Our Consulting Team | The People Company

Karen Sparks

Human Resources & Organizational Development Consultant

Karen Sparks has spent more than 24 years inside Fortune 100 organizations working through the people decisions that have real consequences for performance.

She understands how quickly a sound business decision can break down when leaders underestimate what it will require of the people expected to carry it out. Confusion grows. Managers compensate for unclear expectations. Strong employees disengage or leave. What looked straightforward on paper becomes much harder in practice.

Karen works with leaders facing organizational change, workforce challenges, employee relations, retention, leadership effectiveness, and culture issues where there is rarely one simple answer. Her experience across U.S. and global operations allows her to anticipate the people implications of business decisions before they become bigger organizational problems.

She brings a question leaders cannot afford to overlook:

Will this work with the people, leadership, and organization we actually have?

Karen helps leaders answer that question before the cost of getting it wrong becomes clear.

Education: B.S., Speech Communication and Political Science, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Lloyd Biddle

Executive Coach | Leadership Facilitator | Keynote Speaker

Lloyd Biddle knows what it means to be accountable for results—and for the people responsible for delivering them.

Before entering ministry, Lloyd built a successful Fortune 500 career in sales, management, and executive leadership. Today, he works with leaders who need to set clearer expectations, address performance issues directly, have conversations they have been avoiding, and develop people to take greater ownership of their work.

His approach asks leaders to consider a question that often gets lost in the pressure to perform:

Are my people becoming more capable because of how I lead?

For Lloyd, strong leadership is not measured by how much the leader can carry. It shows up in what the people around that leader become capable of carrying themselves. He works with leaders to build the clarity, judgment, accountability, and confidence their teams need to perform without waiting for the leader to provide every answer.

Lloyd also serves as Lead Pastor of Connection Church in Libertyville, Illinois, and is the author of Live on Purpose: Learn. Do. Teach.

Education: B.S., Finance, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign | MBA, Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management | M.A., Theology, Wheaton College

Credential: Inclusion Institute Certified Diversity Practitioner

Karlyn Russell-Carlson

Data Analyst | Consulting Associate

Karlyn Russell-Carlson helps organizations answer a deceptively simple question: What does the evidence actually tell us?

As a data analyst, facilitator, and project manager, Karlyn examines complex information to find the patterns, gaps, and questions that deserve a closer look. She is especially valuable when an organization has plenty of data but lacks a clear understanding of what it means—or what should happen because of it.

Karlyn doesn’t treat data as the answer. She uses it to test assumptions, sharpen the questions leaders are asking, and separate what people believe is happening from what the evidence supports. As a facilitator, she makes complex findings understandable without oversimplifying them, giving leaders and teams something concrete to examine, discuss, and act on.

Her perspective also reflects experience with racial equity, economic opportunity, housing, and the systems that influence access and outcomes.

Education: M.A., City/Urban, Community and Regional Planning, University of Colorado Denver | B.A., Economics, Minor in Geography, Macalester College

Tyrone Cratic Williams

Consultant | Facilitator | Trainer

Tyrone Cratic Williams works in the space between what people intend and what their decisions actually produce.

His experience in law enforcement, workforce development, financial education, and community engagement gives him a grounded perspective on how assumptions and implicit bias can affect judgment, communication, conflict, trust, and opportunity.

Tyrone doesn’t leave those conversations at the level of awareness. Drawing on his experience as a first responder, educator, mentor, and facilitator, he challenges people to examine what is influencing their choices and consider who may experience the consequences differently.

His work is especially valuable when the subject is difficult, perspectives differ, or people need to move beyond knowing better to doing something differently.

Tyrone has worked with law enforcement agencies, social service organizations, colleges and universities, and community-based nonprofits.

Education: B.A., Edgewood College, Minor in Ethnic Studies | M.A. candidate, Organizational Leadership, Training and Development concentration, Lewis University

Credential: Certified Financial Education Instructor

Jared Biddle

Consulting Associate | Speaker

Jared Biddle brings firsthand perspective to a question many organizations are still trying to answer: What does it take to lead a workforce whose expectations of work have changed?

His work focuses on generational differences, workplace culture, communication, and employee experience, with particular insight into Generation Z. Jared pushes past stereotypes about younger workers to examine what is actually changing—from expectations about feedback and authority to flexibility, belonging, growth, and the relationship people expect to have with their employer.

As a Site Director in education, Jared also leads people and manages the everyday realities of getting work done through others. That experience keeps his perspective grounded in practice, not simply generational theory.

For leaders, the challenge is not getting younger employees to work like previous generations. It is knowing which leadership practices still work, which need to change, and which assumptions may already be costing you trust, talent, and performance.

The workforce has changed. Has the way you lead it changed with it?

Education: B.A., African American Studies, University of Wisconsin–Madison