For a company to bring in diverse talent, it needs a diverse slate of candidates — and O’Kelly is proud to say her organization offers that. She believes that collectively, corporations are often missing an important opportunity when utilizing staffing firms to hire contractors. “That’s where I don’t think corporations really focus on diversity. They think, ‘Oh, it’s just a contractor, we don’t care,’” O’Kelly says. “But when those people end up becoming your employees, then you missed a huge opportunity to bring in diversity from the beginning.”

A supporter of DE&I long before it became a thing, O’Kelly is unafraid to be the one to challenge those in charge. “When I hear business leaders speaking, I ask them, ‘What are you doing? What are you doing to support women-owned businesses? What are you doing to support your internal team, and the vendors that provide services to you?’” O’Kelly explains. She is passionate about keeping these issues and questions front of mind because, as she notes, we may be making progress, but we’ve still got a long way to go.