Recapping the 2016 Annual Conference: Sharing Solutions and Strategies.

• Position: News & Numbers - Conference news

Nearly 5,000 delegates, guests, and exhibitors, including 348 recipients of GFOAs first-time conference attendee scholarship, attended GFOA's 110th Annual Conference, Sharing Solutions and Strategies, in Toronto, Ontario, May 22-25, 2016.

PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS

GFOA President Heather Johnston explained how important it is for finance leaders to work toward making financial resiliency a reality in their offices, including the recruitment and retention of the next generation of leaders. The entire finance office should focus on developing the full potential of future finance officers, and not rely solely on the human resources department. Succession planning also plays a crucial role in creating a sustainable organization. Johnston challenged the audience to consider the future and how they will help new employees become tomorrow's financial leaders. The video of Johnston's speech is available at http://www.gfoa.org/toronto-summary.

KEYNOTE SPEECHES

Bruce Tulgan, who's written a number of books on workplace leadership and performance management, shared insights from his 23 years of interviews with employers and employees. His key finding--that the workforce is changing--is obvious, he acknowledged, explaining that the important thing is why and how it is changing. A number of perceived differences exist among the generations making up the workforce, and of course each generation grew up with different economic and technological experiences. "Didn't you grow up walking around with a supercomputer in your pocket?" he asked the audience. Tulgan ultimately recommended that leaders should emphasize critical thinking (how to extrapolate best practices and how to puzzle through a problem), people skills (being aware of how others work and conceptualize work), and attitude (how you project your inner beliefs to others). "Teach leaders to recommit to the fundamentals," he said, "and the future is yours."

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Researcher and professor Richard Florida, known for his work on urbanism, spoke at the second general session about the "tectonic" shift happening in society--a movement away from an industrial economy to one based on creativity. Metropolitan regions that have a higher concentration of technology workers, artists, musicians, and other creatives are correlated with a higher level of economic development, he explained. The farm and then the factory were once the organizing units of the economy, Florida said...