CEO, Delta Air Lines
Ed Bastian faced one of the most difficult and important turnarounds in business history leading Delta and its 100,000+ employees around the globe through the ravages of Covid. They emerged as the top airline in the world today. He’ll share how he and his top people leaders kept the company moving by prioritizing their people above all else—and how he gets the most out of his workforce by helping his workforce get the most out of their work. It will be an extraordinary exploration of teamwork at scale, with takeaways you can use immediately in your own organization.
Co-Author, The 4 Disciplines of Execution; Global Practice Leader of Execution, Franklin Covey
Every leader has goals they want to achieve, but how do you focus and leverage your teams to accomplish them despite a whirlwind of competing priorities? Unlock the secrets to effective strategy execution with The 4 Disciplines of Execution® methodology, proven to elevate organizational performance. This interactive session will offer you pragmatic ways to get all levels of your organization to execute on critical priorities amidst everyday distractions using the principles of focus, leverage, engagement and accountability.
Commissioner, Upshot League; Former Commissioner and President, WNBA; Founder, Generation W; Former SVP, PGA TOUR
The efficiency—and speed—with which your organization can meet its objectives is what turns good companies into great companies and keeps you ahead of the competition. Donna will help you recognize the gaps that may exist between performance and potential and give you and your teams the tools needed to simplify processes, facilitate innovation and transform the way you work. Hint: it starts with seeing failure as motivation and asking “why not”?
Donna was recruited by Adam Silver to lead the WNBA in its most vulnerable time. She served 6 years as the President/Commissioner of the league, during which time she solidified its base and led double digit growth in all key business metrics. This included 20% plus growth in sponsorship in the height of the recession, 25% growth in television viewership and triple digit growth in digital.
Author, The Power of Mattering: How Leaders Can Create a Culture of Significance and The Invisible Leader
Your people have a fundamental need to be seen, heard and valued. More people than ever report feeling ignored and underappreciated at work—simply put, they don’t feel like they matter to their leaders or their organizations. And these feelings have dire consequences. The hidden epidemic of insignificance is can lead to disengagement, turnover and low performance. The good news is that leaders can learn the skills to ensure everyone around them feels valued and knows how they add value at work. Through a captivating exploration of the emerging science of mattering and drawing from hands-on work with hundreds of diverse occupations and organizations, researcher and speaker Zach Mercurio will reveal how experiencing mattering to others is a fundamental—yet often overlooked—requirement for thriving. In this session, he’ll introduce a simple yet effective framework for making daily interactions with your people more meaningful:
Join fellow attendees for two sets of 25-minute table-top discussions on relevant topics like having difficult conversations, managing different personality types, building cross-functional teams following an acquisition, and more. Please see the back of your name badge for your table assignments.
Topics Include:
CEO, IgniteTech
In this thought-provoking session, we’ll challenge a common misconception: that AI strategy can be handed off entirely to technical teams, especially if AI innovation is a key strategy. As a CEO, understanding AI’s fundamentals has become as crucial as understanding your financial statements in order to plan your AI strategy. Drawing from extensive research and direct experience from his own company’s recent transformation, Eric Vaughan will demonstrate why CEOs who rely solely on their technical leaders for AI direction are positioning their companies for failure in the age of AI transformation. You’ll leave this discussion with a framework to build deep enough technical understanding without getting lost in the details, lead AI transformation while empowering your technical teams and increase employee buy-in to drive an AI innovation agenda.
Facilitated by: Kari Zeller, CEO and Principal, TGN Consulting
“Why won’t my people do what I need them to do?” It’s not that employees refuse change—it’s that standard approaches rarely generate the unity and momentum required. As CEO, you can’t personally oversee every move—your company’s success relies on layers of managers who must rally their teams in sync. In this candid discussion, we’ll examine what genuine mobilization looks like: aligning leadership, culture, and structures so your teams truly move together. Come ready to swap insights, tackle hidden friction, and reimagine how large-scale transformations actually take hold.
Facilitated by: Steve Casey, VP, Global Finance and Accounting Division, Personiv
The talent shortage is no longer just an HR issue—it’s a business-wide challenge affecting growth, efficiency, and innovation. Personiv’s latest CFO Pulse Survey reveals how leaders across industries are rethinking talent strategies to stay ahead. This discussion will focus on sustainable workforce solutions, strategic workforce planning, and new approaches to talent including AI, automation, outsourcing, and upskilling as potential solutions.
Author, Nine Lies About Work and The Problem with Change
Traditional performance management — annual goal setting, a five-point rating scale, and once-a-year feedback presented in a performance review — has been with us for a long time. It’s hardly universally loved, but organizations have struggled to come up with a better system. By looking closely at exactly why the traditional approach fails to deliver on its objectives, and by reexamining those objectives in the light of what we know about human performance, Ashley Goodall will describe a new approach to performance management, one that he implemented successfully at Deloitte and Cisco, and one that leads to more productive employees, more satisfied customers, and more of the performance we were all looking for in the first place.
The Turnover Expert; Author, The Power of Stay Interviews
Reducing employee turnover is not just about retaining staff—it’s about transforming your organization’s culture, making it a place where loyalty fuels excellence—boosts your bottom line. Drawing from his extensive experience and popularized concepts like the “Stay Interview,” renowned author and expert Dick Finnegan will demonstrate how proactive retention tactics can identify and address employees’ needs before they consider leaving. Participants will learn how to implement Stay Interviews effectively, uncover critical insights through deep probing, and use these findings to build trust and engagement within their teams. Finnegan will also discuss his proprietary model, Finnegan’s Arrow, which links turnover and engagement costs directly to business goals, ensuring accountability at every leadership level.
Host of Corporate Competitor Podcast; 12-time New York Times Bestselling Author; Former Associate Editor, Sports Illustrated
Flight Leader and Commanding Officer, U.S. Navy Blue Angels
Absolute faith in one another is imperative among members of the U.S. Navy Blue Angels precision flying team, where soaring canopy-to-canopy at 500 mph is all part of a day’s work. Talk about alignment! But that’s just part of the story. Longtime Associate Editor for Sports Illustrated and 11-time New York Times Best-Selling Author Don Yaeger got the chance to go inside this exceptional organization, and he’ll interview Captain Alexander Armatas, with lessons for every CEO in this turbulent time for talent.
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1:00 - 5:00 pm
Over 70% of Executives Surveyed Agree: Many Strategic Planning Efforts Lack Systematic Approach Tips for Enhancing Your Strategic Planning Process
Executives expressed frustration with their current strategic planning process. Issues include:
Steve Rutan and Denise Harrison have put together an afternoon workshop that will provide the tools you need to address these concerns. They have worked with hundreds of executives to develop a systematic approach that will enable your team to make better decisions during strategic planning. Steve and Denise will walk you through exercises for prioritizing your lists and steps that will reset and reinvigorate your process. This will be a hands-on workshop that will enable you to think about your business as you use the tools that are being presented. If you are ready for a Strategic Planning tune-up, select this workshop in your registration form. The additional fee of $695 will be added to your total.
2:00 - 5:00 pm
Female leaders face the same issues all leaders do, but they often face additional challenges too. In this peer session, we will facilitate a discussion of best practices and how to overcome common barriers to help women leaders be more effective within and outside their organizations.
Limited space available.
10:30 - 5:00 pm
General’s Retreat at Hermitage Golf Course
Sponsored by UBS
General’s Retreat, built in 1986 with architect Gary Roger Baird, has been voted the “Best Golf Course in Nashville” and is a “must play” when visiting the Nashville, Tennessee area. With the beautiful setting along the Cumberland River, golfers of all capabilities will thoroughly enjoy the golf, scenery and hospitality.
The golf outing fee includes transportation to and from the hotel, greens/cart fees, use of practice facilities, and boxed lunch. The bus will leave the hotel at 10:30 am for a noon shotgun start and return to the hotel after the cocktail reception following the completion of the round.
