Executive Summit

In high-achieving environments, the drive to succeed often comes at a quiet cost: exhaustion, disconnection, and a sense that no matter how much we accomplish, it’s never quite enough. When productivity becomes the only measure of worth, rest feels impossible—and burnout starts to look like the norm. But it doesn’t have to be.

In this keynote Kara Hardin, former lawyer, and mental health educator explores why our current approach to performance is backfiring—and what we can do instead. Through research, relatable stories, and practical tools, we’ll unpack:

• How common ideas about time, efficiency, and productivity are quietly harming individual and collective well-being
• Why mental health isn’t the reward for high performance—it’s the foundation
• What leaders can do (for themselves and their teams) to build a healthier, more sustainable relationship with work

Attackers don’t care about traditional organizational lines and roles. No matter the industry, CISOs are paying closer attention to the connections between cyber and physical securities. Threat detection in the cyber space is one thing but using that information to enhance security or even stop crimes in the physical world — is next level. Being able to quickly mobilize after finding risks could prevent damages or loss to an organization — or maybe even save lives. 

Join this session to explore:

• Expanding your risk lens to see the connection between cyber and physical threat detection
• Communicating the scale and gravity of information uncovered to your business and related organizations
• Reporting structures of cyber and physical security teams

From Scatter Spider to the DPRK, attackers are walking through the front door of organizations by exploiting one blind spot: the lack of Identity Verification (IDV). Despite heavy investments in MFA, IGA, PAM, and even emerging controls like JIT and NHI, identity impersonation remains wide open—and it’s fueling some of today’s most high-profile breaches.

In this session, hear the inside story of New American Funding’s IDV journey. Learn how to:

• Build executive support and overcome adoption hurdles
• Deploy protections against liveness bypass and deepfake fraud
• Close one of the most dangerous gaps in identity security before your organization becomes the next headline

CISOs are ready for a fresh approach to third-party risk management that's proactive, automated, and scalable. Real-time, continuous visibility into cyber risks across the entire attack surface is essential in today's complex environment. Also essential is the need to communicate those immediate risks to the business.

In this session, go beyond just compliance to discuss:

• Practical strategies achieving comprehensive 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th, etc. party risk visibility
• Automation for faster onboarding and continuous monitoring of vendors
• Actionable insights about financial impacts that support board-level reporting

Connect with like-minded peers in a one-on-one setting through Peer-to-Peer Meetings. You will be matched with peers in your community based on your shared interests and priorities.

The CISO remit increasingly includes GenAI governance, securing cyber-physical systems, and a range of value-driving services — yet its core charge remains safeguarding operations. As breaches become inevitable and board risk appetites shift, cyber resilience will demand even greater focus. CISOs must define recovery goals, guarantee reliable backups, and restore critical services with speed — focusing on measurable resilience to earn their future role as Chief Cyber Resilience Officers.

Join this session to learn about:

• Defining and measuring resilience for real business outcomes
• Orchestrating reliable backup and rapid recovery strategies
• Embedding resilience across teams as a cultural and leadership priority

CISOs must proactively address evolving threats by strengthening organizational resilience and disaster recovery capabilities. Protecting critical assets and maintaining robust, regularly tested recovery processes are key to reducing risk and business disruption. Effective collaboration between security leadership and business stakeholders drives strategic success.

Join this boardroom to discuss with your peers:

• Methods for identifying and safeguarding critical assets within the security framework
• Implementing best practices for ongoing testing, certification and hardening of recovery environments
• Enhancing collaboration between security teams and executive leadership to align resilience strategies with business objectives

With cyber threats escalating and the increase of legal and financial risks, CISOs must collaborate with their legal teams. Between new regulations, vendor risk management, incident response, AI innovations, M&A and more – building a collaborative partnership is essential.  Plus – how do CISOs make sure they themselves are protected legally?

Join this session to discuss:

• Strategies to foster collaboration with your legal team
• Real scenarios and timelines on when to loop in legal
• Essential questions to ask legal counsel about your own personal liability