Build an AI strategy you can explain, prioritize, and put to work.

Your board wants an AI strategy. Your team needs a practical starting point. In this applied learning lab, Katie Milton Jordan introduces the 12 Thinking Lenses, a framework for assessing how your organization measures performance, designs work, supports adoption, and makes investment decisions. Apply the lenses to your own economic development organization and identify where AI can support the work that matters most. You will connect readiness, workflow choices, and cost assumptions to a focused implementation plan you can discuss with leadership.

Inside the learning lab

Score your organization’s AI readiness, map the maturity of core workflows, and model potential savings using your own assumptions. Practice explaining your priorities to a skeptical stakeholder, then refine your action plan through structured peer feedback.

What you will gain

• Assess organizational AI readiness across the framework’s four phases and identify gaps that deserve attention.
• Prioritize workflows for AI support using a five-level maturity model.
• Estimate potential financial implications and explain adoption priorities in language your board and staff can use.
• Develop an implementation plan with target workflows, success measures, and next steps.

What you will take back

A 12-Lens Organizational Assessment, Workflow Maturity Map, AI Insourcing Cost Model, and a prioritized action plan shaped by peer review.

Who should join:

EDO leaders and practitioners who influence strategy, team operations, or workflow design. No technical AI background is required.

Bring a real workflow challenge and start building your organization’s AI plan.

Registration (Opens December 2026)

Professional Development Credits

Attendance and participation during all sessions of the training course is required by a registrant to obtain the following credits. 

• Certified Economic Developer (CEcD)
  • Exam = Core Requirement
  • Recertification = (3) Level-1 Points
    
    
• Entrepreneurship Development Professional (EDP)
  • Exam = Elective Requirement
  • Recertification = (3) Level-1 Points

Note: IEDC will send a registrant an electronic certificate of completion after the course for their records.

Questions

If you have any questions, please email [email protected] or call (202) 223-7800.

Policies

Please read the following policies carefully prior to registering for the training course.

Materials

The materials provided by IEDC are intended for use only by the registrant of the training course. A registrant should not share the training course materials with anyone else.

A registrant found in violation of this policy will be removed from the training course immediately and will not receive a refund for it.

Payment

A registrant will not receive the materials for the training course until IEDC receives the full amount owed for their registration.

Substitution

A registrant is not allowed to substitute a colleague in their place for any IEDC training course.

Cancellation

Please review our cancellation policy here.

No Show

A registrant is considered a “No Show” if they fail to send a cancellation email and/or do not attend the training course. A “No Show” registrant will forfeit any monies paid to IEDC for the training course.