MEET BETH
I’ve spent my career paying attention to how people learn, grow, and navigate work.
I’m Dr. Beth Fries-Packard, DBA, CMBA™, MBA, a learning and organizational development practitioner, educator, speaker, and the founder of BFP Studio.
For more than two decades, my work has centered on people and the workplace: how we learn, how we lead, how organizations build capability, and what helps people turn knowledge into something they can actually use.
My experience has taken me across industries and environments, from manufacturing and technology to healthcare staffing, corporate learning, and higher education. I’ve designed and facilitated learning, developed leaders, taught university students, supported workforce and organizational development, and worked alongside people navigating the everyday realities of work.
Across all of it, I kept noticing the same gap: we expect people to know far more about how to navigate work than we ever intentionally teach them.
That observation sits at the heart of BFP Studio.
Practice made me curious.
Research made me ask better questions.
DBA
Organizational Leadership & Development
Capella University
My doctoral work gave me the opportunity to go deeper into questions I had encountered throughout my career, how organizations prepare people for change, what capabilities the workforce of the future requires, and how leaders think about developing people for what comes next.
MBA
Project Management
Capella University
My MBA strengthened the business and execution side of my work: understanding how strategy, people, processes, resources, and competing priorities come together to move work forward.
BA
Business Management & Communication
Concordia University - Wisconsin
The foundation underneath it all, the intersection of how organizations work and how people communicate, collaborate, and make things happen within them.
My education hasn't replaced what I've learned through experience.
It's given me new ways to examine it, question it, and put it to work.
My career hasn't followed one narrow lane, and that's become one of the greatest strengths I bring to this work. I've experienced organizations from different seats: as an employee, educator, facilitator, program builder, learning partner, organizational development practitioner, project leader, researcher, and advisor.
Each has given me a different view of the same thing: what happens when people, work, systems, expectations, and organizations meet.
I kept coming back to one question:
If these capabilities matter so much, why do we keep expecting people to figure them out on their own?
We normalize the struggle of navigating work as a rite of passage.
But technical expertise shouldn't be the only thing we intentionally teach.
The human capabilities; judgment, influence, self-awareness, and relational clarity are what actually move the needle for individuals and their teams.
Know. Do. Become.
It’s more than a framework.
KNOW
Understand yourself, your work, and the context around you. Clarity creates better decisions and more confidence in how you show up.
DO
Put what you know into practice. Growth happens through action, experimentation, and the everyday behaviors that turn learning into capability.
BECOME
Knowledge and action come together over time, building the confidence, judgment, and credibility to navigate what’s next.
Beyond the Studio
When I’m not thinking about learning, leadership, or the invisible skills that make work work, I’m usually spending time with my husband and our adult children. I love to travel, especially when the destination gives us time to hike, explore, and experience somewhere new from outdoors. For me, travel and time in nature often go hand in hand.
Milwaukee is home, and I love everything the city has to offer; from the lakefront, to the festivals, food, and unmistakable character.
I’m also at serious risk of sourdough becoming my entire personality. My starter, Amelia Bread-ila, stays hard at work in our kitchen. And despite living in Milwaukee, my sports loyalties remain firmly in Chicago, with one notable exception: my fantasy football team, the Roasted Gnomes.