Sessions
Explore all our conference sessions
Beyond Small Talk: Successful Strategies to Network with Intention and Purpose
Building Connections: Networking with Purpose, Not Pressure
How do you go beyond transactional networking and build relationships - not just collect contacts? This session will provide frameworks to create meaningful, mutual connection from the first meeting and beyond that align with your personal values, networking goals, and boundaries.
Working Side by Side with AI: Strategies for Advancing Our Resilience and Innovation
The pace of change today calls for creativity, adaptability, and collaboration. What if you had just 1 percent more time, resources and skills to do this better daily? This session, led by two Hopkins alumni, explores how artificial intelligence can serve as a trusted partner and collaborating tool to shape sustainable outcomes amidst change. Rather than viewing AI as a tool for efficiency alone, we will demonstrate how ChatGPT, Copilot, and Claude (Anthropic) can work alongside us to spark ideas, strengthen decision-making, and accelerate ideation and innovation. Through real-world use cases, participants will follow along and learn how to engage AI in meaningful dialogue, integrate its insights with human judgment, and co-create solutions that reflect both technological capability and human values. Attendees will leave with practical strategies and a new perspective on partnering with AI to navigate an ever-changing world as well as a takeaway tip sheet they can use for their own learning journeys.
Ignite Your Entrepreneurial Spirit: Turning Uncertainty into Opportunity
Periods of financial uncertainty—whether sparked by career transitions, family responsibilities, or broader economic shifts—often call for both reflection and forward movement. This virtual panel discussion brings those elements together by featuring inspiring real-life stories of resilience from panelists who have navigated financial change and emerged with greater clarity, confidence, and stability.
In this moderated online conversation, panelists will share personal experiences of confronting uncertainty, adapting to evolving circumstances, and making intentional choices to strengthen their financial well-being. Their stories offer not prescriptions, but perspective—highlighting how small, thoughtful actions can lead to meaningful progress over time.
Attendees will have the opportunity to:
- Learn from diverse lived experiences, gaining insight into how others reframed challenges as turning points
- Explore practical, flexible approaches to financial resilience rooted in real-world decision-making
- Reflect on their own skills, experiences, and resources as assets that can support long-term stability
Designed to be engaging and accessible, this virtual panel encourages both listening and reflection, with space for guided discussion and audience participation. You’ll walk away with fresh perspective, actionable ideas, and renewed confidence in your ability to navigate financial uncertainty on your own terms.
Join us to hear powerful stories, reflect on your own journey, and take the next step toward lasting financial resilience—through shared insight, honest conversation, and purposeful action.
Registration & Networking Breakfast
Welcome & Warm-Up
Keynote Fireside Chat
Break & Transition
Leading Through Change: Unleashing Your Adaptability Superpower
Adaptability is one of the most critical capabilities for individuals, leaders, and teams in today’s volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) world. This interactive session, Dr. Wolf will introduce a science-backed framework for measuring and developing adaptability and explore how it can be used to overcome challenges, navigate uncertainty, and thrive in a rapidly changing environment. You will walk away from the session with strategies to develop grit, build mental flexibility, manage stress, unlearn and stay anchored in this VUCA world.
Small Talk to Big Results: Turning Networking Conversations into Real Connection
Don’t just talk about the weather - turn that surface-level conversation into an impactful connection. It is simpler than you think. This interactive workshop teaches you the two skills that transform any networking interaction: how to ask intriguing questions that spark genuine dialogue, and how to gracefully transition between conversations. No more getting trapped in endless small talk or wondering how to politely exit when it's time to move on.
Using the proven iConnect framework, you'll practice moving seamlessly from "How's the weather?" to conversations that actually matter. Through hands-on exercises with fellow participants, you'll learn a repeatable system for authentic networking - creating real connections without awkwardness or exhaustion. Leave with five new genuine connections and a simple system you can use whenever you meet new people to turn small talk into big results for your career and relationships.
Fractional Leadership: A Modern Pathway for Mid-Career Reinvention and Organizational Growth
The workforce is shifting—and so is leadership. As organizations rethink how to access senior-level talent, fractional executive roles have emerged as a powerful option for both companies and seasoned professionals. This panel brings together four distinguished Johns Hopkins alumnae—each thriving in a different fractional C-suite function—to demystify the world of fractional work and explore how it is reshaping modern careers.
Representing the roles of Fractional Chief of Staff/COO, CHRO, CFO, and CMO, the panelists will share candid insights from their own career pivots, including how they transitioned out of traditional full-time roles, what it takes to build a successful fractional practice, and how this model provides autonomy, flexibility, and meaningful impact for mid- to late-career women.
Attendees will walk away with a clear understanding of:
- What fractional executive roles are (and are not)
- Why more organizations are embracing this model
- How seasoned leaders can transition into fractional careers with purpose and confidence
- Practical steps to explore, prepare for, or pursue this career path
- How companies can strategically leverage fractional experts to strengthen their leadership bench
When Technology Meets Intention
As artificial intelligence becomes more embedded in our work, the question is no longer whether to use AI but how, why and when. This cross-industry panel explores AI as a strategic and collaborative tool – one that can improve efficiency, performance, and growth when used intentionally. Panelists will share real-world experiences, discuss challenges and unintended consequences and reflect on how leaders and professionals can balance continued research, knowledge creation and human judgement with responsible use of AI.
Lunch
Beyond Small Talk: Successful Strategies to Network with Intention and Purpose: How to Network After You Have Been Laid Off
If you’ve been laid off or think you might be, the idea of "networking" can feel awkward, exhausting, or even intimidating—especially if you haven’t had to do it in years. Even the term "networking" can make people uncomfortable. This interactive session reframes this process and shows you how to reconnect with people in a way that feels natural, focused, and genuinely helpful, not forced or transactional.
You’ll learn the five criteria for a successful connection so you can be intentional about who you reach out to and why. We’ll cover practical do’s and don’ts during this transitional time—what helps, what hurts, and what to avoid saying when emotions are still close to the surface. You’ll also practice crafting a clear, factual way to explain what happened, so you can talk about being laid off with confidence and without over-explaining or self-blame. Through guided exercises and peer discussion, you’ll test ideas in real time and learn from others navigating similar transitions. You’ll leave this session with clarity about who to reach out to, language you can use to explain your situation calmly, and renewed confidence in your ability to rebuild professional relationships in a way that feels natural to you.
When Technology Meets Intention
As artificial intelligence becomes more embedded in our work, the question is no longer whether to use AI but how, why and when. This cross-industry panel explores AI as a strategic and collaborative tool – one that can improve efficiency, performance, and growth when used intentionally. Panelists will share real-world experiences, discuss challenges and unintended consequences and reflect on how leaders and professionals can balance continued research, knowledge creation and human judgement with responsible use of AI.
From Pause to Power: Turning Overlooked Skills Into Income
Career transitions — whether planned or unexpected — can shake confidence and financial stability. This workshop guides participants through evaluating their strengths, mapping their transferable skills, and identifying income-generating opportunities during times of change. From upskilling strategies to flexible work pathways to entrepreneurship-ready skills, we’ll explore how life experience becomes a valuable professional asset. Each participant will leave with an action plan and concrete earning opportunities aligned with their goals and strengths.
The 15 Minute Solution: Building Sustainable Change with 1% of Your Day
Do you often feel like you're just one step away from greatness? Like if you could just COMPLETE one important goal, your career and life would launch forward? If you're honest, how often do you let the fires and priorities of the day steal time from the work that would actually make a difference?
Research shows that women leaders face unique obstacles to sustainable change - 40% higher burnout rates, disrupted sleep patterns during peak career years, and the cultural expectation to manage everyone else's change while putting their own goals last. This isn't about time management; it's about change management designed specifically for how women's brains and lives actually work.
In this interactive workshop, you'll discover why 15 minutes of daily focused action creates lasting transformation while grand gestures often fail. You'll learn the science behind sustainable habit building and identify your biggest lever for change - that one focus that, when pursued consistently, creates a cascade of positive outcomes in your professional and personal life.
Break & Transition
Plenary Session: Your Cognitive 1%: Small Shifts, Sharper Thinking
The modern world doesn't ask for more hours—it asks for more from our brains. In this plenary session, Dr. Kate Bechtold tackles the real challenge: managing the relentless overload of tasks and information that competes for our attention. Discover evidence-based strategies to work with your brain, not against it, protect your cognitive health through every stage of life, and find your cognitive 1%.
Sharing Summary & Closing Remarks