2026 Association Day – EDUCATION
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CAE Hours: TBD
KEYNOTE SESSION
EMILY JONES
Sports Journalist & Media Personality
"Knowing Your Value: Lessons Learned on Camera, Off the Field, and Along the Way"
From a small-town girl with network dreams to three decades in sports media, this talk traces a career built on relationships, resilience, and reinvention. Through wins, mistakes, motherhood, and moments that changed everything, you’ll hear five hard-earned takeaways about opportunity, adaptability, and knowing your value - plus proof that you don’t have to have it all figured out to build a meaningful life and career.
MORNING BREAKOUT SESSIONS
Membership Dues Aren’t Enough: The Revenue Shift Associations Can’t Afford to Ignore
Speaker: Bill Sheehan, Global Head, Association Strategy – D2L
Membership dues alone can’t sustain associations in today’s fast-changing landscape. Demand for education, training, and credentialing is surging, creating a huge revenue opportunity. This session explores how associations can monetize learning, scale programs, engage members, and diversify revenue, unlocking growth and relevance while staying true to their mission.
Say Less, Mean More: Member-Centered Messaging They’ll Pay Attention To
Speaker: Anh Nguyen, Chief Brand Amplifier – Amplified Marketing
Association leaders face a crowded communications landscape more channels, more demands, and more pressure to show member value, often with lean teams. This session helps executives move beyond doing more and focus on clarity and intention in their messaging. Attendees will learn how to define what truly matters, align marketing and engagement efforts, and use communication as a leadership tool. The result is stronger trust, clearer value, and content people actually pay attention to.
Click to Convention Floor: Association Research Insights on Event Attendance
Speaker: Rich Vallaster, CEM, QAS, AAiP, Sr. Director of Industry Relations and Community Engagement – Personify
Fresh research from 750+ association professionals confirms what many suspect: members want to attend events but often can’t. The real barriers aren’t interest or loyalty, but workload, approvals, and budgets. This candid, data-driven session reveals the gap between perceived and actual attendance drivers, why knowing your membership isn’t enough, and how to rethink value narratives, build ROI tools for employer approval, and audit hidden access barriers to close the intent-to-attendance gap.
Boomer to Zoomer: Making Generational Gaps Work for You
Speaker: Rebecca Achurch, PgMP, PMP, CSM, CAE, Founder/CEO – Achurch Consulting
Your organization spans Baby Boomers to Gen Z, each bringing different technology expectations and strengths. What if those differences were your strategic advantage? This session reframes generational gaps as assets that propel technology to change forward. Learn how to build balanced tech teams leveraging diverse perspectives, design change strategies honoring different working styles, and create environments where multi-generational teams thrive during digital transformation.
AFTERNOON BREAKOUT SESSIONS
How AI is Exposing Cracks in the Association Operating Model
Speaker: Chris Vaughan, PhD, Chief Strategy Officer – Sequence Consulting
AI isn’t failing in associations because the technology is too new. It’s failing because most operating models weren’t built for their speed, scale, or unpredictability. In this session, Chris Vaughan, PhD. reframes the AI conversation away from tools and trends, and toward how work gets done. He explores why traditional workflows - linear, approval-heavy, and risk-averse - break under the weight of AI-driven demands.
Care as Currency: The Science of Transforming Member Connections into Lasting Loyalty
Speaker: Jamie Shibley, CEO – The Expressory
Today’s association members crave connection and trust, but most engagement remains transactional and digital. Based on the Strategic Engagement Index research, Jamie Shibley reveals how care is the new competitive edge. Leaders can replace outdated "know, like, trust" models with science-based engagement. Attendees will leave with a blueprint to deepen loyalty, drive referrals, and measure ROI blending psychology with strategy for impactful, legacy-building results.
Becoming an Event Architect: Creating Innovative Experiences for Association Meeting Planners
Speaker: Lydia Vara-Sebany, Event Coordinator – Visit Frisco
The standard event playbook of repetitive ballroom seminars is no longer enough to drive registration or member engagement. To thrive in the meetings industry, association executives must transition from being logistics managers to experience architects.
Find Your Lane: The Power of Influence in Your Association
Speaker: Bruce Waller, CRP, PHR, SHRM-CP, Vice President Corporate Relocation – The Armstrong Company
In today’s fast-paced business and talent landscape, influence is the currency of change. Many business and association professionals struggle to gain executive and board-level buy-in. In this practical session, business and sales leader Bruce Waller shares five proven strategies to build trust, gain alignment, and move ideas forward, equipping participants to influence with confidence and turn initiatives into measurable impact.
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