San Diego keynote speaker for healthcare, association, and corporate events.
Chris Sund is a keynote speaker, Maxwell Leadership Certified Coach, and sitting executive who leads national healthcare staffing organizations. He speaks on workforce motivation, leadership, retention, and human potential for national associations meeting in San Diego, health systems, defense and technology employers, and organizations across the region.
Response within one business day.
A lot of your people are being measured on things they do not control.
San Diego’s labor market has two features no other American city combines, and both of them quietly distort how employers evaluate the people who work for them.
The first is the border. San Ysidro handles better than seventy thousand northbound crossings a day, making it the busiest land crossing in the Western Hemisphere, and the San Diego and Tijuana region operates as a single economy with a combined workforce in the range of three point eight million people. A meaningful share of the frontline workers in this county’s shipyards, hotels, kitchens, construction sites, and healthcare support roles begin their commute on the other side of an international boundary.
For those employees the commute contains a variable measured in hours rather than minutes, controlled by federal processing rather than by traffic, and impossible to predict or call ahead about. A forty five minute wait becomes three hours with no notice. So when a supervisor marks someone down for reliability, there is a real chance they are grading border wait times and recording it as a character trait.
The second is the military. San Diego has the largest concentration of military personnel of any city in the country, with installations employing over one hundred thousand active duty people and defense activity accounting for something close to a fifth of the regional economy. That produces a steady flow of people leaving service and entering civilian work. A twenty seven year old who supervised thirty people and was accountable for equipment worth more than most departments will routinely get screened out of a civilian supervisory role, because the resume does not read the way a hiring manager expects.
Both are the same failure. An organization measuring the wrong thing and drawing a conclusion about a person from it. Separating what someone controls from what they do not, before you judge them on it, is not a nicety here. It is the difference between keeping good people and losing them to a spreadsheet.
Chris runs national healthcare staffing organizations and has keynoted state association conferences in eleven states, including LeadingAge Illinois and health care associations in Iowa, Montana, South Dakota, and Colorado.
Operator, Not Consultant
President and COO of national healthcare staffing organizations, still making the hiring and retention calls he speaks about.
Reading Capability Correctly
Daily work in staffing, an industry built on judging what a person can actually do rather than what their paperwork looks like.
Association Conference Work
Annual meetings and general sessions are Chris’s most frequent format, and San Diego is a leading national conference destination.
Groups Chris speaks for.
San Diego combines a major convention market with defense, healthcare, higher education, and life sciences, which puts a wide mix of audiences in one region.
- National associations meeting in San Diego, at the convention center and the region’s resort conference properties, for opening and closing general sessions
- Sharp HealthCare with more than eighteen thousand employees and Scripps Health with over twelve thousand, along with the region’s other systems, for nurse leadership, all-staff, and recognition events
- University of California San Diego, among the region’s largest employers with a workforce near thirty nine thousand across the campus and health system
- Defense employers and contractors, including the naval installations and the roughly fifteen thousand county businesses working on Department of Defense contracts
- Life sciences and biotechnology employers across the Torrey Pines corridor, alongside the Salk Institute and Sanford Burnham Prebys
- County of San Diego and San Diego Unified School District, two of the largest public employers in the region
- Hospitality, shipbuilding, and manufacturing employers across the county and the South Bay
San Diego employers drawing from the same pools.
Healthcare is where Chris operates, but the measurement problem shows up across this economy.
Shipbuilding and Manufacturing
Yards and plants staffed heavily from the South Bay and across the border, where attendance metrics need context to mean anything.
Hospitality and Tourism
Hotels, restaurants, and attractions serving a major convention and visitor market with large frontline teams.
Defense and Technology
Contractors and technology firms hiring transitioning service members whose experience does not translate onto a standard resume.
Education and Public Sector
The county, the city, and a school district serving students from more than a hundred and sixty countries.
San Diego and regional venues.
- The San Diego Convention Center and downtown hotel ballrooms for national association annual meetings and general sessions
- Coronado, Mission Bay, and La Jolla resort properties used for corporate and leadership retreats
- Sharp, Scripps, and UC San Diego Health campuses for nurse leadership and all-staff days
- UC San Diego and regional colleges for campus, faculty, and staff programming
- Chula Vista, National City, and the South Bay for employers staffing from the border region
- Carlsbad, Oceanside, and North County for life sciences and defense employers
San Diego events Chris speaks at.
Association Conferences
National association annual meetings, opening and closing general sessions, and member education. The core of Chris’s work.
Hospital and Health System Events
Leadership days, nurse recognition events, and all-staff meetings.
Corporate and Leadership Summits
All-hands gatherings, sales kickoffs, and leadership meetings across defense, technology, and life sciences.
Retention and Frontline Leadership
Supervisor development focused on judging people by what they actually control.
HR and SHRM Chapter Events
Human resources conferences and chapter meetings on hiring, evaluation, and reading transferable capability.
Long-Term and Senior Care
Skilled nursing, assisted living, and continuing care conferences and in-service days.
Keynote topics for your San Diego event.
Every session is customized for the audience, the format, and what you are actually trying to change.
See what conference organizers and HR leaders have said after booking Chris.
Booking a keynote speaker in San Diego
We are bringing our national conference to San Diego. What format works best?
Does Chris travel to San Diego?
Many of our staff commute across the border. Does the session speak to that?
We hire a lot of transitioning military. Can the session help with that?
Can the session run for multiple shifts?
What does a San Diego keynote cost?
Can Chris speak virtually to a San Diego audience?
Keynote speaking across southern California.
Each city page covers the local employers, the venues Chris speaks in, and the specific workforce pressure leaders there are working on.
Bring Chris to your San Diego event.
Send your date, location, and audience. You will get availability and a quote back within one business day.
info@chrissund.com · 402-212-5771 · California speaking · All locations