Greater MKE – A Greater Tech Hub!
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August 16, 2018
2:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Greater Milwaukee – A Greater Tech Hub!
Our August meeting is going to cover a very hot topic that is specific to the Greater Milwaukee area and Southeastern Wisconsin. We have a panel of employers, higher education and workforce development executives discussing various aspects of technical talent in our region.
With all of the emerging technologies, digital transformations and personnel shifts in our industry, there is an incredible need for skilled IT talent to fill technical roles across all fields of business.
- How do we develop this talent?
- How do we fill these roles?
- How do we attain and retain top technical talent here in our own backyard?
Last year there was a study done that revealed an approximate $27 billion impact that the tech industry had on the seven county Milwaukee area. Understanding this economical impact has heightened the sense of urgency to develop Milwaukee into the type community that attracts top technical resources.
Manpower will be our gracious host for our event on August 16th. This is how our panel is shaping up:
Our Moderator:
Perry Wedum, Senior Vice President of Experis, North America
In this role he leads ManpowerGroup’s professional resourcing and project-based workforce solutions business across the United States and Canada, placing over 10,000 IT, Engineering and Finance professionals annually.
Perry joined Experis in 2008 as Managing Director for the Minneapolis Region. In 2014 he was named Regional Vice President of Central US markets for Experis IT, and in 2015 he became Senior Regional Vice President, responsible for Experis’ North Region, including key markets like New York, Boston, St. Louis, Chicago, and more. During this time, Perry helped deliver rapid growth to Experis IT in the North, expanding sales and increasing gross margin.
Prior to joining Experis, Perry developed an in-depth knowledge of the IT and technology-focused, professional resourcing industry through his work managing sales and business development functions with organizations including: TEKsystems, ProStaff, techies.com and Hudson.
Our Panelists:
William Caraher, CIO and Director of Operations for von Briesen & Roper Law Firm
Bill has 20 years of experience managing and supporting technology in the enterprise. He’s passionate about innovative and business focused technology solutions that align with and empower his firm’s attorneys. Under Bill’s leadership, von Briesen was the first Wisconsin law firm to implement A.I. with an IBM Watson based solution. The firm is researching uses for Blockchain and related emerging technologies to keep ahead of the curve both in the legal vertical and for our diverse client’s needs.
Bill earned his MBA degree from Marquette University and a Bachelors of Science from DePaul University. He is currently an Adjunct Professor in the Marquette College of Business and he has also created and taught a technology coursework for the Marquette Law School.
In 2018, Bill is excited to have helped launch an inner-city, youth technology training program in Milwaukee.
Bill has won awards from the International Legal Technology Association, The Wisconsin Bar Association, and has been recognized as a standout CIO by Forbes & Huffington Post. Most recently he was named “CIO of the Year” by the Milwaukee Business Journal.
Scott Jansen, Executive Vice President/Chief Operating Officer, Employ Milwaukee
Scott Jansen oversees the operations of Employ Milwaukee. He came to Employ Milwaukee in January 2017 from the State of Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development (DWD). He served as the Administrator of the Division of Employment & Training at DWD since August of 2013, working to build an educated and skilled workforce across Wisconsin through impactful programming and intentional partnerships. Prior to that, he was the first DWD Office of Skills Development Director, where he designed and implemented the Wisconsin Fast Forward Initiative. Jansen joined DWD after two years as the Talent Dividend Director for the Greater Milwaukee Committee. Prior to that, he spent 28 years with AT&T and retired as regional vice president of external affairs.
Kim Ehlert, Dean of the Business School at Waukesha County Technical College (WCTC)
Kim has been an information technology educator for the past 28 years teaching industry certification and networking technology courses. For the past ten years, Kim has served first as the Associate Dean of Business Information Technology and more recently as the Dean of the Business School at Waukesha County Technical College. This role includes the oversight and management of sixteen associate degrees and many professional development technical certificates taught by a team of 35 full time and 100 part time faculty members. Her accomplishments include demonstrated excellence in adult and higher education, staff development, grant writing and management, instructional design and leadership development. Through grant funding, Kim established the WCTC IT Student Center, which provides an experiential education and collaboration area for information technology students.
Kim graduated from the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee with a Bachelor’s degree in Management Information Systems and a Master’s in Business Administration. Her career has included providing technical support and education at Blunt, Ellis & Loewi, Johnson Controls, MIS Mequon, the City of Franklin and the Milwaukee School of Engineering. She has completed the Wisconsin Leadership Development Institute’s Leadership Academy and received the National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development Teaching Excellence award in 2005. Kim’s passion for education is reflected in her focus on student-centered learning and resource maximization.
Todd McLees, Founder and CEO of Pendio Group
Pendio Group is a management consulting firm in Milwaukee. Todd’s team builds frameworks to help organizations throughout the region implement strategies to scale faster. Todd is a strategic consultant to key members of Foxconn’s business unit responsible for manufacturing, production and distribution of their solutions. Pendio built the frameworks for the Supplier Readiness Program being used by Foxconn to identify high-performing suppliers in the region, enabling them to build the infrastructure of partners they need in Wisconsin. His team also built the frameworks for choosing ideal partners for joint solution development and Industry 4.0 initiatives. Todd is helping Foxconn build their ecosystem throughout our region with a particular emphasis on Smart Factory and Smart Office solutions.
Todd is an active member of the steering committee for HERA, the Higher Education Regional Alliance in Wisconsin. He volunteers his time applying lessons learned to the rapid growth that is possible for our economic region.
James Hischke, Director Tech Advancement & Outreach at Northwestern Mutual
James began his career as a software engineer at Strong Financial and has held a variety of positions in technology and process improvement at Northwestern Mutual over the last 14 years. He currently leads the Tech Advancement & Outreach division at Northwestern Mutual. James has an undergraduate degree in Computer Science from Carroll University and a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Marquette University.
Northwestern Mutual disrupted itself and began the digital transformation journey. NM’s commitment to its future success and the future success of the entire Milwaukee region will be heavily dependent upon technology talent. Our Tech Advancement and Outreach team is focused on growing the technology talent pool for the Milwaukee region and growing NM’s share of that technology talent. We believe that Milwaukee’s ability to thrive in the digital economy will provide NM an opportunity to continue as an industry leader, providing the best financial security to more clients through an ever increasingly digital experience.
There’s a lot of great up and coming talent in Milwaukee…we need to keep it here!
We believe there will be a large turnout for this event and advise you to register as early as possible, as space will be limited.
REGISTER NOW…
Looking forward to seeing you there!
Parking Information: