Speakers

SHATTERING LIMITATIONS AND DARING TO THRIVE

Dima Ghawi’s story of personal transformation encourages audiences to confront and conquer internal limitations. As she recounts her own struggles and triumphs, her vulnerability and insight sparks light for attendees’ own journey of self-discovery.

Dima dares individuals to examine at their own internal limitations, such as the pursuit of perfection, the fear of failure or being judged. She then equips audience members with the tools and courage it takes to shatter those limitations and emerge as empowered individuals.

Audiences will learn:

• The importance of self-awareness and how effective personal leadership starts from within.
• How conscious professionals lead to better teamwork, enhanced communication, and an improvement in the overall organizational culture.
• How internal limitations inhibit individuals from performing at their best and advancing professionally.

Key attendee takeaways:

• Elevate employee engagement and team morale by encouraging risk-taking and increasing individual self-awareness.
• Shattering internal limitations creates more confident and conscious leaders.
• By increasing courage in organizations, creativity and innovation also increases, improving the bottom-line results.

HARNESSING THE POWER OF AN INCLUSIVE WORK CULTURE 

Creating a culture of inclusion is no longer a “nice to have.” It is essential for recruiting, engaging, and retaining top talent. It is a competitive advantage of any company. In this keynote, Dima Ghawi shares findings gathered over decades of conducting hundreds of interviews and workplace surveys on how to create a welcoming and inclusive workforce. Dima’s real-life experiences with organizations around the world, as well as her unique and fascinating upbringing in the Middle East, bring to life for audiences the critical importance of diversity and inclusion.

Through powerful storytelling and personal narratives, she deconstructs conscious and unconscious biases, guiding attendees to address common workplace resistance to DEI. She teaches leaders that increasing inclusion creates a safe and healthy culture. More than picture-perfect diversity, this presentation shows audience members how to foster a sense of inclusion within their workspace.

Audiences will learn:

• How to create a safe and inclusive workplace culture
• The meaning of unconscious bias and its effect in the workplace
• What diverse employees are looking for and how to integrate these needs into management styles

Key attendee takeaways:

• The insight of a bottom-up approach, the influence of courageous office culture, and the power of affinity groups.
• What diverse employees are looking for and receive actionable tips to create a courageous and integrative workplace culture.
• How to create a more productive, engaging, and inclusive workplace for all.

INSPIRING BOLD LEADERSHIP & CREATING ENGAGED EMPLOYEES 

Employees in healthy cultures thrive. These cultures are created and passed down, inherited by the next generation of employees. The strongest leaders know to focus on a long-term strategy with an emphasis on corporate culture health for future generations to sustain.

For decades Dima Ghawi worked with Fortune 20 corporations and diverse teams around the world. Through her work in 19 countries with IBM in Leadership Training and Development, she gained critical insights into leading across global teams. She recognized that bold leadership, employee engagement, and DEI were not only inextricably linked, but they were also important across cultures.

Her experience has given her deep insights in how to be an effective leader in the global age:

• START WITH TRUST TO BUILD RELATIONSHIPS: Trust is the basis for nearly all healthy relationships, and getting it starts with giving it.
• HIGHLIGHT SIMILARITIES: It’s easy to focus on cultural differences, but leaders must understand their team and pay attention to universal similarities.
• BE ADAPTABLE: Leaders must be able to adapt quickly to their team’s cultures and find what they value.

Audiences will learn:

• The wisest leaders recognize that corporate culture is learned and passed down to the next group of employees.
• The strongest leaders prioritize healthy employer/employee connection, and healthy, connected cultures produce connected, engaged employees.
• That inspired, courageous leadership involves assuming the responsibility of modeling and teaching healthy culture to create their organization’s next generation.

Key attendee takeaways:

• Disconnected employees diminish productivity and innovation, and this disconnection can be a significant factor in their leaving an organization – or worse yet, staying.
• Incorporating long-term strategies for the next generation of employees to adopt healthy culture is critical for sustained growth
• Creating a shared confidence in the future and a culture of belonging, connection, and inclusion are key to employee engagement

Dima is a dynamic speaker, and her energy is contagious. As the keynote speaker for the Maximizing Millennial Minds (M3) Conference, she shared insightful information about engaging with millennials and generation Z in the workplace. Her presentation was backed by industry research, yet humanized by interesting personal anecdotes. Dima emphasized the importance of being nimble in order to harness the talents and attract the interests of future generations. Her practical advice and candor as she delivered "How To Future-Proof Your Company: Engaging Gen Y to Z" is just what we needed to hear! And, the feedback has been great. It was my absolute pleasure to work with Dima, and I look forward to working with her again in the very near future.

DIRECTOR OF OUTREACH & ALUMNI ENGAGEMENT, GOLDMAN SACHS 10,000 SMALL BUSINESSES

Delgado Community College faculty and staff took both a personal and professional journey with Dima at our Spring Convocation. She inspired us to climb mountains! She shared her experience as an international student and how her professors engaged and inspired her. Delgado colleagues have been impressed enough to commit to making positive changes in themselves and promote change in other faculty and students.

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, LOUISIANA RESEARCH PARK CORPORATION

Dima is one of the most thought provoking speakers I've heard. I have been the Program Chair for ABWA booking our monthly speakers for the last 2 years, so I have heard a lot of motivational speakers. Dima's charisma, passion, and true life experiences captured everyone in the room's attention and respect. It is obvious to me why so many people vie for her mentorship. I am eagerly anticipating the next opportunity I have to learn from her.

VICE PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS, NEW JERSEY BANKERS ASSOCIATION

Dima presented her "Shattering Limitations" workshop to the Visit Baton Rouge staff. She did an amazing job engaging everyone and capturing their attention. Dima's courageous leadership journey is inspiring and the skills that she teaches are immeasurably valuable. She is an expert in leadership development, and inspires her audience to take action to advance personally and professionally. Dima's presentation was truly compelling and the response she elicited from was incredible. We look forward to seeing the positive outcome in our organization.

CEO | CREATIVE DIRECTOR, BE THE FOCUS

Whether Dima is presenting to hundreds or a group of twenty, she has the ability to connect instantly and intimately with her audience. She has a true gift of audience engagement. It never feels like Dima is just talking to us. She's actually interacting and engaging with the audience—she and the audience feed off of each other's energy. Within seconds of every speech I've attended, we're all on the edge of our seats as she takes us on a journey of leadership, employee engagement, confidence and self-discovery. Break that vase!

MARKETING DIRECTOR, LOUISIANA SBDC

Members of Greater Baton Rouge SHRM (GBR SHRM) had the awesome opportunity to have Dima Ghawi kickoff our year for 2017. The feedback from our members and attendees was excellent! Dima has a great way of storytelling with both humor and inspiration and takes the participants on a journey with her. Even while discussing important leadership topics, the presentation was delivered in an engaging way that kept the attendees interested. While inspirational, the audience was motivated to take action to be great leaders for their organizations.

VICE PRESIDENT, VISIT BATON ROUGE, OFFICIAL TRAVEL RESOURCE

Dima inspires everyone she meets. We need more people to catch her energy and passion.

CEO, PELICAN STATE CREDIT UNION

Life changing speech. Thanks for this great perspective.
DIRECTOR, PANERA BREAD