Krissy is the Co-Founder & Executive Director of Student ACES, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to inspiring & developing student-athletes of character, honor & integrity. The organization's mission is to create CHAMPIONS … which is an acronym that guides their core values: Command Respect, Honor Your Word, Aspire to Greatness, Maintain Courage, Possess a Work Ethic Second to None, Inspire Others, Own a Winning Attitude, Never Settle, and Sacrifice for Self and Team. Krissy has been in leadership positions in the non-profit sector for over 12 years. She is a certified instructor of Mental Health First Aid and has dedicated her career to inspiring a new generation of leaders. Through Student ACES, she has positively impacted over 50,000 high school student athletes and has taught them leadership skills, values, and character education to be successful men and women in the classroom, the athletic fields and in their communities.

Nick opened Nick's Furniture in Sugar Grove, Illinois over 20 years ago with a simple passion, he liked to sell and give customers honest advice and quality furniture without the pressure. What he didn't expect was that his passion for educating customers would eventually take him beyond the showroom floor. Nick became an early adopter of social media for business, building a following across Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube with content. His honest, no-gatekeeping approach to furniture buying resonates with audiences nationwide. Now Nick is pivoting from store owner to industry speaker and consultant, helping other retailers use social media to compete and grow. His story is about adaptation, resilience, consistency.

Christina is the founder of Digital Heights Marketing (DHM), a boutique social media management agency based in Chicago. She specializes in industries that most people think are too boring to be on social media - industries like highly regulated financial, insurance, and legal spaces- and then she proves those people wrong every day. Her strategy is simple: build meaningful connections and trust. That will always outperform automated tactics. In a world chasing algorithms and vanity metrics, Christina focuses on community, consistency, and authentic storytelling that turns an online presence into a long-term business asset. DHM works with clients who understand that showing up online is a long game worth playing.

Excellent communication with your clients, your suppliers, your staff, and any other faction among your interested parties is essential to success. But many entrepreneurs don't pay enough attention to this critical skill, resulting in lost business, annoyed customers, limited growth, or worse. In today's program, we discuss some common screw-ups and draw attention to the critical communication you need to master if you are to succeed at the highest level. No matter how long you've been in business, or how successful you are, you might still learn something in this program and fix an error that will further boost your success. They are simple changes … which means they are also easy to overlook!

Managing your staff (or suppliers) with efficiency and great communication – and having them appreciate and learn from the process – is one of the best lessons learned in the book "The One Minute Manager". The book is filled with small bits of insight that power organizations and is itself is an excellent example of ideal communication … simple and elegant! In this program, we discuss one of the key learnings and how we have seen it applied – or misapplied – in organizations that we have worked in. Organizational management and development can be dramatically simplified and much more effective by applying these lessons learned!

Dan is a serial entrepreneur, documentarian, and soon-to-be author. He's spent his career helping people tell their story. Now, as Co-Founder of Chapters, he's building a home for industry experts, scientists, and founders to capture, protect, and monetize their Intellectual

Property. At Chapters, the book is only the beginning. Dan is a former chapter president of EO (Entrepreneur Organization) and the American Advertising Federation.

Cynthia is the founder and creative director of Sunhouse Craft, a Berea, Kentucky-based artisan manufacturing company dedicated to preserving traditional craft while building a modern American home goods brand. An experienced fabricator and entrepreneur, she believes business can be a powerful tool for strengthening communities, creating meaningful work, and rebuilding regional supply chains. Before founding Sunhouse Craft, Cynthia spent more than a decade in collaborative design and fabrication, including launching a furniture line, workshop program, and workforce training initiative at Chicago's Rebuilding Exchange. Today, she leads a growing team producing handcrafted brooms, wooden wares, and traditional Appalachian goods that are sold through hundreds of retailers across North America. Sunhouse Craft has been featured in publications including Architectural Digest, Southern Living, Country Living, and Fast Company. Cynthia is a graduate of the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program and is currently leading a revival of Kentucky's historic white oak basket-making tradition through a new apprenticeship and production initiative.

Wendy is the founder of Meticulous Matters, a very interesting bookkeeping and accounting services company. Established in 2007, Wendy and her team provide remote, after-the-fact, monthly bookkeeping services to for-profit businesses primarily in service industries. Her business model is to provide monthly, remote, after-the-fact bookkeeping services … which means they are not managing a client's cash, A/P, or A/R. They complete the books and reconcile on a monthly basis, ask necessary questions, and send clean year-end reports and supporting backup to the client's CPA. Their mission is to provide this year-end package so that CPA's have no questions.