Five Speakers - Five Sparks - Career & Life Changing
One day, two powerful parts:
An opening keynote that will change how you think about communication under pressure, then a shift into four fast-paced "quick hit" sessions built to spark real conversation, sustainable change, and meaningful growth.
Keynote: Communication & Connection: Tips From a Hostage Negotiator
SCOTT TILLEMA
Scott is a FBI-trained hostage negotiator and professional speaker who teaches leaders how to communicate with calm, clarity, and emotional intelligence—especially under pressure. With over two decades of law enforcement and negotiation experience, Scott served as a SWAT-trained crisis negotiator for one of the largest police departments in the country.
He’s known for bringing tactical, high-stakes communication tools to everyday leadership challenges, helping executives, HR professionals, and teams build trust, defuse tension, and lead difficult conversations with confidence.
Scott's signature keynotes deliver powerful stories from the front lines of negotiation, backed by data from Harvard and Chicago Booth on emotional decision-making.
With a rare blend of real-world experience, humor, and practical wisdom, he equips leaders to listen better, ask smarter questions, and creates meaningful change through courageous communication.
Afternoon 'Quick-Hit' Speakers
Founder, Heather Yancey Fitness, and Host of the Badass Reset Club podcast.
Talk: Your Burnout Plan is Working Perfectly
Heather Yancey is a Human Performance and Workplace Wellness speaker specializing in sustainable performance in high-demand environments. She helps organizations understand how physical health, stress physiology, and daily habits directly impact focus, resilience, and productivity at work.
Blending expertise in movement science, strength training, and nervous system regulation, Heather delivers practical, science-backed strategies professionals can use immediately to reduce pain, increase energy, and prevent burnout. Her approach goes beyond traditional wellness talks by connecting how we move, think, fuel, and recover to how we lead, collaborate, and perform.
Known for her engaging style and actionable takeaways, Heather equips teams with small, repeatable habits that build lasting results because performance isn’t built in one big push. It’s built one rep at a time.
Founder & CEO of Pathfinder Strategies, Organizational Strategist, Speaker, and Author.
Talk: Being Too Nice is Hurting Your Career
Brandy finds the problem underneath the problem. The thing leaders point to — bad communication, inconsistent managers, a team that won’t click — is rarely the real issue. The real issue is usually that people are being asked to lead through growth, change, and pressure without the clarity, confidence, and alignment to do it well. Brandy names that gap and closes it.
As Founder & CEO of Pathfinder Strategies, Brandy has done this work across finance, insurance, healthcare, nonprofits, growth-phase startups, and the fire service — where leadership isn’t a slide in a deck; it’s whether a crew trusts each other at 3 a.m. She built the frameworks behind it — The Forge for leadership confidence, Spark for communication — and wrote two books, including the Amazon bestseller Spark: How Great Leaders Start. The point of all of it: leaders who trust themselves, and organizations that stop wasting their best people.
Digital Wellness Expert. Founder of Scroll By Choice
Talk: Lean Into AI Without Getting Sucked Into It
Riz is a digital wellness entrepreneur and speaker helping organizations, schools, and families reclaim focus in a world engineered to distract. As Founder and CEO of Scroll By Choice, he applies behavioral science to the modern challenge of excessive tech distraction - translating complex issues around technology, Al, and attention into practical, implementable frameworks.
As a former executive at Microsoft and Aon, Riz led global transformation initiatives. He brings systems thinking and data-driven insight to how attention-hijacking designs affect productivity, wellbeing, and workplace culture.
Growth Architect, and Founder & CEO, MetaHelm
Talk: Start With 'What': How Action Shows What Planning Never Will
Guillaume created Strategic Narrative®, the methodology founders use to grow their company and build one they also love running. He founded MetaHelm to bring it to founders in brand-new markets. Over 33 years, Guillaume has founded four ventures and advised leaders at Alaska Airlines, the Gates Foundation, Google, Microsoft, and L'Oréal. Clients call him "the business therapist," because the inner work matters as much as the strategy.
He teaches founders at startup incubators worldwide, and at the University of Washington, in a program ranked Top 3 in the US. He came to the US with nothing but a pair of work gloves. And built from there.