He has also counseled several professional technology groups on innovation and has given congressional testimony on creating digital opportunity for all. Fulton has received numerous awards, most notably the "Technology Pioneer Award" for leadership in public/private technology ventures from the U. S. Congress and a Computerworld Smithsonian Laureates Medal for technology leadership. His influential papers on technology are permanently archived at the Smithsonian Institute.
Fulton earned a B.A. from Virginia Tech in Urban Affairs & Planning with two years of Computer Engineering and a minor in Sociology. He earned a professional certificate in Management and Policy Analysis from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. Keith is a Sloan Fellow and earned his M.S. in Management and Policy Analysis from the New School’s Milano Graduate School of Management and Urban Policy. He earned his J.D., with a focus on Electronic Commerce, Intellectual Property and Telecommunications Law at New York Law School. Fulton is a member of the Federal Communications Bar Association.
Fulton is a native of Virginia and resides in West Virginia with his wife, Ingrid, and twin boys, Joshua and Terrell.
Michael S. Garrison
Mike Garrison became the 22nd president of WVU on Sept. 1, 2007.
As president, he is committed to West Virginia University’s key missions—changing lives and providing opportunities to all through education; building knowledge through research;
and serving the people of West Virginia through
economic development and health care.
A respected public servant and immediate past chair of the West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission, Garrison, 39, was elected to the WVU presidency April 13, 2007, by members of the WVU Board of Governors, with the consent of the Higher Education Policy Commission.
Garrison was managing member of the Morgantown law office of Spilman Thomas & Battle PLLC. Prior to joining the Charleston-based law firm in 2003, he served as former Gov. Bob Wise’s chief of staff and as cabinet secretary in the state Department of Tax and Revenue.
He is a member of the WVU Alumni Association National Board of Directors, and has served as an adjunct professor of political science in the WVU Eberly College of Arts and Sciences for the past several years.
A West Virginia native, and a member of the first generation in his family to graduate from college, Garrison earned a bachelor’s degree in political science and English from WVU in 1992 and a Doctor of Jurisprudence from the WVU College of Law in 1996. He also studied for a year at Oxford on a Rotary International Scholarship.
During his undergraduate career at WVU, Garrison was elected Student Body president. He was also a member of Mountain Honorary and captain of the Men’s Rowing Team.
He is married to Heather Malone Garrison, also an attorney and a WVU graduate, and they have two daughters, Julia Grace and Gabriella Malone.
Lisa A. Marsh
Lisa Marsh is the Director of Health Services for Mountain State Blue Cross and Blue Shield. Lisa directs the operation of Mountain State Blue Cross Blue Shield’s clinically-related programs and services, including clinical quality improvement, care and case management, utilization management, disease management, clinical appeals and external peer reviews, medical policy, prescription drug utilization management, utilization management reporting, transplant coordination and credentialing for practitioners, facilities and allied health providers.
Lisa is a graduate of Alderson-Broaddus College with a BS in sports medicine and Marshall University with an MS in Exercise Science, Clinical Applied Area. She previously worked in various health care settings as a clinician, manager and health care educator. She has served as an adjunct faculty member for Marshall University. She is a Fellow of the American Association of Cardiovascular and Pulmonary Rehabilitation (AACVPR) and serves on the AACVPR National Committee on Health Policy & Reimbursement. She is also a 2007 graduate of Leadership West Virginia.
Luke Ravenstahl
Luke Ravenstahl became the 59th Mayor of the City of Pittsburgh, America’s Most Livable City, on September 1, 2006. The 27-year-old Pittsburgh native – who holds the distinction of being the youngest mayor of any major U.S. city – took office upon the death of Mayor Bob O’Connor. Mayor Ravenstahl’s ascent to the top of Pittsburgh government began less than three years earlier when he became the youngest member ever elected to Pittsburgh City Council. Just two years later, his colleagues unanimously voted him Council President. In the May 2007 primary election, the people of Pittsburgh displayed their confidence in Mayor Ravenstahl’s leadership by electing him by the largest percentage of votes in the City’s 250-year history.
Mayor Ravenstahl recognizes that the City’s “most livable” designation is due to the unique characteristics of its 88 neighborhoods and has put neighborhoods first while working to attract and retain residents and businesses. He has brought financial stability to the City and has introduced and implemented initiatives that are tackling quality of life issues while working hard to resolve some of the City's long-standing and enigmatic issues. He has embraced technology, helping to bring Pittsburgh into the 21st century as a tech and research business hub and a national leader in Green Building.
As Mayor, he is addressing quality of life issues with a “neighborhoods first” approach to revitalization. Immediately after taking office, Mayor Ravenstahl launched the 311 Response Line to streamline communication between City government and its residents, increasing efficiencies in City departments and improving customer service. Mayor Ravenstahl has also doubled the investment in the O’Connor administration’s “Redd Up” campaign to make Pittsburgh one of the cleanest and safest cities in the nation. He led successful efforts to buy back $64 million worth of tax liens on 11,000 parcels of properties at a fraction of the cost. By regaining control of these tax liens, the City has taken a giant leap in eliminating blight caused by vacant properties in numerous neighborhoods.
Mayor Ravenstahl has introduced new methods of eliminating and deterring crime in neighborhoods. He is changing the face of the police force by reinstating the beat cop program. Through the increased presence of beat cops patrolling the streets, Mayor Ravenstahl has bridged the communication gap between communities and the police force – and restored the feelings of safety and pride experienced by residents who know their neighborhood cops.
Mayor Ravenstahl is a change agent leading Pittsburgh to fiscal stability and working to make the City more business-friendly. He initiated and hosted a Mayors’ Summit, calling together his peers from throughout Pennsylvania to discuss pension problems straining city budgets nationwide. Under his leadership, the City is securing millions of dollars of investment and development. Mayor Ravenstahl has brought transparency and accountability to the City's permitting and planning departments by streamlining the permitting process from paper-based to web-based.
Strongly committed to retaining the best and brightest of the City of Pittsburgh, he has organized the Propel Pittsburgh Commission to empower young people to take ownership of the region’s future – and he has created a Blue Ribbon Economic Development team to make Pittsburgh the most business-friendly city in America. Mayor Ravenstahl's financial foresight and fiscally strong budget have led to a $42 million budget surplus, reinforcing his commitment to lead Pittsburgh to financial stability.
While at the table with business leaders and other elected officials, Mayor Ravenstahl fought to resolve previously unsettled issues. His work to build a new multi-purpose arena for the City and the Pittsburgh Penguins hockey team has led to a $290 million development opportunity for the Hill District, while also keeping the Penguins in Pittsburgh. He worked tirelessly to save the historic Pittsburgh Brewing Company, bringing it out of bankruptcy and reopening it for business. In less than a year, Mayor Ravenstahl built consensus with disputing parties for development of property known as Oakhill in the City’s Hill District, accomplishing something no leader in over a decade had been able to tackle. By doing so, residents of the Hill District have a voice in the development of Oakhill and the University of Pittsburgh can expand its sports facilities, furthering its competitiveness as one of the world’s top universities.
Mayor Ravenstahl remains a champion of neighborhoods and a pioneer in moving Pittsburgh into the 21st century. As a councilman, he introduced a resolution calling for new controls on council spending and led the charge to move forward the City's downtown Wi-Fi plan that provides two free hours of wireless Internet access. Mayor Ravenstahl has also kept a strong commitment to Pittsburgh by lending time to various boards and authorities, including City of Pittsburgh Municipal Pension Fund, the Firemen's Relief and Pension Fund, Pittsburgh Cultural Trust and Carnegie Library.
Mayor Ravenstahl was born and raised in Pittsburgh’s North Side, where his father continues to serve as a district judge. In 1998 he graduated from North Catholic High School, where he had excelled as both student and athlete – serving as president of student council and captain of the football and baseball teams. Mayor Ravenstahl continued his sports career at Washington & Jefferson College, where he served as captain of the football team and set the college’s record for career field goals. In 2002, he graduated with honors and earned his Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration. Mayor Ravenstahl and his wife, Erin, now reside in Pittsburgh's Summer Hill neighborhood and are members of Holy Wisdom Parish.
Charles Ryan
Charles Ryan is Dean of the new Graduate School of Business at the University of Charleston. He was named to the post this past December and is currently building and implementing the graduate program and curriculum.
The school, located in a unique downtown Charleston financial and business center, offers a Master of Business Administration & Leadership (MBAL), Executive Master of Business Administration (EMBA) and an Executive Master of Forensic Accounting (EMFA).
Ryan is a native of Keyser, West Virginia, and is a graduate of the West Virginia University School of Journalism. Prior to his 33-year business career, he practiced journalism for 18 years as an anchor and news director for television stations in Charleston, West Virginia, and St. Louis, Missouri.
He founded Charles Ryan Associates, an advertising and public relations firm in 1974. It is now the state’s largest marketing firm, and one of the leading such firms in the mid-Atlantic region. Ryan sold the firm to a West Virginia investment group in 2007. As an entrepreneur, Ryan began, and subsequently sold, four successful marketing firms in West Virginia, Virginia, and Washington, D.C.
