Karena A. Stewart

• L E A D E R S H I P C A P A B I L I T Y
• T A L E N T S T R A T E G Y
• O R G A N I Z A T I O N A L
E F F E C T I V E N E S S


L E A D E R S H I P C A P A B I L I T Y • T A L E N T S T R A T E G Y • O R G A N I Z A T I O N A L E F F E C T I V E N E S S

E X T R A O R D I N A R Y, B Y D E S I G N.

About Karena

I solve complex, ambiguous problems, the kind that don't fit a category and don't come with a playbook. I design strategy, I lead teams, and I build experiences that change how people work and how organizations see results.

I have built enterprise leadership capability strategies for senior executives at a Fortune 500 company and directed a global workforce of 2,500 across six countries through a pandemic to stabilized operations and year-over-year improvement. I built a talent stratification program that redesigned the employee lifecycle from sourcing through performance, so our best people served our highest-value customers. I don't just design these solutions. I own them. And when the work needs something built that doesn't exist yet, I build it.

I am known for executing at a velocity that standard corporate processes consider impossible. I built an immersive heritage museum out of a defunct mailroom in just 29 days, bringing Macy's iconic history to life and unifying a matrixed organization around a shared identity. Facing complex municipal and operational hurdles, I transformed 96,000 square feet of dormant corporate space in New York City into an enterprise conference and event center in under three months, a facility that now anchors leadership development, merchandising showcases, and enterprise gatherings. Strategy or structure or space, I build with an uncompromising bias toward people, because when a strategy is people-centered, the adoption sticks, the execution holds, and the enterprise delivers.

Now, I’m bringing that conviction to AI adoption. As a Senior Advisor at CAS Strategies, I partner with clients on the workforce and leadership side of AI adoption, honest about the promise and the price of it.

The human + machine workforce is evolving faster than anyone's ready for. Ambiguous, complex, deeply human, exactly what I've run toward my whole career. It won't be won with better technology. It'll be won with people, led well.

Let's build.

“When the project changes,
the outcome doesn’t.

P R O B L E M S W I T H N O P L A Y B O O K.

Journey

Every chapter started the same way. Here are six of them.