Commerce Secretary Liz Tanner is stepping down to take a new job. What she'll be doing next.
Tanner's departure was announced in a news release heralding the formation of the nonprofit Ocean State 2026, which McKee called a "major strategic move."
Her last day as commerce secretary will be July 4, at which point an interim will take over the state's economic development offices.
Ocean State 2026's job will be to ensure that "Rhode Island maximizes the exceptional economic opportunities" the World Cup tournament next June will provide," the release said.
The tournament is being held throughout the United States, Canada and Mexico with seven matches at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro, Massachusetts.
'This world-class soccer event presents a major opportunity to showcase Rhode Island on the global stage – and we're ready to seize it,' McKee said in the news release. 'This new nonprofit will help ensure we're attracting visitors, supporting local businesses, and driving economic activity in the state."
At least so far, no Rhode Island site has been chosen as a training base for any national teams competing in the tournament, and there is no official fan festival event scheduled in the state.
Boston is an official host city, and a separate Boston 26 nonprofit has been set up as "the official Host City initiative."
Rhode Island General Treasurer James Diossa has led efforts to attract World Cup fans to Rhode Island and organize state planning around it.
Diossa will be chairman of the new Ocean State 2026.
It was not immediately clear who will provide funding for the new nonprofit.
Matt Touchette, spokesman for the Executive Office of Commerce, said no state money is expected to go into the World Cup effort. No private donation or lead sponsors have been announced.
Earlier this year, Diossa asked McKee for state funds to kickstart World Cup preparations, but the governor has not made any World-Cup-related budget request to state lawmakers.
'While we are still early in the planning process, I want to emphasize that the vast majority of funding for 'Ocean State 2026' will come from private contributions through a targeted fundraising effort," Diossa wrote in an email. "We're excited about the opportunity to celebrate Rhode Island's rich history and bright future, and our goal is to ensure that all 39 cities and towns feel well represented as well as reaping the benefits of this statewide initiative."
Touchette said he believed Tanner's new job as executive director would be paid, but did not know what the salary would be.
Diossa said Tanner's salary will not be paid with any state funds.
McKee's office did not respond to questions about Tanner, including whether the governor had asked her to step down as commerce secretary.
Tanner, who is set to make$ 238,597 this year, according to the state transparency portal, was one of McKee's key Cabinet members when he replaced Gina Raimondo as governor.
Before McKee appointed Tanner commerce secretary in 2022, replacing Stefan Pryor, she was director of the Department of Business Regulation.
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: RI Commerce Secretary Tanner will resign to head World Cup nonprofit
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Harvard Business Review
6 hours ago
- Harvard Business Review
Your AI Strategy Needs More Than a Single Leader
In boardrooms around the world, a familiar question keeps surfacing: Who should lead our AI efforts? It's a reasonable question. As generative AI reshapes the business landscape, leaders are rightly trying to determine who is best positioned to guide their companies through the shift. In response, some have rushed to appoint chief AI officers (CAIO), as if one brilliant hire could unlock AI's full promise. But this approach often misfires. The CAIO arrives with fanfare. Pilots begin. A few flashy demos surface. And then? Not much. Projects stall. Teams don't adopt. The CAIO departs. The board starts asking tough questions. It's not because the CAIO wasn't smart or capable. It's because the role itself, at least as it's currently imagined, is overloaded and misaligned. The assumption is that one individual can bridge innovation and operations, oversee compliance and infrastructure, and deliver fast wins across the enterprise. That's an impossible job description. The companies making real progress are building ecosystems of leaders involved in the AI journey. The Lone-Leader Trap Too often, the CAIO is tucked under the CTO or siloed in a strategy group. They're told to experiment, to be bold, but also to avoid risk, deliver immediate value, and ensure enterprise-wide transformation. In one global-services firm, the AI lead created a promising prototype using a large language model. But the project went nowhere. Business units hadn't been brought in early, training never happened, and the new tool sat unused. Even in better-aligned orgs, the pressure on a single leader to drive AI transformation is intense. Boards want their investment in AI to quickly translate to top-line revenue. Legal asks for guardrails. Operations wants automation. Marketing wants personalization. It's not that these goals are wrong. But expecting one person to deliver them all is setting them up to fail. An Ecosystem Approach In companies where AI is taking root, the best leadership is distributed, with many executives working in sync. Holmes Murphy, a leading commercial-insurance brokerage-and-services company, offers an early example. One individual has been elevated to orchestrate the overall AI program, but the responsibility for AI-driven change is distributed across all levels of the organization. It starts with an AI leadership team made up of deeply engaged senior executives (including the CEO, CIO, head of technology, and chief legal officer), each selected for their deep understanding of the business, commitment to innovation, and ability to drive top-down operational change. Supporting them is a small, cross-functional AI Center of Excellence (COE) composed of five or six individual contributors and manager-level employees who share a passion for innovation and willingness to challenge the status quo. The COE is tasked with developing deep expertise in AI capabilities, staying current on emerging trends, and translating those capabilities into business-relevant applications. Over time, the COE will serve as a key driver of internal innovation, with the broader goal of embedding an AI-forward mindset across the entire organization. Some leaders in your AI ecosystem should focus on building. These are your engineers, heads of digital, or product teams experimenting with generative tools. Others should focus on integration: the COO rethinking workflows, the customer-support lead reorganizing teams to leverage new AI systems. Still others should serve as connectors: the CFO tying investments to outcomes, the general counsel evaluating risk, the CEO ensuring that AI is embedded in how the organization learns and adapts. This doesn't require a complex bureaucracy. The structure matters less than the mindset: AI isn't a department. It's a capability the whole leadership team needs to own. The CEO's Critical Role Among those leaders, the CEO plays a unique and outsized role. The CEO holds the power to set strategy, align incentives, and shape the organization's cultural response to change. AI transformation, when done well, is not about the technology itself. It's about the strategic and operational shifts it enables. AI strategy is your business strategy. That's why CEOs cannot delegate AI leadership entirely. Their words and, more importantly, their actions, signal how seriously their companies are taking the transition, and whether the future includes a place for every employee. The most effective CEOs lead with direct involvement, authenticity, clarity, and a growth mindset. Authenticity means mapping AI adoption to their own personality and strengths. A technical CEO might prototype new workflows and share the results. A non-technical CEO might co-create new processes with internal builders and show that AI is for everyone, not just experts. Direct involvement means showing up, not just as a sponsor, but as a peer in critical working sessions. It means engaging with pilots, attending hackathons, and giving feedback as real work happens. That behavior was on full display recently at ITAGroup, an 800-person employee-recognition and events company. The CEO, Brent Vander Waal, along with the COO, CIO, and CFO, spent hours in cross-functional sessions with managers and frontline staff. Together, they mapped how each unit operates and pinpointed opportunities for AI to improve employee and customer experience. The initiative culminated in a company-wide hackathon chaired by the executive team. Leadership watched, listened, offered feedback, and judged the results. The signal was clear: This transformation belongs to everyone. Clarity and a growth mindset should define how the CEO communicates. Policies must be clear. Messaging must be consistent. And the underlying frame should be opportunity-driven. It's about scaling work, evolving roles, and creating space for more human creativity and judgment. Who Else Should Be at the Table? Start with a builder. Someone curious, energized by possibility, and willing to test new ideas even when the outcome is uncertain. This might be someone already inside the organization, a head of innovation, a product lead, or an engineering director quietly experimenting with AI tools. But that builder needs a partner. Someone grounded in the business, who understands where work happens, where friction happens, and what's worth solving. Without somebody who can view experiments through an operational lens, they will often remain disconnected from real impact. Finally, you need a strategist. Someone who can zoom out, assess which initiatives align with long-term goals, and steward limited resources to their highest use. These leaders don't need identical resumes. But they do need to all be collaborative. Curious. Grounded in reality but open to reimagining how things work. They can tolerate ambiguity but know when to focus and ship. Some of the most impactful AI champions emerge organically through hands-on exposure rather than formal selection. We've observed that many organizations are still in the early stages of AI maturity and lack a practical understanding of what today's tools can realistically accomplish. An effective way to bridge this gap is through ideation sessions with leadership that demystify core concepts, showcase live examples, and—crucially—encourage hands-on experimentation with tools such as ChatGPT Pro and Claude. These early interactions often shift mindsets and spark more grounded, creative thinking about AI's role in the business. These early sessions often ignite curiosity. In at least two recent cases, participants who had no prior AI experience got inspired and became deeply engaged after seeing use cases tested live. They began experimenting independently, generating new ideas, and encouraging peers to do the same. This kind of early empowerment has helped surface unlikely champions—people who, once inspired, lead by doing rather than by title. It's tempting to look inward and tap the existing AI team to lead the company-wide shift. But as Brendan Hopper, the CIO of Commonwealth Bank, notes, 'Many of the people who've been working with AI the longest may not be the right ones to lead enterprise transformation. They're brilliant in the lab, but transformation happens in the business.' That's a crucial distinction. Technical expertise is necessary but not sufficient. Leading transformation requires business fluency, emotional intelligence, and the ability to galvanize others across functions. Consider how Jeff Maggioncalda, Coursera's former CEO, seized on ChatGPT not as a lab exercise but as a business imperative. He dove into the tool himself, then launched 'Project Genesis,' a cross‑functional team that mapped AI pilots—involving such tasks as translations, coaching, and content generation—against clear impact metrics. He rewrote OKRs to bake AI goals into every department, held open forums to surface concerns, and built human‑in‑the‑loop feedback to catch bias and manage risk. That blend of technical curiosity, business fluency, and change‑management muscle is exactly what transforms isolated experiments into company‑wide breakthroughs. Designing for Durability AI efforts stall when coordination breaks down. A promising model might need new data flows, process redesign, legal input, change management, and training. If each of those sits in a different part of the org, each with its own roadmap and priorities, the friction can be fatal. One of us (John) outlined this in a previous HBR article on the systematic adoption of AI. The key isn't just experimentation. It's designing a repeatable system for evaluating, integrating, and scaling good ideas. That means clarifying roles: who builds, who integrates, who decides. It means standing up lightweight infrastructure, centers of excellence, working groups, playbooks, that create flow between departments rather than barriers. It also means avoiding several dangerous pitfalls. Notably: Ignoring change‑management. A candidate who can articulate how neural networks work but can't craft a narrative, negotiate risk, or upskill thousands of colleagues will leave cultural resistance untouched and ROI unrealized. Gatekeeping of ideas. When AI planning is limited to a tight inner circle, the team misses the lived‑in knowledge of frontline employees. Strong leaders keep the channels wide open—through idea portals, rotating workshops, even factory‑floor office hours—and run a clear process for sorting, testing, and scaling the best suggestions. Misreading the risk landscape Choosing someone blind to ethics, privacy, and regulatory exposure can spark reputational or legal crises that overshadow any early gains, eroding executive and board confidence in the whole program. Lead Together, or Not at All It's tempting to believe the right hire will unlock AI. But AI isn't a solo act. It's not even a duet. It's an enterprise-wide shift that touches every function. The companies that figure this out won't be the ones who find the perfect CAIO, if such a person exists. They'll be the ones who build a leadership model flexible enough and durable enough—and staffed by leaders curious enough—to navigate what comes next. Hiring matters. But the real work starts when the whole team leans in.
Fast Company
7 hours ago
- Fast Company
You have a story to tell: 4 tips for becoming a better storyteller at work
Stories generate better context and deeper emotions. Here are four tips I would suggest all of us employ to become better storytellers. [kenchiro168 / Adobe Stock] The Fast Company Executive Board is a private, fee-based network of influential leaders, experts, executives, and entrepreneurs who share their insights with our audience. BY Listen to this Article More info 0:00 / 5:32 My wife's grandmother is 100 years old. She is healthy, smart, energetic, and fun to be around. Last year at Thanksgiving, I sat at a table with her for an hour-and-a-half with my wife and her two sisters as we listened to her tell stories about her life. We were all transfixed. Experience may be life's best teacher, but stories come in a close second because they give us the benefit of someone else's experience. Stories give us context that yields understanding much deeper than memorizing facts. More importantly, stories can generate emotions that bury ideas deeply enough inside us to cause us to act. Scientists have a name for the shared phenomenon that happens when storytellers connect with their audiences. It's called 'neural coupling,' and it refers to the way that our brains and emotions begin to synchronize with a speaker as their story unfolds. WHY STORYTELLING MATTERS IN THE WORKPLACE As I speak with leaders around the country about how to create intentional cultures, I encourage them to leverage the power of stories. As we onboard, train, or develop people on our teams, we can give them the advantage of the hard-won lessons we have learned from our experiences. More than just learning what to do, stories can help them understand the 'why' by equipping them with principles they can apply to future scenarios we can't predict. I learned this many years ago when I met with two managers who had both started with us about 90 days prior. They were pretty important hires for our then-young company, so I was checking in to see how they were progressing. I asked each of them for feedback on their onboarding. The first told me that he felt like it had been fine and that he was starting to figure things out. The second manager gave me a very different answer. 'It's been incredible. I feel like I've been here forever.' 'Wow,' I responded. 'That's great, but I have to ask, why do you say that?' 'Well, every day, I have a meeting with my manager at 5:00, and in that meeting, she just tells me stories. She tells me about what happened when we signed a contract, or something that occurred with a client or associate. I just feel like I understand so much about why we do things the way we do them.' This conversation caused me to be more intentional about telling stories to our people as often as I can. Because I don't like to leave important things to serendipity, storytelling has become a part of our practices. Which makes the next story even more embarrassing. HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR STORYTELLING SKILLS Recently, I gave an online seminar about culture with my usual encouragement for leaders to lean into storytelling. I took questions at the end, and someone asked me: 'How can I become a better storyteller?' As someone telling people to tell stories, you would think I would have a good answer about how to become good at it. I didn't. I gave an answer that was vague and I'm certain pretty unhelpful. Storytelling has always been a part of how I communicate. As a writer, speaker, and actor, it is just a natural part of what I do. I've never really thought about having to explain how to do it effectively. So, with thanks to whoever asked that question, I would like to ask for another chance at the answer. Here are four tips I would suggest all of us employ to become better storytellers: 1. Read Great Stories If you want to become good at telling stories, then you need to read great stories. Next time you find yourself engrossed in a story, ask yourself why it captured your attention. Learn about classic story development tools, like the Hero's J ourney, and look for how they are applied in storytelling to create engagement with an audience. To start, read a wide range of literature—novels, short stories, poems, plays, essays, biographies, and other creative work—instead of mass-market fiction. 2. Lean Into Vulnerability As storytellers, revealing our frailty helps break barriers with our audience because it allows them to connect with our humanity. We are suddenly off the pedestal of the stage and on common ground with our audience as they realize we have the same struggles they do. Tell the story that may be embarrassing. Paradoxically, instead of diminishing our credibility, vulnerability can connect you with people and make them more open to hearing what you have to say. Remember the science around neural coupling. 3. Talk About The Elephant The most impactful stories are ones that make us a little uncomfortable. It makes us think about something we don't like to think about or admit to ourselves, or something we usually deny. Though these stories can be painful to discuss, they are usually the ones that create and can help us convey our most deeply held beliefs and passions. 4. Don't Worry About How Well You Do It The best musicians in the world typically create an album with 10 songs, and inevitably, seven of them are forgettable. Likewise, authors create many stories that are never published. Don't worry about becoming good at storytelling, just start doing it. After all, experience is life's best teacher. The more you do it, the better you will get, and the more you will learn about which stories best engage your audience. If something is important, don't leave it to chance. Take some time to examine areas in your life where you want to teach or pass on important information. Think about what happened to you that formed your views on that topic and how you can tell those stories to those you lead or love. The early-rate deadline for Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies Awards is Friday, September 5, at 11:59 p.m. PT. Apply today.
Forbes
7 hours ago
- Forbes
Unhappy Managers Are Quietly Breaking Your Business
The Wall Street Journal reports that managers are more miserable at work than ever, which doesn't bode well in terms of how their direct reports are feeling. This isn't just a U.S. problem. Employees around the world are feeling less happy about work than they have in years, with managers reporting the sharpest declines. According to Gallup's annual State of the Global Workplace report, the percentage of employees who report feeling engaged about their work fell to 21% last year from 23% the year prior. This was only the second time global engagement fell, with the first time occurring during the COVID crisis. The decline was especially extreme among managers. A mere 27% reported feeling engaged at work in 2024, a 3-point drop from the year before, with younger managers and female managers experiencing big declines. These numbers are disconcerting for a number of reasons. The Future of Management A recent study by Robert Walters found that over half of Gen Z workers do not want to take on a middle management role in their career. With talent pipelines shrinking and succession planning growing more complicated, it's essential for businesses to grasp why people, (especially younger workers) are steering clear of leadership roles—and how to encourage their engagement. Why Disengagement is So Low Imagine walking into the office only to find out that your manager (and many of their peers) have just been laid off? Millions of workers don't have to imagine this, as this is their reality. CEOs are bragging about smaller workforces and touting how they're leaving jobs unfilled, which is leaving managers to pick up the slack. As tomorrow's potential leaders watch this shift taking place, they're deciding the job is not worth the stress these managers are experiencing. Another reason for the decline in engagement is the number of people working for managers who haven't a clue how to manage. According to Jim Harter, chief scientist, workplace at Gallup, only 44% of managers ever had training to be a manager. So half have never even received any type of training, despite the many workplace changes happening around them. According to Harter, 'If you want to improve engagement of managers, training needs to focus on helping them form habits such as keeping in regular touch with the people they manage and asking them questions like, 'What kind of challenges are you facing in your job?'' He goes on to say, 'We did 17 studies of this kind of training during and after the pandemic with almost 15,000 participants and found the managers who received it were anywhere from 10% to 22% more highly engaged in their work.' Where Do We Go from Here? Leadership doesn't get a pass. When managers are disengaged, it's only a matter of time before everyone checks out. The data is clear: Engagement is plummeting, especially among those we count on to inspire teams—managers themselves. This isn't a slow leak; it's a gusher, and CEOs who brag about leaner headcounts while their leaders burn out aren't just risking talent, they're inviting an exodus. Yet here's the real kicker: We already know the fix. It's not another engagement survey. It's not more pizza parties or anonymous suggestion boxes. It's managers who know how to lead. People don't work for companies. They work for people. You can turn this engagement crisis around by investing in real leadership. What are you waiting for? Get started today.
