10:15am – 11:15am Concurrent Session 1 (60-minutes)

A Wellness Wheel: Mental Tips & Tricks – Lyndsey Fennelly
The first step is often the hardest. How do we make the steps to improve our daily mental health? We take that first step. Attend this breakout session with keynote speaker, Lyndsey Fennelly as you make simple, repeatable action steps to maximize your overall wellness. Learn some key tips and tricks that will help develop a list of non-negotiables. And build on a wellness wheel incorporating 8 areas of your life to make positive changes and a strong difference. 

From Messy to Manageable: Transforming Workday Data with Power Query in Excel – Michael Boyd
Ever wish Excel could do the tedious part for you? If you often find yourself reformatting data before you can actually use it, this session is for you. Discover how Power Query- a powerful yet often overlooked feature built right into Excel- can automatically transform and prepare your Workday data with just a few clicks. You’ll learn how to import, filter, merge, and reshape data using repeatable steps that save time and reduce manual effort. No programming experience required- just bring your curiosity and a dataset you love to make easier to work with.

Avoiding AI Fails – Kate Garretson
If you’re using generative AI tools like Copilot, ChatGPT, Elicit, and others, you could be setting yourself up for an “AI fail” if you’re not using them carefully. This workshop will help you understand the best ways to use these tools, offer you a chance to practice evaluating AI output, and provide some best practices so you can avoid the major embarrassment and other negative consequences of an “AI fail.”

Leading with Empathy: Connecting the Pieces to Create Possibilities – Ani Das
Empathy is more than a soft skill- it’s a leadership strength that connects people, purpose, and possibility. This interactive session invites P&S staff to explore how empathy can enhance communication, collaboration, and trust within campus teams. Participants will engage in short reflections, small-group discussions, and practical exercises to strengthen leadership through understanding and connection. Together, we’ll examine real workplace scenarios, identify what empathy looks like in action, and develop one concrete step to bring empathy into daily leadership practice- turning pieces into possibilities.

Wing and a Prayer vs. Process and a Plan: Leading Your Team to Creative Solutions – Stacy Renfro and Tera Lawson
In this session we will explore how the design thinking process integrates with project management and how you can inspire creative solutions to problems while keeping your team on the same page and on track.

Working with UHR – Dwaine Heppler
This session helps P&S employees know and engage with their UHR Delivery team, services we provide, where to find information, and how to navigate the various initiatives and programs offered to employees through UHR.

12:45pm – 1:45pm Concurrent Session 2 (60-minutes)

Data at ISU is a-MAZE-ing: Solving the Puzzle of University Data – Susan Ray, Jesse Rothweiler-Foster, and Korrie Price
Where do I find data about…? What does… mean? We have all cried (or at least thought) these questions since ISU’s move to Workday. The Office of Institutional Research will help you put together the pieces of our new data puzzle.
In this session, we will cover the recent history of data at ISU, what data is available, and who to ask when you need help. Exploring our new data landscape has its challenges, but allow us to help you find the tools to navigate data at ISU.

Digital Accessibility: Small Changes, Big Impact – Susan McNicholl
You may have heard about digital accessibility and thought, “That’s for web people.” Or designers. Or someone else entirely. But if you create documents, slides, or PDFs—congratulations, you’re a content creator. And your content needs to be digitally accessible. This session is geared for all staff who want to make their everyday documents clearer, more usable, and more inclusive. With a focus on Microsoft Word and PowerPoint, we’ll look at simple, high-impact habits and built-in tools that quietly do a lot of good, for a lot of people. Bonus: they also happen to align with Iowa State’s digital accessibility expectations. Bring your laptop if you’d like to follow along, and expect plenty of practical take-home tips and resources you can put to use right away. No jargon. No perfection required. Just small changes that help make Iowa State a place where all faculty, students, and staff can thrive.

The Hidden Influences That Shape Our Choices: Everyday Tools for Stronger Communication and Leadership – Dariana Glasco-Boyd
Every day, professionals make countless decisions that shape team culture, communication, and trust — often without recognizing the hidden influences behind them. This interactive session helps participants uncover how personal experiences, cognitive shortcuts, and workplace habits impact the way they interpret situations and interact with others. Through storytelling, reflection, and practical tools, attendees will learn how to pause between automatic reactions and intentional responses, create space for diverse perspectives, and strengthen their ability to lead from any level. Participants will leave with simple, actionable strategies they can apply immediately to build more inclusive, connected, and high-trust environments.

Graduate College’s Individual Development Planning Tool – Kristin Terrill
In this session, you will be introduced to the Graduate College’s Individual Development Planning (IDP) tool—a self-assessment and professional development goal-setting resource that helps connect you with available campus supports. You will also be invited to provide feedback, suggest enhancements, and recommend additional resources to strengthen the tool.

Designing Your Career Puzzle: Resilience, Values, and Possibilities – Callie Craig and Heidi Seegers 
In this interactive session, participants will explore how career development is a dynamic puzzle—one that requires resilience, reflection, and creativity. Grounded in Krumboltz’s Happenstance Learning Theory and the Stanford Life Design Lab approach, the session introduces five foundational skills for navigating career uncertainty and change: curiosity, persistence, flexibility, optimism, and risk-taking. Attendees will engage with potential tools, such as CareerOneStop’s Work Values Matcher, to build a personalized Career Resilience Toolkit that helps them navigate uncertainty and plan for the unexpected. The session will conclude with a creative brainstorming activity where participants design three possible future paths—Odyssey Plans—that reflect their values, strengths, and motivations, reminding them that they are already finding their way.

Solving the People Puzzle – Alison DePenning, Kris Baldwin, Gayle Coon, and Robin Ertz
Difficult conversations often feel like missing pieces in our professional harmony. This fast-paced session invites you to look at workplace conflict from a different angle, turning tension into trust through curiosity and new communication frameworks. From the front desk to the boardroom, you’ll discover how to “speak the language” of those around you to find solutions. Join us to build the skills that connect people and turn everyday challenges into possibilities for growth.

2:00pm – 3:00pm Concurrent Session 3 (60-minutes)

Navigation tips for ServiceNow KBAs and Workday – Morgan Bruce and Kayla Pippitt
In this session, you will learn practical tips and tricks for effectively searching in Workday and Knowledge Base Articles (KBAs). Led by Morgan Bruce, Assistant Finance Manager of Operations, this session will help you navigate two platforms that are essential to much of our daily work but can often feel challenging to search or use with confidence. Designed for both newer users and those looking to strengthen their comfort level, you will leave with strategies to find information more efficiently and make better use of these tools.

Using AI to Improve How We Work – Dan Fillius and Kris Baldwin
Purveyors of AI have promised us so much, but what are some ways that it actually helps us out? Learn what AI is good at, what it’s surprisingly bad at, and how employees at ISU are making AI tools work for them.

Letting Go to Grow – Sara Klute Behn
An interactive, mind-body workshop designed to help participants release tension and create space for growth. Key Takeaways: Understand the mind-body connection to stress, identify what’s draining vs. sustaining your energy, practice guided breathwork or relaxation techniques, and develop personal “let-go-to grow” action steps.

Innovate at Iowa State: Learning from Failure – Rebecca Nation
“Why is failure such an “”F”” word in today’s society? Failure isn’t fun, but it’s one of the most powerful tools in the realm of creativity. In this interactive session, we’ll unpack how failure can teach you valuable lessons and how to shift your mindset to build resilience and creativity when mistakes inevitably happen. Innovation Programs at the Student Innovation Center invites you to embrace failure and see how every mistake or lesson learned fits in the larger innovation puzzle.

You’ll learn how to:  

• Reframe failure as a natural and essential part of the innovation process
• Identify what went wrong and what you can learn from it
• Build resilience and improve your creative process
• Envision yourself utilizing the resources available at the Student Innovation Center”

Questions to Pull You Out of Quicksand – Stacy Renfro and Nicole Scott
How to get unstuck when the work, the team, or the plan starts to sink.   Every project hits a moment that feels like quicksand. The more you push, the deeper you sink. For our teams to be successful, we have to learn to pause, look around, and ask better questions before reaching for another solution. This session explores how purposeful questions can help you find solid ground again. You’ll learn how to uncover what’s really slowing progress, bring clarity to confusion, and move the work forward with less effort. The goal is simple: use questions to create traction when things start to stall.   Learning Outcomes   Identify the early signs of “quicksand” in your work or team.   Learn how to frame questions that reveal what’s missing or unclear.   Practice using curiosity and inquiry to regain momentum and focus.   

Learning Objectives:

• Identify the early signs of “quicksand” in your work or team. 
• Learn how to frame questions that reveal what’s missing or unclear. 
• Practice using curiosity and inquiry to regain momentum and focus.    

Leadership at Any Level – Kelsey Hummer
This session empowers participants to develop leadership qualities, mindsets, and behaviors that drive positive impact—regardless of title or position. You’ll learn practical strategies that have proven successful for employees at ISU, including ways to take initiative, foster innovation, and influence change in any role. We’ll also cover how to highlight these leadership skills on your resume to stand out for advancement opportunities. Whether you aspire to a formal leadership role, want to position yourself for growth, or simply seek greater confidence and influence in your current role, this session will help you lead from where you are.