Success in the workforce starts with your leaders. If those taking charge don’t have clarity and a focused direction, their talent will lag behind. But knowing exactly where you, your team, and your talent needs to go isn’t always simple, and sometimes, you need to bet on your success.
Few know this better than Ericka Portis, Director of Performance for Fanatics Betting & Gaming, who joined us for an exclusive Q&A ahead of our SPARK Talent 2026 conference to discuss with us her HR journey, the road she’s followed, and paved, for leadership success.
From talent systems to leadership strategy, Portis has led the charge in development for some of the most prominent businesses out there. Here are our top four takeaways from our electric interview!
Leaders Never Stop Learning
Portis’ background includes several paths in education, which taught her one of her greatest lessons she’s brought into the HR World: Leaders should be students as often as they are teachers.
One person can’t hold all the answers, and being a truly great leader isn’t about knowing everything, but rather knowing who to ask, and making sure questions don’t need to be asked twice. Portis explains, “I genuinely believe people do their best work when growing.”
You Can’t Always Save the Day
Leaders always want to be the hero. With the responsibility lying on their shoulders, it makes sense to want to save as many employees and coworkers from as much hassle and stress as possible. But that doesn’t build strong teams, just wears out leadership.
True leadership is about building up others around you to fight their own battles. “The best leaders that I work with don’t spend their time rescuing people,” Portis explains. “They spend their time creating clarity. They define what success looks like, remove obstacles, and provide coaching.”
It’s About Experiences, not Processes
Thinking back to a pivotal moment in her career, where one of Portis’ first teams partnered with a leadership council team, and came out the other side with a presentation of what they learned. What Portis saw was a group of people, for the first time, understanding how leadership was deeply intertwined in being a good human.
“What stood out was how personal their reflections were,” Portis said. “Several of the participants became emotional, because for the first time, they really examined the connection between who they were outside of work, and who they were as leaders.”
Want to learn more? Join Kevin Bishop at SPARK TALENT 2026 in Disney Springs, Florida, where he will dive deeper into LinkedIn’s concept called talent velocity and share practical tools to help you invest in your people.