Reimagining Social Mobility Extension

A defining feature of today’s geo-economic landscape is the rapid and uneven transformation of opportunity structures across regions, industries and social groups. Artificial intelligence and automation are reshaping skill requirements and potentially substituting for traditional “mobility gateway” jobs. Geopolitical realignment and shifting expectations around diversity, equity and inclusion are altering the institutional environment in which firms design recruitment, promotion and compensation systems. Meanwhile, deindustrialization and energy transitions are weakening traditional employment paths in “left-behind” regions, fueling political discontent.

This one-day workshop brings together leading scholars and practitioners to examine how organizations and entrepreneurial ecosystems respond strategically to these unequal opportunity structures. Four curated panel discussions and an interactive research sprint address how recruitment systems, internal labor markets and career ladders shape mobility trajectories, when and for whom entrepreneurship functions as a pathway to upward mobility, what evidence organizations and NGOs actually need to design mobility-enhancing strategies and how declining opportunities relate to populism and democratic resilience.