Subject Matter expert
How Distributors are Driving Employee Engagement
Tuesday, September 29 , 9:00 AM PDT / 12:00 PM EDT – 10:00 AM PDT / 1:00 PM EDT
Engagement looks different when your workforce is in a warehouse, a truck, and a sales territory all at once. Here’s what actually works.
Employee engagement has always been a challenge in wholesale distribution — a workforce spread across warehouses, delivery routes, and sales territories, often with limited visibility into company direction and few natural touchpoints with leadership. The pressure is sharper now. Retention costs are real, frontline expectations have changed, and the organizations that figure out how to build genuine engagement across their entire workforce — not just corporate staff — are seeing it show up in performance.
In this Subject Matter Expert session, Nancy Disbrow, SHRM-SCP, Managing Director of Talent at Nivalmi Consulting, draws on her direct experience leading HR at a wholesale distributor to examine what employee engagement actually looks like in a distribution environment — the specific practices that move the needle, why standard approaches often fall short in this industry, and what distribution leaders can do starting now to build a more engaged workforce.
Key Takeaways
- Why employee engagement looks different in wholesale distribution and why generic HR approaches often miss the mark
- The frontline engagement gap — where most distributors lose ground and what leading organizations are doing differently
- How to build connection and visibility across a workforce that is rarely in the same place at the same time
- What managers at every level can do to drive engagement without adding bureaucracy or overhead
- How engaged workforces in distribution translate to measurable outcomes in retention, productivity, and customer experience
What You’ll Learn
How to build a culture of engagement that sustains itself through leadership transitions and periods of growth or change9, 2026 at 9PT/12ET to explore how AI is transforming warehouse operations in wholesale distribution.
Practical engagement strategies that work across the distinct segments of a distribution workforce — warehouse, delivery, inside sales, outside sales, and operations
How to assess where your organization stands on engagement and identify the highest-leverage areas to address first
What communication, recognition, and development practices are making a real difference at peer distribution companies
Speaker
Nancy Disbrow
Managing Director of Talent, Nivalmi Consulting
Guest
Coming Soon
Sponsor
Speaker
Nancy Disbrow
Managing Director of Talent, Nivalmi Consulting
Nancy Disbrow is Managing Director of Talent at Nivalmi Consulting, where she partners with leaders to align people strategy with business goals. Nancy helps organizations build high-performing teams and scalable people systems that grow with the business. Drawing on her experience leading HR within distribution and logistics organizations, she brings firsthand insight into what it takes to build engaged, high-performing workforces in complex, fast-moving environments. Nancy has a proven track record of turning people strategy into measurable business outcomes, from stronger retention to improved productivity and culture. She regularly advises leadership teams on practical, sustainable ways to strengthen engagement, communication, and performance across their organizations.
Guest
Coming Soon
Host
Jonathan Bein, Ph.D.
Managing Partner, Distribution Strategy Group
Jonathan Bein Ph.D. has worked with over 100 distributors to apply advanced analytics and AI to improve customer experience, define value proposition, estimate sales potential, and create digital strategy.