A Night to Remember: All In Together’s Fourth Annual Rising Voices Forum
How often do young (or aspiring) professionals get to pose their most burning career questions to the people leading hiring and workforce strategy at major companies? We created that opportunity at our annual Rising Voices forum. We moved past the generic advice and really focused on what it takes to build a career in 2026. Leave a comment to join the conversation.
The Human Resources heads providing real insights from Wiley, Moody’s, Etsy, and Lord Abbot
What We Learned About “Making Change at Work and Beyond
Stay curious. Toni Thompson, the former CHRO at Etsy, shouted out curiosity as a hero skill.
Figure out how you stand out from the crowd. People often assume it’s best to just do what is asked of you in a new workplace. However, we learned that you have to be willing to show up and speak up in rooms where you might feel like an outsider to truly stand out. Growth doesn’t happen in your comfort zone; it happens when you embrace the awkwardness of learning on the fly.
Leverage your unique perspectives, rather than blend in with workplace expectations. Maral Kazanjian, CHRO of Moody’s made a powerful point saying, “The future is in the people who are just starting out, because they can go in so many different directions.” Your most valuable tools are the things that make you different; your ability to adapt allows organizations to stay fresh and keep up with today’s ever-shifting trends.
Or as Toni put it: “Know where your strengths lie, know what your skills are, and be able to articulate them into a story. How did you gain them? What skills do you actually enjoy leveraging more than others? And how do they fit in the current landscape of the company that you’re entering?”
In spite of all the articles about how bad the early career landscape is, our experts were actually jealous of young people. They were excited about the opportunities that today’s new workers will have.
All in, what we’re taking away is the focus on finding your individual skills and marketing them. Figure out what distinguishes you from others (and AI) and make sure you’re leading with that.
Mayor of Hoboken Emily Jabbour
Consider Jobs in Public Service
The wisdom didn’t stop with our corporate leaders. To truly make your mark, we recognize that professional life intersects with civic duty and community development. During “New Jersey Women Lead” our CEO, Lauren Leader, had an inspiring conversation with Hoboken Mayor, Emily Jabbour, on her path to politics. They discussed the moments that activated them, giving them the motivation to stand up and make a change. Here’s what we learned:
Anyone can be a leader. Mayor Jabbour recounts her decision to run for City Council saying “I had every explanation to say ‘No, I’m not qualified enough’ or ‘I’m not prepared enough.’ But now, I would go back and say to myself, to trust your gut a little more.” Your life can be your expertise. We all have unique experiences that shape us and the skills we build from everyday life can often translate into leadership.
Find what drives you. Whether it’s an emotion, a specific issue, or an experience; there’s something that motivates you to move forward.
Leadership isn’t about having all the answers. It’s about having the courage to stay engaged with people and meet them where they’re at.
How Do You Actually Find Your Niche?
Dr. Lilian Ajayi Ore can has the answer. In order to make any of the above advice work, you first need to put in the work to define your story and your skillset. In her new book, Dr. Lilian Ajayi Ore, lecturer at Columbia SPS and CEO of Global Connections for Women, outlines how you can intentionally design your life and career. She designed a tool called the “Prowess Map” (which you can check out in her book The Learning Mindset), a strategic plan for career growth that emphasizes continuous learning. While you’ll have to read the book to get the full experience, you can cultivate your own WIN Mindset, which perfectly encapsulates everything we learned through the Forum.
Cultivate your WIN Mindset
W = Willingness to learn
Dr. Ore argued that the most successful professionals in 2026 are those who view their careers as a constant learning loop. Instead of feeling pressure to “know it all,” you should focus on your capacity to “learn it all.”
I = Intentionality
Intentionality is about taking ownership and deciding what you need to do to succeed. Instead of leaving things up to chance, take initiative and create the life you want to live.
N = Nurturing
It’s important to take care of yourself first. When you’re done, spread that care to the person next to you. Cultivate a healthy environment for all of us, so we can succeed together.
You don’t need to be a finished product. By mapping out your unique skills, pivot points, and values, you can stop chasing every opportunity that comes your way and start focusing on the ones that actually align with your long-term vision.
The Value of Being in the Room
Events like Rising Voices don’t come around often. It’s one thing to read a LinkedIn post about “the future of work,” it’s another thing entirely to be in a room where the people actually making those decisions in hiring, investing, and governing are talking directly to you, telling you what they look for, what they wish they’d known, and how they’ve stumbled and recovered. Rising Voices helps build a pipeline by investing in the people who are just getting started. One of our attendees stated how she was drawn to the event’s focus on curiosity as a strength in the workplace. She said the event provided her with “A better understanding of how rapidly the workforce is changing, and how important it is to be able to adapt to new environments.” By connecting with young people and fostering their talents early, we encourage the life-long learning efforts that our speakers each highlighted.
This is emblematic of all of our programming at All In Together. We create rooms of people who would never meet anywhere else, and showcase how learning and change can come from the most unexpected places. We invest in relationship and community building, and watch the results unfold. If you want to see more rooms like this, consider supporting our work.
