Registration will be from 7:30AM to 8AM, event will begin promptly at 8AM.
Succession problems rarely begin when a key leader announces they are leaving. They often begin years earlier, when organizations promote based on technical performance, avoid difficult conversations, rely on assumptions, or wait too long to intentionally prepare the people who will be responsible for what comes next.
But succession planning is not only a process problem. It is also a leadership headspace problem.
These decisions can trigger loyalty, fear, uncertainty, personal attachment and resistance to change. When that happens, even experienced leaders can default to what feels comfortable rather than what the evidence is telling them.
This candid, practical conversation will explore how leaders can first get themselves into the right headspace to make better people decisions and then use behavioral insight, emotional intelligence and objective evidence to determine who is ready, who has potential, and where development must occur before a critical role becomes vacant.
Succession planning is not simply about replacing leaders when they leave. It is about building the talent, business acumen and leadership capacity an organization needs to thrive in the future. HR plays a key role by bringing thoughtful talent assessments, challenging assumptions and helping leadership teams and boards evaluate not only who might be ready next, but who may be needed three, five or even ten years from now as business strategies, technology and workforce needs continue to evolve. For some organizations, that conversation may also include employee ownership as a succession strategy, requiring leaders to think beyond identifying a single successor and instead create an environment where people can grow, take on greater responsibility and contribute in new ways over time. Succession planning is not linear. It is a continual dance of assessing readiness, potential, organizational needs and evolving business priorities. Leaders must continually evaluate talent through both a current and future lens, recognizing that what got us here may not get us where we need to go.
Participants Will Leave With:
- A better understanding of how emotion, familiarity and personal bias can influence succession and promotion decisions.
- Practical strategies for getting into a more intentional, objective headspace before making high-stakes people decisions.
- A clearer distinction between technical performance, leadership potential and actual readiness.
- A stronger understanding of what the leader of the future will need to look like, especially as AI, technology and rapidly changing work environments reshape roles, expectations and decision-making.
- A framework for allowing evidence - not comfort, history or assumption - to guide leadership decisions.
- Greater awareness that effective succession requires developing future leaders and organizational stewardship, while recognizing that the leader who was right for yesterday may not be the leader needed for tomorrow.
- Questions you can immediately take back to your organization to begin more intentional conversations about succession and future leadership.
Meet our Presenters:
Amanda DeVito (Facilitator)
Amanda DeVito is Butler/Till’s Chief Marketing Officer, responsible for driving strategic thinking, creative solutions, and innovation across the agency. As CMO she is integral in setting the future course of the agency. Amanda has 20+years of experience assisting clients, agencies and brands generate effective results. Her four key competencies are: Business/Disruption strategy; Marketing/Communication strategy; Growth/Innovation strategy; Leadership/DEIB strategy. She has vertical expertise in healthcare, financial services, automotive, retail, B2B and technology. Amanda came to Butler/Till from Alterian (now SDL), where she was a key player in a start-up success story and recipient of its Global Excellence Award.
She has a bachelor’s degree in Communications and Journalism and graduated Magna Cum Laude from St. John Fisher College. She recently also completed an Executive MBA from Rochester Institute of Technology. She was nominated by her EMBA peers for the Donna Scheid Leadership award and is part of the Beta Gamma Sigma Honor’s Society.
Currently she is an Advisory Board Member of Ownership America. Amanda also belongs to Chief, a private membership network focused on connecting and supporting women executive leaders.
Amanda has spoken at St. John Fisher College, Rochester Institute of Technology, Roberts Wesleyan College, the American Marketing Association, ClickZ, the National Center for Employee Ownership, Step Up, the Direct Marketing Association, the Rochester Advertising Federation, MediaPost, Digital Innovation Week, and the Epsilon Conference. She loves her family, and her hobbies include snowboarding, golf, and paddle boarding.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/amandadevito/
Joan Graci
Joan Graci is a nationally recognized leadership strategist, workforce development advocate, and founder of APA Solutions, a brain-based consulting firm that helps organizations strengthen leadership, improve communication, and build high-performing cultures.
For more than three decades, Joan has partnered with manufacturers, construction firms, financial institutions, healthcare organizations, and service-based businesses across New York State to develop leaders, improve employee engagement, and create sustainable workforce strategies. Her work with manufacturing organizations has helped leaders navigate workforce shortages, succession planning, employee retention, change management, and leadership development while improving organizational performance and bottom-line results. She has worked alongside manufacturers ranging from family-owned operations to large multi-site organizations, helping leaders address the people challenges that directly impact productivity, safety, quality, retention, and growth.
As an advocate for leading with the brain in mind, Joan integrates the latest neuroscience research into practical business applications. She is known for translating complex human behavior into actionable strategies that increase self-awareness, strengthen emotional intelligence, improve stress management, and enhance team effectiveness. Her engaging and highly interactive approach enables leaders to better understand how people think, communicate, and perform under pressure.
Joan's brain-based training and coaching programs have been implemented by organizations throughout New York State, resulting in stronger leadership pipelines, increased employee engagement, improved workplace relationships, and measurable business outcomes. Her work has helped organizations build more resilient cultures, develop next-generation leaders, and create workplaces where people and performance thrive together. Driven by her passion for workforce development and the future of work, Joan is also the founder of
Be Your Own Hero (BYOH), a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to connecting education to employment through self-awareness, career exploration, and empowerment. Through BYOH, Joan continues to help students, educators, employers, and communities prepare the next generation of talent for success in an evolving workforce.
Tracy Till
Entrepreneur, Board Governance Specialist & Employee Ownership Advocate
Tracy Till is an accomplished entrepreneur, executive, and board governance specialist recognized for her pioneering work in employee ownership and business longevity. As the co-founder and former co-CEO of Butler/Till, a major marketing and communications agency, she built an enterprise from humble beginnings into a 100% Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP), B-Corp, and WBENC certified women-owned business. Today, she leverages her deep expertise in exit strategy alignment, executive compensation, and leadership continuity to guide business owners through seamless transitions via her consultancy, T4 Verge, Inc.
Succession & Exit Strategy Expertise
A hallmark of Till’s career is her masterful execution of collaborative succession plans driven by partner timelines. When navigating the eventual exit of herself and her co-founder, Sue Butler, Till rejected standard third-party sales that might compromise the company’s core culture. Instead, they designed a multi-stage exit strategy structured around both partners' long-term personal timelines and operational readiness.
- Timeline-Driven Continuity: Developed a gradual transition framework that allowed both co-founders to step down from day-to-day operations at their own pace, moving from co-CEOs to board governance roles without disrupting agency operations.
- The ESOP as a Succession Vehicle: Leveraged a 100% ESOP structure to reward long-term employees, preserve corporate values, and achieve tax-free capital gains while ensuring a stable, internal leadership handoff.
- Humanizing the Transition: Championed the branding of the ESOP in accessible language, translating technical corporate equity into an "ownership culture" that incoming owner-successors could easily embrace and sustain. Corporate Leadership & Board Governance
- Founder & Former Chair/Vice-Chair, Butler/Till: Co-founded the firm in 1998, steering its trajectory to land on the Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing private companies for seven consecutive years and earning a spot as an Ad Age National Best Place to Work.
- President, T4 Verge, Inc.: Leads a boutique advisory practice specializing in advising women-owned firms and privately held organizations on governance, culture, and business evolution.
- Independent Board Director: Delivers strategic oversight on compensation, succession planning, and structural transformations for multiple companies, including Threaded Fasteners, Inc. and Campbell & Company.
- Academic & Non-Profit Governance: Serves on the Advisory Board for Rutgers University's Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing and campaigns for local business continuity as a Community Advocate for EO/ROC.
Education, Honors & Accolades
- Awards: Recipient of the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) 2020 Herbert W. Vanden Brul Entrepreneurial Award, the ADDY's Silver Achievement Award, and recognized as an EY Entrepreneur of the Year Finalist.
- Education: B.A. in Journalism & Business from the University of South Carolina-Columbia; alumnus of SUNY Canton and Penfield High School.
Thank you to our Sponsors:
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