Heather Ishikawa

For over 15 years, Heather Ishikawa has been working in the areas of strategic talent management. Heather currently serves as the Director for the Pearson Talent Assessment division in North America. Heather is also the co-author of the bestselling book, Now You’re Thinking focused on developing critical thinking skills (FT Press 2011).

Heather’s experience spans a variety of industries and includes:

• Strategic design of assessment and development strategies to support global leadership identification and development
• Creation and rollout of a profitable start-up professional services function
• Thought leader in the design of an in-depth eLearning University; the product was selected by eLearning magazine as the product of the year
• Implementation planning to support a change in go-to-market sales strategy
• Development and implementation of a sourcing strategy to include reviewing and establishing strategic university alliances

Previously, Heather served as a Senior Consultant for CPP, Inc. working with Fortune 500 organizations to launch assessment based organizational-wide talent strategies. She also spent over 7 years as a Leadership and Organizational Development Consultant and Staffing Director for PeopleSoft gaining experience in behavioral performance, talent assessment, recruitment and staffing, leadership effectiveness, and delivery of consulting services.

Heather has a master’s degree in Organizational management and a bachelor’s degree in Organizational Communications. She has contributed to numerous articles and whitepapers including HR Executive magazine, CFO.com and Drive Thru HR.