KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

Gregory Offner is a multi-talented individual, with a passion for entertaining and educating others. His keynotes, workshops, and corporate consulting engagements help the world's leading organizations create high-performing, highly fulfilled leaders.

Prior to this work, Gregory led global sales and marketing efforts for several Fortune 100 organizations; brokered complex Risk Management and Insurance programs for large commercial organizations; and drove process improvement initiatives as a certified Lean Six Sigma practitioner. But during that time, Gregory lived a double life. By day, he was a suit and tie-wearing professional; but under the cover of night, Gregory was better known as "Junior" - a world-renowned professional dueling pianist.

As an entertainer, Gregory has performed on stages of every size; for audiences of every size; on 5 continents. His ability to integrate that fun and energy into his programming (yes, he often uses a piano on stage) transforms his program from a keynote speech into a keynote experience.

Gregory's work as a keynote speaker, coach, and workshop facilitator fills a void that most organizations leave in their training programming: soft skill development.

Gregory has always been passionate about soft skills, interviewing over 1,000 senior executives about purpose, and analyzing the onboarding, training, and development programs of 43 companies before the age of 30. He was fascinated by the performance differences between organizations that prioritized soft skill training and those that focused primarily on hard, job-specific skill development.

Through a mix of speaking, audience participation, and a little dueling piano bar magic sprinkled in, Gregory reveals the insights and tools you need to accelerate your growth, amplify creativity, and deliver a performance that leaves the audience cheering for an encore.

Dr. Michael J. Jabbour is the Microsoft AI Innovation Officer in the Office of the CTO and a recognized leader in large-scale organizational transformation. With over two decades of experience spanning artificial intelligence, human-centered agile development, and healthcare, he has become a driving force behind impactful digital transformations and operational mergers. As a regular guest lecturer at Stanford University, Dr. Jabbour brings his extensive expertise to academia, complementing his previous roles as CIO/CTO for various NYC agencies—including the NYC Department of Education—while securing significant innovation project funding and developing programs that have benefited millions of users. At Microsoft, he combines his deep industry knowledge with a passion for societal impact, advancing education, medicine, and other critical fields through pioneering research that pushes the boundaries of human-AI collaboration. His current research extends to biologically inspired AI models, distributed agency, and the future of education and medicine, empowering individuals globally to harness the transformative potential of AI.

Speaker Bio:
Jenny Evans is a speaker, author, and on-air expert on physiology and chemistry, as it relates to resiliency, confidence and performance. She is highly experienced, having worked with thousands of C-suite executives, leaders, and employees — from corporations, associations, and universities across the globe.

Her dynamic presentations and training sessions both educate and inspire audiences by linking the stressful challenges of everyday life to the body’s own chemistry and physiology. Jenny brings to life the art of optimizing your own chemistry to boost your performance and productivity, all while enhancing your health and energy.

Jenny’s events are active, engaging, high-energy, and life-changing – leaving audiences inspired, informed and on their way to leading a more productive life in increasingly demanding business environments.

Liz Clark is Vice President for Policy and Research for the National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO). Liz has been working to advance the goals and priorities of colleges and universities on Capitol Hill since 1999.

She joined NACUBO after spending more than three and a half years leading the State University of New York (SUNY) System Office of Federal Relations in Washington, DC. Liz also served as Director of Federal Relations for Oregon State University and prior to that, she was Assistant Director of Federal Relations at Cornell University, where she was charged with overseeing Cornell University's first Washington, DC-based federal relations office.

A native of Liberty, NY, Liz is a graduate of Binghamton University (SUNY) and received a Master’s of Science degree in Policy Analysis and Management from Cornell University. While in graduate school, she also completed a fellowship at the University at Albany's Center for Women in Government.