Speakers

Jeff Bardwell serves as OPM’s Acting Deputy Associate Director for Strategic Workforce Planning. He leads a team that guides, enables, and assesses workforce strategy and planning across federal departments and agencies. This includes closing skill gaps; supporting workforce transformation efforts; administering the world's largest employment survey; and using evidence-based policy, forecasting, and data analytics to drive enterprise workforce priorities.

Prior to this role, Mr. Bardwell spent 15 years with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in increasing roles of responsibility within the acquisition workforce.

Mr. Bardwell holds the degrees of Master of Public Administration from George Mason University, Bachelor of Arts in Communication Studies with a minor in Political Science from American University, and Associate in Applied Science in Business Management from Northern Virginia Community College.  Mr. Bardwell is certified in federal contracting and program management. He is a graduate of the DHS Management Directorate’s NextGen leadership development program, the President’s Management Council Interagency Rotation Program, and the ACT-IAC Partners program for industry-government communication and leadership development.
 

Ms. Andrea J. Bright serves as the Assistant Commissioner, Office of Human Resources Management, Enterprise Services, U.S. Customs and Border Protection. In this role, her priority is to provide a premiere employee experience from recruiting through retirement. She is responsible for all aspects of human resources services, including recruitment and hiring, benefits, survivor advocacy, workplace safety, personnel research, executive services, human resources business systems, labor and employee relations, and employee engagement. Ms. Bright is accountable for directing the quality and delivery of these services to more than 60,000 nationally and internationally dispersed, uniformed, and non-uniformed employees who comprise the largest law enforcement agency in the United States.

Prior to serving as Assistant Commissioner, Ms. Bright served as the Chief Human Capital Officer and Chief Learning Officer at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), where she was responsible for overseeing all human resources functions and services for the agency. Ms. Bright also served in a variety of key leadership positions at OPM, including Deputy Associate Director for Human Resources Management/Deputy Chief Human Capital Officer, Deputy Human Resources Director, and Manager of Classification and Assessment Policy.

Ms. Bright completed graduate coursework in Industrial/Organizational Psychology at George Washington University, where she was a Presidential Merit Fellow.  She also holds a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology, with a minor in English, from the University of Houston.

Dr. Cassandra C. Lewis serves as the Acting Deputy Director and Provost of the Foreign Service Institute. In this capacity she is leading FSI’s efforts to build a culture of learning and assessment in FSI and across the Department. Prior to joining FSI, Dr. Lewis was the Chancellor and Dean of Faculty and Academic Programs at the National Defense University (NDU) College of Information and Cyberspace (CIC). As a member of NDU’s senior leadership executive council and chief administrator of CIC’s academic programs, with responsibility for financial, facilities, and personnel management, Dr. Lewis was instrumental in strategic planning and coordination of University initiatives. She maintained relationships with partner NDU components, U.S. government agencies, the private sector, international allies and Department of Defense and civilian educational institutions and universities and has engaged in international capacity building on the behalf of the University.

During her leadership, CIC’s academic programs and curricula continued to be rigorous, relevant, and of high quality, to effectively fulfill its mission; and the College continues to be recognized as an institution of choice for education, scholarship, and thought leadership in cyber and information. Her track record and involvement in government, academia, industry, and the non-profit sector reflect her commitment to leader development, educational innovation, and building a resilient workforce.

Dr. Lewis holds a Bachelor’s degree in the Interdisciplinary Social Sciences/ International Studies from the State University of New York at Buffalo; Master’s degree in Higher Education from Boston College; a Ph.D. in Education Policy from the University of Maryland, College Park; and a Certificate in Executive Leadership Coaching from Georgetown University.

Todd Simpson is the NCUA’s Chief Information Officer. In this role, he is responsible for leading NCUA’s IT workforce, establishing the agency’s IT strategy and roadmap, and safeguarding, operating, and maintaining its technology resources.

Mr. Simpson’s experience includes serving as Chief Information Officer of the Food and Drug Administration, Associate Chief Information Officer of the Department of Transportation, Chief Product Officer of the Department of Health and Human Services, and Deputy Assistant Secretary for IT Operations, Development and Security of the Department of Veterans Affairs. Most recently, he served as the Staff Vice President, Technology, Engineering and Operations for Elevance Health.

A veteran, Mr. Simpson served three years of active duty and three years in an active reserve capacity in the United States Air Force.

Mr. Simpson holds a Master of Science degree in Information Systems from Drexel University and a Master of Science degree in Public Administration from The Ohio State University. He also holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Resources Management from The Ohio State University.

Alex Snider is the Program Manager for the White House Leadership Development Program at the General Service Administration and a contributing writer for Psychology Today. Previously, he led strategy for the President’s Management Agenda, helping shape how government improves service and trust through cross-agency collaboration.

Alex spent the first decade of his career at the U.S. Department of State, working on anti-corruption, democracy, counterterrorism, and Africa policy. He holds degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service. He’s also worked in the World Bank, US Mission to the UN, and for Senator Chris Murphy.

He writes about mindfulness, urgency culture, and the emotional life of public service on Substack Slow Mindfulness—you can subscribe here to follow his latest posts.

A certified meditation and authentic relating instructor in-training, Alex leads weekly gatherings in Washington, DC, and co-founded Mindful Fed, a cross-government mindfulness community. Learn more at slowmindfulness.com or follow him on Instagram @slowmindfulness.

Greg has spent over 20 years providing enterprise software to the federal government, state and local government, and systems integrators. Based in Washington DC, Greg has earned a trusted advisor role to the Public Sector for DocuSign, Icertis, and currently acts as Director of Public Sector at Egnyte.
 

Alex Ortiz serves as the Federal Client Manager for the Department of Defense, Department of
Energy, and the Federal Reserve System at Handshake. In this role, he is responsible for
managing partnership relationships with Handshake’s customers at these departments and
agencies, identifying their strategic priorities for early career talent acquisition and branding, and
ensuring Handshake delivers strong results aligned with their top talent initiatives. Alex is
accountable for helping his federal customers fill mission critical occupations, drive brand
engagement and perception shifts with Gen-Z, increase efficiency and return on investment on
all recruitment activities, build a highly-qualified workforce, and create data-driven recruitment
strategies. Prior to serving as Federal Client Manager, Alex worked with Handshake’s private-
sector clients, including HR and Talent Acquisition leaders in the Fortune 100 seeking interns
and recent graduates from colleges and universities nationwide. Alex holds a Bachelor’s degree
in Neuroscience, with a minor in Chemistry, from the University of Miami.
 

Katie Tobin joined Google in 2021 as the Head of Workspace Innovation for Google Public Sector. In this role, she helps federal and international customers to achieve their missions in new and creative ways using Google Workspace.  Before joining Google, Katie spent over a decade in the Intelligence Community. As Director of the Lateral Innovation Division at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, she led a team that helped innovators across the IC build their skills, navigate bureaucracy, learn from their failures, and share their successes. Before this role, she spent over four years at the Central Intelligence Agency, creating technology tools and experiences to support analysts as they craft complex information into compelling messages. She is also an accomplished triathlete and has represented Team USA at world championship races in Europe and North America.

Edward Graham is a technology reporter for Nextgov/FCW, where he reports on national security technologies and policies, the Department of Veterans Affairs and election security issues. He received his master’s degree in Journalism and Public Affairs from American University in 2016.