Agenda

Badge Pick Up and On-Site Registration  |  7:00am – 3:30pm

Breakfast Briefing Sponsored by ExxonMobil   |  Years in the Making: Inspiring Stories of Conservation that Endure |  7:30 – 8:50am

• Ashley Fox, Associate Environmental Advisor, OPG
• Timothy Pylate, Executive Director, Armand Bayou Nature Center
• Megan Gutierrez, Coordinator, Certification, Tandem Global (Moderator)

Big conservation wins don’t happen overnight; they’re built through years of persistence, collaboration, and a willingness to keep showing up. In this session, you’ll hear two powerful stories of what long-term commitment can achieve. One explores the transformation of Gulf Coast land from a threatened landscape into one of the largest urban wilderness preserves in Texas, made possible by decades of protection and a landmark expansion. The other follows the ongoing effort to restore Atlantic salmon to Lake Ontario, where sustained partnerships, habitat restoration, and careful monitoring are helping bring a species back home.

Different ecosystems, different challenges, but a common thread: progress that only happens when corporations, communities, and partners stay engaged for the long haul.

Exhibit Hall Open  |  8:00am – 4:00pm

Mainstage Keynote Presentation   |  AI at the Center: How Chief Sustainability Officers are Leveraging Technology to Advance Climate and Nature Goals |  9:00 – 10:00am

• Bill Cobb, VP and Chief Sustainability Officer, Freeport-McMoRan
• Eunice Heath, SVP and Chief Sustainability Officer, CRH
• Emilio Tenuta, SVP and Chief Sustainability Officer, Ecolab
• Margaret O’Gorman, CEO, Tandem Global (Moderator)

As artificial intelligence rapidly reshapes global business, chief sustainability officers are navigating both unprecedented opportunity and heightened responsibility. In this mainstage conversation, three CSOs from leading corporate members of Tandem Global share how AI is transforming their operational models, accelerating climate and nature initiatives, and reshaping expectations from investors, regulators, and customers.

From emissions reduction and supply‑chain transparency to biodiversity assessment and nature-positive strategy, they’ll explore where AI is already unlocking value—and where risks, blind spots, and governance challenges still remain. This session offers an insider’s view into how sustainability leaders are preparing their organizations for an AI-enabled future while ensuring environmental integrity stays at the core.

Session  |  10:00 – 11:30am

Building for Bees Workshop: Supporting Pollinators the Right Way

• Andy Grinstead, Senior Conservation Manager, Pollinator Partnership
• Sara Wittenberg, Bee Friendly Gardening Manager, Pollinator Partnership
• Delainey Williams, Manager, Certification, Tandem Global (Moderator)

What starts as a simple act, installing a bee house, can quickly become something much more complex. As pollinator habitats gain popularity around workplaces and project sites, they’ve become powerful symbols of environmental commitment. But behind their growing appeal lies an important question: are we helping, or unintentionally causing harm?

In this hands-on workshop with Pollinator Partnership, participants will explore how bee houses can be used effectively to support native bees, moving from intention to informed action. Attendees will have the option to design and build their own take-home bee house or simply participate in the session to learn what these structures are meant to do, common pitfalls to avoid, and how thoughtful decisions around materials, placement, and maintenance can support pollinator health.

Concurrent Sessions  (there are 2 concurrent sessions during this time)  |  10:00 – 10:50m

Seeding Success: What High-Impact Conservation Partnerships Get Right

• Sherrell Cordas, Community Relations Manager, WM
• Joseph Plappert, Urban Wildlife Biologist, Texas Parks and Wildlife Dept
• Alexandra Hofner, Senior Manager, Social Impact, Tandem Global (Moderator)

Good partnerships can make conservation projects easier, stronger, and more likely to last, but they don’t just happen on their own. This session looks at what it takes to build and maintain partnerships that work.

Speakers from WM and the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department will share real examples from WHC-Certified programs, including how they’ve worked with community partners to plan projects, solve challenges during implementation, and keep efforts going over time. You’ll hear what’s worked, what hasn’t, and what they’d do differently.

The session will also draw from a long-running partnership between a manufacturing site in southern San Antonio and state wildlife biologists. Together, they’ve tackled projects like pollinator gardens, grassland restoration, Texas Horned Lizard conservation, Loggerhead Shrike monitoring, and invasive species control, while also connecting with nearby communities through outreach and education.

From Turf to Habitat: Turning Corporate Land into a Strategic Asset

• Amy Beasley, Associate Sustainability Director, Water and Nature, DOW
• Dr. Sara Phelps, Senior Research Scientist, Ducks Unlimited
• Nate Terra, Senior Analyst, Property Services Strategy, Toyota
• Hannah Tailor, Senior Manager, Certification, Tandem Global (Moderator)

What if your corporate footprint could deliver measurable biodiversity gains, not just curb appeal? Across industries, companies are rethinking land management, moving beyond maintenance to unlock real environmental and business value. From campuses to industrial sites, everyday landscapes are becoming powerful levers for nature-positive impact.

This session explores how organizations are scaling enterprise land management through strategic partnerships and on-the-ground action. You’ll hear how companies are restoring biodiversity across complex sites, training landscaping teams to support native ecosystems, and setting ambitious targets that drive measurable results.

Walk away with practical strategies to align internal teams, activate partners, and transform underutilized land into thriving, resilient habitats.

Concurrent Sessions  (there are 2 concurrent sessions during this time)  |  11:00 – 11:50m

Where Nature Meets People: The Human Dimension of Conservation

• Carolyn Jewell, Senior Manager Biodiversity and Natural Resources, CRH
• Karin Perissinotto, Sustainability Manager, CalPortland
• Rob Campbell, Senior Director, Consulting, Tandem Global (Moderator)

Integrating nature into everyday work can create meaningful benefits that go beyond metrics – supporting people, culture, and the ecosystems we depend on. This session explores the often-unseen ripple effects of biodiversity initiatives, from industrial sites to corporate offices. Participants will hear real-world stories of how thoughtfully designed nature projects can foster wellbeing, strengthen workplace culture, and inspire new forms of collaboration across teams.

Alongside these examples, the discussion will highlight how internal networks and communities of practice can amplify impact, turning site-level action into organization-wide momentum.

Early Warning Systems: Using Biodiversity To Anticipate and Manage Risk

• Jorge Calderón, Head of Strategic Ecosystems, The Earth Lab
• Julie Stanford, CEO, eDNA Explorer
• David Strelneck, BeeOdiversity
• Shaun Clark, Senior Consultant, Tandem Global (Moderator)

Nature often signals stress long before it shows up in business reports or climate disclosures. Across unique landscapes, teams are using innovative monitoring tools to track changes in real time. Bees have become data collectors, carrying pollen that reveals plant diversity, pesticide exposure, and contamination across thousands of acres. Environmental DNA (eDNA) allows scientists to detect the presence of microbes, providing a scalable view of ecosystem health over time.

By integrating these approaches with local knowledge and community partnerships, organizations can identify stress points in habitats, guide targeted restoration actions, and even predict environmental impacts before they cascade into financial, operational, or social risk. This session shows how translating ecological signals into actionable intelligence transforms how companies and communities respond to emerging challenges, shifting from reactive management to informed, proactive decision-making.

Lunch and Mainstage Presentation |  State of Corporate Conservation   |  12:00 – 1:30pm

• Margaret O’Gorman, CEO, Tandem Global

Concurrent Sessions  (there are 2 concurrent sessions during this time)  |  2:00 – 3:00pm

Beyond Gray Infrastructure: Nature-based Solutions That Deliver

• Jenni Harris, Geospatial and Sustainability SME, BP
• Dr. Richard Kline, Professor, The University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley
• Justin McInnis, President and CEO, TEXSAR
• Abigail McBride, Consultant, Tandem Global (Moderator)

Nature-based solutions are moving from concept to necessity; but execution is where many organizations stall. What does it actually take to operationalize them at scale?

This session brings together perspectives from nonprofit, corporate, and academic sectors to explore how these approaches are being applied across different contexts. From disaster response and community preparedness in Texas to the use of digital tools that integrate nature into day-to-day operational decisions, speakers will share how organizations are embedding nature into both strategy and action.

The discussion will also explore emerging research on artificial reefs as blue carbon systems, revealing how marine infrastructure can simultaneously support carbon storage and biodiversity. Together, these examples illustrate how nature-based solutions can move beyond concept to deliver measurable impact for both people and the planet.

Stories Behind the Metrics: Nature at Scale

• Grace Saunders, Trinity Consultants
• James Stewart, Director of Environmental, Governmental and Community Affairs, ASARCO
• Rickie White, Director of Corporate Engagement, NatureServe
• Josiane Bonneau, Manager, Nature Programs, Freeport-McMoRan (Moderator)

How do you turn complex ecological data into meaningful action? This session follows the journey from field measurements to strategic decision-making, showing how organizations are making biodiversity data actionable at scale.

Speakers will share real-world case studies, from establishing baselines on individual sites to analyzing net impact across regions and illustrate how emerging universal metrics can guide nature-positive decisions. Participants will hear where measurements succeed and fall short, and how companies are bridging the gap between numbers and on-the-ground impact.

Through practical examples and discussion, attendees will see how robust, scalable biodiversity frameworks can move beyond reporting, becoming a powerful tool to shape strategy, track progress, and deliver tangible conservation outcomes.

Networking Break Sponsored by ExxonMobil   |  3:00 – 3:30pm

Sessions (there are 2 concurrent sessions during this time)  |  3:45 – 4:30pm

Biodiversity-Based Site Prioritization: Practical Tools for Smarter Development and Restoration Decisions  – Sponsored Content Presented by Ramboll 

• Dr. Alison Anastasio, Managing Consultant, Biodiversity and Ecology, Ramboll
• Dr. Lis Castillo Nelis, Principal, Ecology and Biodiversity, Environment & Health, Ramboll
• Dan Rockefeller, Managing Consultant, Environment & Health, Ramboll
• Emilia Stepinski, Sr Managing Consultant, Environment & Health, Ramboll

Biodiversity-based site prioritization is becoming increasingly important for organizations looking to reduce risk and meet sustainability goals. When applied at different scales and throughout a project’s lifecycle, it helps guide better decisions for both development and restoration. For example, prioritizing between sites can highlight areas with lower biodiversity value that may be more suitable for development. Within a site, prioritization can inform project design by helping teams avoid high-quality habitats and sensitive ecosystems.

This presentation will explore practical tools and methodologies for biodiversity-based site prioritization at multiple scales, demonstrate how prioritization underpins the mitigation hierarchy, and illustrate how these approaches can be effectively integrated into planning, engineering, and sustainable decision-making.

The Ecology of Microhabitats: Small-Scale Conservation with Big Results

• AJ McDonald, Process Technology Engineer, W.R. Grace & Co.
• Kailey Miller Davis, Senior Manager, Social Impact, WM
• Daniel Goldfarb, Director, Ecological Restoration, Tandem Global (Moderator)

Not every conservation project starts with hundreds of acres. Sometimes impact begins in overlooked corners: a seasonal pond beside an industrial site, a microforest along an urban riverbank, or a pollinator habitat woven into everyday operations.

This session explores how companies are transforming small, underutilized spaces into thriving ecosystems that support amphibians, pollinators, birds, and other wildlife. Through real-world examples, speakers will share how microhabitats are delivering measurable biodiversity benefits and creating new opportunities for employee and community engagement. Attendees will leave with practical insights into how small-scale habitat projects can become powerful tools for conservation.

Why Some Voices Win: The Real Rules of Influence at Work – Keynote and Reception: A Tandem Global Elevate Network Event  |  4:30pm – 6:00pm

• Jayme Shiarla, Executive Wellness Coach, Jayme Shiarla Coaching

Influence isn’t about speaking louder, it’s about shaping how decisions are made.

Join executive coach Jayme Shiarla for a focused conversation on how women in business can move from participation to impact. This session explores how to build credibility, frame ideas strategically, and become a trusted voice in moments that matter. You’ll gain clear, practical approaches to increase your visibility, strengthen your influence, and play a more decisive role in outcomes, whether you’re stepping into leadership or already there.

Afterwards, enjoy a cash bar and networking hour with fellow attendees.

This event is hosted by Tandem Global Elevate – Women in Business and Nature Network.