Dr. J.J. Walcutt is a scientist, innovator, and learning engineer that specializes in talent development and strategic reform across education, military, and government. She served in the U.S. Government as the Director of Innovation at the Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) Initiative under the Office of the Secretary of Defense and as a Human Innovation Fellow under the Office of Personnel Management. During her tenure in the government, she helped define the interoperable digital backbone required for training, education, and talent development across the military, intelligence, and greater security sector. She also designed an open innovation model for re-imagining the executive branch to promote talent development and retention. In her role at the Pentagon, Dr. Walcutt focused on promoting the science of learning through her service as a U.S. Delegate to NATO, Partnership for Peace, and as a national and international keynote speaker. In her role as a Human Innovation Fellow, she used the science of human centered design to recommend improved governmental communication structures with the American people to promote innovative problem solving. In this role, she provided keynote speeches nationally regarding innovation across, and transformation of, the federal government. Dr. Walcutt has over 20 years of experience in research and development for training and education with specific interests in improving educational systems to promote talent development, knowledge management, and decision making under stress.

Sae Schatz, Ph.D., works at the intersection of human cognition and learning, technology, and data. Most recently, she helped to produce the Learning Engineering Toolkit, published by Routledge. From 2015 to 2022, she served as the director of the Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) Initiative, a government program for research, development, and policy stewardship. Under her leadership, the program grew its impact across the US and international defense sectors, and she sparked the community's pursuit of the future learning ecosystem, in part with her popular book Modernizing Learning: Building the Future Learning Ecosystem.Before joining the civil service, Sae worked as an applied human systems scientist in both business and academia. She led the Marine Corps "Making Good Instructors Great" project and the Joint Staff's award-winning Border Hunter and Blended Learning–Training projects. Sae formerly held an assistant professorship with the University of Central Florida's Institute for Simulation and Training, and she was an instructor in the UCF Digital Media Department. Sae is a prolific writer and professional presenter as well as an accomplished graphic designer who often uses those skills to enhance books, presentations, and infographics.

Jason Briefel (he/him/his) is a partner (non-attorney) and Director of Government and Public Affairs at Shaw Bransford & Roth, a boutique federal employment law firm. He provides legislative and organizational representation to clients of the firm’s government affairs practice, including serving as Director of Policy & Outreach of the Senior Executives Association (SEA). Mr. Briefel is frequently quoted in the media discussing legislative and executive actions impacting the functioning of the federal workforce and efficiency of the federal government. He is a frequent speaker at trainings, conferences, and events. He has designed and managed a variety of professional development events, including the SEA Leadership Summit. Mr. Briefel also serves as Editor-in-Chief of the firm’s FEDmanager and FEDagent e-report newsletters, and is a regular host of FEDtalk on Federal News Network. Mr. Briefel holds a B.A. from the University of Richmond and an M.N.R. from North Carolina State University.

Reese Madsen is the founder and owner of MEMY&I, LLC. He is a senior learning executive that consults on program design, development, and improvement for the federal government sector. Using his 40 years of federal service and the last 15 as a Chief Learning Officer at the Department of Defense to support national and federal learning programs. His experience included leading a learning enterprise of 52 schoolhouses and programs for the U.S.’s largest government department - including overseeing a $2 billion budget supporting 2.5 million professionals. He developed policies, plans, programs, and training for civilian, military, government, academic, and industry workforces. This included maintaining a Learning Enterprise comprising of 5,000+ courses and providing more than 21 million hours of instruction per year.

Dr. Sydney Heimbrock serves as Chief Industry Advisor for Government at Qualtrics, where she brings an experience management approach to government workforce systems and programs. Dr Heimbrock served in the US Federal government for a quarter century, culminating in a 13-year Senior Executive Service appointment to the US Office of Personnel Management. There, she led the President’s Management Agenda on strategic human capital management initiatives for the 2.1 million Federal civilian workforce. Among her accomplishments is leading government-wide learning and development programs including the Federal Executive Institute, the President’s Management Fellows program, and the Federal HR Institute. Dr Heimbrock founded the Innovation Lab at OPM, a $ 6M, 30-designer-strong educational hub that trains thousands of Federal, state and local civil servants in experience management. She has global experience transforming governments through investments in workforce development and policy reform. Dr Heimbrock’s professional expertise includes measurement and evaluation; human centered design and design education; leading and managing creative teams; strategic foresight and continuous process improvement; human capital strategy and management; leadership and workforce development; public policy analysis and public management. Dr. Heimbrock holds degrees from Stanford, Syracuse, London School of Economics and Miami University of Ohio.