2026 Conference Schedule

Amy Leneker, The Leneker Team

Keynote: The Joyful Rebellion: Why Less Stress Is the Future of Work

What would happen if we created workplaces where people could do great work and feel good doing it?

In Joyful Rebellion, Amy Leneker shares insights from her national research study, The State of Stress & Joy at Work 2026. The findings offer both a hard truth and a hopeful one: while workplace stress is systematically impacting people’s careers and lives, joy can be part of the solution.

Join Amy to explore the connection between stress, joy, and performance, and discover how rethinking the way we work can create healthier, more engaged, and more sustainable workplaces. Together, we’ll challenge some of the assumptions we’ve accepted about work and consider what becomes possible when we make less stress and more joy part of the equation.

This fun and informative session offers a data-driven, hopeful path forward to less stress, more joy, and better work.

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Marcy Jacobs, Consultant, and Hannah Burns, Granicus

11am Session - From Public Service to CX Leadership: Lessons Across Government and Industry with Marcy Jacobs and Hannah Burn

What does it take to build and sustain a customer experience (CX) program that creates meaningful change? In this fireside chat, Marcy Jacobs will share lessons and insights drawn from her career across the State of Maryland, the Federal Government, and the private sector.

Marcy will reflect on her experiences developing and advancing CX programs in different environments, exploring what she has learned about building a customer-centered culture, navigating organizational change, engaging leaders, and turning CX principles into practical results. The conversation will highlight both the common challenges and unique opportunities that emerge when applying CX across government and industry.

Through candid stories and real-world lessons, Marcy will offer perspectives on what works, what doesn’t, and what CX leaders can learn from working across sectors. Attendees will leave with practical insights and a broader perspective on how to build CX programs that are sustainable, impactful, and focused on the people they serve.

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Bobby McKee, State of Missouri's Office of Administration

The Next Steps for Missouri in it’s CX Journey. Leveraging Survey data to Make Real Change.

Missouri has an opportunity to move its customer experience (CX) journey from simply measuring satisfaction to driving meaningful change. Survey data provides more than a snapshot of how customers feel—it can reveal where government services are falling short, what matters most to Missourians, and where targeted improvements can have the greatest impact.

Ultimately, the next chapter of Missouri’s CX journey is about making survey data actionable. When the voice of the customer is connected directly to decision-making and service delivery, feedback becomes more than a report—it becomes a catalyst for real, visible change.

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Sarah Norton, Washington State Department of Licensing

Excellent Service Starts with Us

Join Sarah Norton for an overview of how the Washington State Department of Licensing equips learners with practical tools and strategies to build positive workplace interactions. The training explores a variety of essential topics, including growth mindset, empathy, emotional intelligence, intent versus impact, social identity, unconscious bias, effective communication, and partnering with the customer to create positive service experiences.

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Jeannie Bowen, Your Washington, and Steve Page, University of Washington Evans School

Why Some Problems Don’t Stay Solved: A New Way to Understand Public Sector Challenges

Join Jeannie Bowen with Your Washington and Professor Steve Page with the University of Washington Evans School of Public Policy & Governance to explore the difference between technical and adaptive challenges, and how adaptive leadership can help address complex customer service issues. Drawing on research, real-world examples, and lessons from the Evans School’s Leading Public Innovation Certificate, we’ll share and practice tools for diagnosing challenges and choosing approaches that fit.

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Joe Vansyckle, Washington State Employment Security Department

The Innovators Method: Driving Impactful CX Through Deep Immersion

In this fast-paced, 50-minute masterclass, you will learn from Joe Vansyckle with the Washington State Employment Security Department how to apply core discovery tools from The Innovators Method to transform your customer experience (CX) strategy. We will break down the Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) framework to explore how emotional, social, and functional drivers influence people. You will walk away with actionable immersion techniques—specifically advice interviews, contextual interviews, and ethnographic observation—to look past surface-level complaints and solve systemic service bottlenecks.

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Jennifer Phillips, Washington State Department of Social and Health Services

Embracing Universal (Inclusive) Design in Government

Universal design is a set of principles and practices focused on creating inclusive spaces, products and experiences that work for broad groups of people. In this session we will explore what universal design means and why it matters in the public sector to improve programs, physical environments, digital services, and community engagement. Participants can expect to dig into real world examples and discuss challenges unique to government services.

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Dr. Ben Granger, Qualtrics

Keynote Day 2: Sustaining Customer Experience Through the Employee Experience

In this keynote session, Qualtrics’ Chief Workplace Psychologist, Dr. Ben Granger, will share the theoretical backdrop for aligned employee-customer experiences as well as actionable insights collected from customers, employees, and business leaders on what drives experience and business outcomes.

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Sadeeq Simmons, Alysha Myers, and Kendra Latham, Washington State Department of Licensing

How DOL is Leveraging Technology to Understand Customer Experience

Gathering good customer feedback is one thing, but analyzing it is another. In this session, Alysha Myers, Sadeeq Simmons, and Kendra Latham with the Washington State Department of Licensing will share how their agency is using technology to understand customer feedback.

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Dr. Wendy Fraser, Wendy Fraser Consulting

The Trust Lens: A Practical Framework for Better Work and Better Customer Experiences

In this interactive session, Dr. Wendy Fraser introduces her research-based Trust Behaviors Framework, a practical lens for understanding the behaviors and organizational conditions that strengthen—or erode—trust. Grounded in research and refined through years of work with teams and organizations, the framework explores five interconnected areas: purpose, roles, core processes, communication, and interpersonal dynamics.

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Cheryl D'Angelo-Gary, Washington State Department of Labor and Industries

What if We Went Bananas for Change Management and Customer Experience?

The Savannah Bananas decided to put customer experience first in 2016. As a result, they went from being unable to sell out even one section in their home field to filling major stadiums and arenas across the nation. More than 35 million people follow their social media, and they had to move to a lottery system for ticket sales. Join Cheryl D’Angelo-Gary with the Washington State Department of Labor and Industries to take a look at not only what they did, but also how they did it.

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Camy Naasz, Anthro-Tech

Using Human-Centered Design in CX Improvements

In this session, Camy Naasz, Director of Human-Centered Design at Anthro-Tech, will show how human-centered design helps public agencies identify customer experience problems, understand the needs and behaviors behind them, and design more effective services.

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Kellyanne Beck, Arizona Department of Economic Security

From Feedback to Function: Why CX is the New Standard for Public Service

This session with Kellyanne Beck from the Arizona Department of Economic Security explores how a CX-first approach streamlines service delivery while simultaneously reducing the administrative burden on your workforce. Join us to learn how putting people at the center of your operations creates a more efficient government and a more fulfilled team.

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Anne Althauser, Your Washington

Behind Every Customer Experience Is a Staff Experience

Anne Althauser with Your Washington will share how we designed the listening effort, what we learned about the connection between staff experience and customer experience, and how we are turning those insights into action. Participants will leave with practical ideas for listening to the people closest to customers—and using what they hear to improve services, systems, and the experience of government itself.

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Jodi Sandfort, University of Washington

Keynote Day 3: Walking our Talk - Leading Innovation in These Times

Public institutions rarely suffer from a shortage of good ideas; turning them into lasting changes that improve how citizens experience public service is the harder work.  This keynote session with Jodi Sandfort, Professor & Dean at the Evans School of Public Policy & Governance, examines what happens between aspiration and implementation—and why changing routines, assumptions, and ways of working is often more difficult than designing the solution itself. Leading innovation in these times requires a particular kind of courage: the willingness to work across boundaries, experiment without certainty, confront what gets in the way, and keep learning as we act. Together, we’ll explore what becomes possible when innovation moves from something we talk about to something we practice every day.

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Cami Feek, Washington State Department of Enterprise Services, Taylor Linke, Health Care Authority, and Amy Windrope, Department of Fish and Wildlife

Leading with agency values to bring change

What happens when customer experience (CX) becomes more than a goal and starts shaping how an organization works from the inside out? Join us for a conversation with Cami Feek, Interim Director of the Washington State Department of Enterprise Services; Taylor Linke, Deputy Director of the Health Care Authority; and Amy Windrope, Deputy Director of the Department of Fish and Wildlife. These leaders will share how they’ve used CX to challenge old ways of working, inspire their teams, and create meaningful culture change across their organizations. Come hear what’s worked, what they’ve learned, and how they leverage their agency’s values to make CX a lasting part of organizational culture.

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Craig Szelestowski, Lean Agility Inc.

Finish: Getting CX Projects All the Way to the Citizen

In his forthcoming book, “Finish: Why Smart Organizations Spin – and How to Finally Get Things Done”, Craig Szelestowski explores why so many government CX projects never reach the citizen, and what to do about it. Drawing on 500+ public-sector engagements, this practical session reveals the patterns that kill CX work mid-stream: scope drift, competing priorities, leadership turnover, fading sponsorship, and the silent killer – and a set of five shifts that overcome them.

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Paige Fury, Washington State Office of Financial Management

Strategies for Customer Service and Change Management in Public Health

Join Paige Fury with the Washington State Office of Financial Management to explore practical strategies for delivering excellent customer service and managing change effectively within public health organizations. Participants will learn key principles of empathetic communication, cultural awareness, and community partnership, alongside foundational change management models such as Kotter, ADKAR, and Prochaska.

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Kara Withers, Washington State Department of Corrections

People-Centered Leadership: Leading with Courage, Connection, and Growth

Kara Withers with the Washington State Department of Corrections will explore three leadership competencies that are quickly becoming essential for leading today’s workforce; adopting a coach-led approach to developing others, leveraging authenticity and strategic storytelling to strengthen influence and connection, and cultivating psychologically safe teams where feedback, learning, and continuous improvement become the bedrock of team culture.

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Jessie Cronin, Washington State Department of Health

Make Friends and Do Cool Stuff: Building the Relationships That Turn Ideas into Action

In this highly interactive session with Jessie Cronin from the Washington State Department of Health, you’ll explore how your own personality, strengths, and working style can become assets for building trust and attracting collaborators. Through guided activities and practical tools, you’ll develop a personalized influence strategy you can start using immediately.

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Dr. Rain Carei, Washington State Department of Corrections

Evidence Based Treatment to Improve Client, Staff, and Community Recovery

In this presentation, Dr. Rain Carei with the Washington State Department of Corrections will highlight the connection between incarcerated women and the communities we serve. Incarcerated women are our mothers, daughters, wives, aunts, friends, sisters, and neighbors. Throughout the presentation, we will examine the impact of evidence-based trauma care at the individual, facility, and community levels through the lens of concentric circles of healing.

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