NewsLearning & Development - Heather Johnson

When employee owners think about what it means to “Create Your Future,” they often assume it means pursuing a new role with new responsibilities. However, Creating Your Future at VGM Group can take multiple forms. For many, it’s simply about taking that next big step in developing professionally.  

Heather Johnson, Training & Compliance Manager, VGM Education, employee owner since 2016, began her career at VGM focusing on compliance for Education’s accreditations, continuing education units (CEUs), and their platforms. Within a few years, Heather wanted to do more within her business unit. She later learned Education’s developmental tool, which led to Heather not only working compliance, but also helping create the courses Education provides. 

“I’ve always liked having challenges and Welcoming Change,” said Heather. “Any challenge that can help me develop or build my skill set, I’ll gladly take those opportunities.” 

VGM Journey Guide 

One of these opportunities came in 2021 when VGM Group was revamping the tour of headquarters known as the VGM Journey. The company was looking for tour guides and Heather was approached to audition for this first group. There was some initial hesitation because, even though she had been at VGM for 5 years at this point, she still didn’t know a lot about the company. 

“Public speaking had always been a ‘silent’ stretch project of mine,” said Heather. “I decided to audition because I saw this as an opportunity to build some of that confidence speaking in front of crowds. And I also just wanted to learn more about VGM in general because I really only knew Education’s world.” 

To this day, Heather is still a VGM Journey Guide. She said that one of the best parts about being a tour guide was getting to know employee owners across the company as well as making connections with visiting members, vendors, and partners.  

“It also gave me a stronger sense of employee ownership pride,” said Heather. “People now see me as a sort of expert about VGM because of the knowledge I’ve been able to build through these tours.” 

Heartland Activity Coordinator 

Being a VGM Journey Guide was just the start of Heather’s opportunities to expand her knowledge and get more involved with VGM. Around the same time as the Journey restructuring, Heather was approached to be an activity coordinator for the Heartland Conference. Her first role as an activity coordinator was working the check-in desk. 

It seemed like a natural step for Heather. She had already worked on the education side of Heartland, and, along with juggling Journeys, she saw this as another opportunity to have a people-facing role. 

“I love people and getting to connect, especially with members and getting to be that first impression they see when coming to Heartland,” said Heather. “And because I was also working on the CEU approvals through Education, any questions attendees had about sessions, I’d be able to answer.” 

For the last few years, Heather also helped co-lead the golf tournament. And while 2025 was her last year as a Heartland Activity Coordinator, Heather says she still plans to help where she can for future conferences. 

Employee Ownership Ambassador 

If being a Journey Guide and Heartland Activity Coordinator weren’t enough, Heather sought another opportunity to meet other VGMers and expand her knowledge about employee ownership: the Employee Ownership Ambassadors (at that time called the ESOP Communication Committee). 

“I was selected to join the ambassadors in 2021 around the same time I joined as a Journey Guide,” said Heather. “It was something different, and I wanted to learn more about our ESOP.” 

As time went on and Heather felt that she had grasped the knowledge about VGM and the ESOP, she applied for, and received, the ESOP co-chair position, which she held for 2 years.  

It was in 2023 that the ambassadors were going through a rebrand, shifting their focus to providing more educational pieces about the ESOP and employee ownership. 

“I really wanted us to develop a tool to provide more education to our employee owners,” said Heather. “It was my third year as an ambassador, and from talking with others and making connections at ESOP conferences, I had an idea about what we could do.” 

ESOP University 

One of those ESOP connections had told Heather about educational courses their company had that helped their employees learn about the ESOP. 

“I was at the end of my term on the ambassadors, but I extended my term so I could work on this project,” said Heather. “I wanted something that all employee owners could take, including remote, warehouse, and Spanish-speaking employees.” 

The project would be named ESOP University, a multi-course educational program that would expand from entry level to more advanced courses.  

“This was a big undertaking, but it was something I wanted to see succeed,” said Heather. “It was a team effort developing these courses and the look of them. We brought in Corporate Communications to help put the design touches on the courses, and then I was able to develop the functionality of them.” 

ESOP University’s first courses were released in 2025 during Employee Ownership Month for Camp Ownership, a month-long, competitive camp-theme celebration.  

“It was great seeing the feedback from employee owners on these courses,” said Heather. “Between 800-900 employee owners completed them each week, which was outstanding considering VGM is a company of 1600. Though this is my last year with the ambassadors, I’m glad I was able to provide them this accomplishment of ESOP University.” 

2025 And Beyond 

This year proved to be a milestone year for Heather. The years of effort to build her confidence, knowledge, and her “silent project” of public speaking came full circle at the Midwest ESOP Conference. Here, Heather gave her first-ever presentation as a speaker in front of an audience of this scale. 

“Speaking at the Midwest ESOP Conference was incredibly enjoyable,” said Heather. “The years of exploration and putting myself out there just came together. I’m looking forward to more opportunities like this in the future.” 

Though ESOP University is wrapping up, her term as an Employee Ownership Ambassador is ending, and being an activity coordinator for Heartland is no longer on her schedule, Heather still has a stretch project she’ll be working on. 

“Within the last year I took on billing for VGM Education,” said Heather. “I’ve been working on process improvement for our billing system, bringing in the VGM & Associates Data Team to help automate some of the processes that were previously done manually.” 

Looking back, Heather isn’t sure that all she’s been able to accomplish would have been possible had it not been for the encouragement from her fellow employee owners. 

“This is the beauty of VGM: You can be involved in as much as you want,” said Heather. “VGM has this culture of encouragement, and you just need to have that mindset of, ‘I can do this.’ Up until about a year ago, I wouldn’t have considered myself a ‘leader.’ But being a leader is more than just a title. ‘Lead’ wasn’t part of mine, but people saw me as one. I don’t think this is something you can find in many places outside of VGM.” 

Thank you for sharing your story, Heather! 

VGM has many opportunities to Create Your Future like Heather. Check out our Careers page to check for current openings.