Week of Belonging is an annual tradition at the David Eccles School of Business that aims to showcase our collective culture, to build a stronger sense of community, and to amplify unique voices.

The 2025 iteration, which took place between Feb. 10-13, featured panel discussions and lectures that proved both educational and connective, illustrating not only the commonality of the issues that impact our daily lives, but also the personal and distinct ways that we experience those issues.

Monday

The events kicked off with an Opening Session in which Dean Kurt Dirks unveiled the Eccles School’s feature in the BBC StoryWorks Commercial Productions’ “Leader Generation” series, highlighting our holistic approach to student wellness. The segment features Glen Kreiner (Professor of Management) and Eccles alum Abbey Salamera (Program Coordinator, Student Engagement and Belonging), who both subsequently took part in a discussion alongside Tara Hardison (Assistant Dean of Undergraduate Programs at the Eccles School) on the importance of student wellness and its impact on students and the business community.

Hardison and Salamera both put a spotlight on various programs and resources available (through administrative and student government efforts) to assist students. Kreiner, meanwhile, focused on the need to reduce and eliminate stigma, partly by dispelling the idea that you either have mental health or you don’t, and instead presenting the concept of mental health as a continuum that everyone is on.

The conversation didn’t stop there. Later, the Breaking Barriers panel was staged in collaboration with Women in Business (WIB) and Women in Finance (WIF). It featured Maria Echevarria (Chief Operating Officer, Opencontour), Lianna Kinard (Chief Marketing Officer, The Buckner Group), and Georgi Rausch (Professor, Department of Management, Eccles School) sharing insights on balancing the demands of leadership while prioritizing personal wellness and maintaining equilibrium.

An intriguing theme they touched on included the need to first prioritize your own well-being to maximize your ability to lead others. All three women also highlighted the importance of creating a personal board of directors of sorts — a group of mentors and confidants you trust to be sounding boards and to give you agenda-free perspective.

“Don’t always think of mentorship as career mentorship, that it’s got to be something that will help you with your job or where you want to get. There are different mentors who can keep you grounded, to help you stay true to who you are, that know you well enough to help you remember what’s important when you make a decision,” said Echevarria. “It’s about finding that personality connection that is not about them telling you everything that you want to hear; that there’s enough trustworthiness that when they say something to you, you know it’s coming from the heart.”

The day wrapped up with the Multi-Cultural Gala, a full-on celebration of global heritage with incredible food, performances, and plenty of chances to meet new people and swap stories.

Tuesday

The next day, Kreiner presented his research, titled Mental Health: Next Frontier for Belonging, in which he delved more deeply into how organizations engage with the topic of employees’ mental health. He presented data that argued for a more nuanced approach beyond a blanket “leave your problems at home” policy:

• 81% of workers identified mental health support as an important factor in choosing a workplace.
• 62% of workers said they would stay at a job for robust mental health benefits.
• Mental health concerns at work are one of the largest predictors of turnover.

“We can make the compassion case and the morality case and the ethics case of why we should be helping each other and creating organizations [that prioritize mental health],” Kreiner said, “but we can also make a really good financial case of why we should be doing that.”

Wednesday

A four-person panel came together for a session titled Fostering Religious and Spiritual Belonging in the Workplace, which explored the role of faith in professional environments and how we can foster mutual understanding across different beliefs.

The participants were John Wynne, Ph.D. (Associate Professor of Classics, Coordinator of the Religious Studies Major, University of Utah); Emilie Call and Ashlie Sanders (founders and hosts of That’s Church! podcast and Interfaith Experiences); and Brian Farr, J.D. (Advisory Council Chair, Salt Lake Interfaith Roundtable).

Included in the discussion was the importance of bringing belonging to both spaces and to the people you are interacting with. Wynne stressed the importance of approaching conversations about religion with charity and love. The sister duo of Call and Sanders mentioned that the mission of their podcast is not to proselytize, but to learn about and embrace differences.

Thursday

The final event in the week of programming was Economic Justice & Wellbeing: Empowering Communities Through Opportunity, a panel discussion about the role of economic opportunity and how access to financial resources impacts lives and communities. This session was particularly compelling given the distinctly disparate points of view of the three panelists.

Kim Belliston (Organizational Development and DEI Administrator, Zions Bancorporation) was a staunch advocate for people with disabilities. Erika Carlsen (Director of Culture, Operations, and Strategic Initiatives, Trust-Based Philanthropy Project) brought a community-organizer perspective and focused upon historically marginalized groups. And Amanda Morton (Vice President of Relationship Development, Cyprus Credit Union) stressed the need for both increased economic literacy among the populace as well as financial institutions being “actively engaged with the community to discover opportunities.”

Belliston encouraged attendees to remember that while people with disabilities are often burdened with additional expenses owing to the need for medical supplies and durable equipment, they also are significant contributors to the economy, as hybrid and remote jobs have reduced inherent transportation issues and led to a 31% increase in people with disabilities joining the workforce in Utah since 2020.

Carlsen spoke about the modern impacts of redlining and the newer scourge of predatory lending institutions taking up residence in poor neighborhoods. She advocated both for financial institutions becoming more willing to lend to those in underserved communities to bolster entrepreneurism, as well as the subsequent need for consumers to support local businesses.

Morton, meanwhile, brought up the need to expand participation in programs that teach financial literacy from increasingly young ages, so that everyday occurrences in economic variance don’t become catastrophic events that impose more barriers and lead to downward spirals.