Have you ever been told you need to "think more strategically," but weren't quite sure what that actually means? 

You're not alone. Join us for a hands-on workshop led by Mark Schaff, a former Principal Trainer at the Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA).

Strategic thinking is often treated as a single, vague capability. In reality, it is a set of distinct ways of thinking that can be learned, practiced, and improved.

This highly interactive workshop provides a clear, practical model for how effective leaders think strategically—and applies it directly to the real challenges participants are facing.

The program is built around a three-part framework drawn from graduate-level leadership research and teaching at Northwestern University.

You'll learn to strengthen strategic thinking by developing:

From the beginning, you'll work in groups on real issues as you identify and prioritize the most important challenges you are currently facing. These issues become the working material for the day, ensuring that concepts are applied in a way that is immediately relevant and transferable.

Each element of the framework is introduced, demonstrated through a familiar case, and then applied in your small groups to your selected issues. Interactive exercises, simulations, and games are used to make abstract ideas tangible and to surface common strategic pitfalls that even experienced professionals encounter.

Pricing:

Lunch, snacks, and coffee will be provided.	Early Bird thru 3/13/26	Just in Time after 3/13
Member	$119	$129
Members of all other ATD chapters	$139	$149
Non-Member	$169	$179

About our Presenter:

Mark Schaff (CPA, MBA) is a seasoned business educator and leadership development practitioner with experience spanning public accounting, corporate finance, and organizational training. He retired in March 2025 after nearly 20 years with the Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA),  where he served as Principal Trainer and led enterprise wide leadership development efforts.

At OCTA, Mark designed and delivered leadership programs focused on improving judgment, decision-making, and organizational effectiveness. He created the agency’s flagship Leadership Development Program in 2016, which brings together selected employees for monthly, full-day sessions over the course of a year. Participants study leadership and strategic-thinking models, apply them to real organizational challenges, and complete the program with a capstone presentation aligned to OCTA’s strategic goals. Before transitioning into organizational development, Mark built a successful career in corporate financial management, holding senior and executive roles at divisions of publicly traded companies including Times Mirror, International Rectifier, and McKesson Corporation. He began his professional career at KPMG’s Los Angeles office and is a licensed CPA in California (inactive).

Mark holds a B.S. in Business Administration from California State University, Northridge, and an MBA from the University of Southern California.

In his current work, Mark focuses selectively on teaching, consulting, and research related to strategic thinking, leadership development, and organizational systems. His facilitation style emphasizes clarity, real-world application, and helping professionals think more effectively in complex environments. Mark is also a certified Working Genius facilitator, and incorporates insights about energy, contribution, and team dynamics into his leadership and development work where appropriate.

Earn Professional Professional Development Points

This program is worth 4.5
Professional Development points. 

Find out more about APTD/CPTD Certifications here.

ATD Capability Model

This program aligns with the following Domains and Capabilities: 

Building Personal Capability

Developing Professional Capability

Impacting Organizational Capability

Talent development professionals should be able to implement a multilevel, systematic method for gathering, analyzing, and reporting on information about the effectiveness and effort of learning programs.

To find out more about the ATD Capability Model for the Training and Development Profession, visit http://tdcapability.org.

Accessibility

ATD-OC events are accessible to all participants. If you have questions or require special accommodations or auxiliary aid related to a disability for you to participate in the event, please notify us at least three weeks in advance by message to ocoffice@atdoc.org, with subject line "ADA Accommodations," outlining your needs and request for accommodation.

We will make every effort to work with you to accommodate your need.

PHOTOGRAPHY RELEASE

As part of your registration, you will be required to indicate your acceptance or rejection of the statement below:

By registering for this event, I hereby give the Association for Talent Development, Orange County Chapter, its clients, agents, and assigns, full permission to use, publish and copyright photographic images, film images, video images, sound recordings, and any reproductions from these materials of me and/or my property or any part thereof, either in conjunction with or without using my name, and make changes or alterations therein and/or alterations thereto Worldwide in perpetuity. Some places these images and recordings may be used and posted include, but are not limited to, the Internet, emails, social media, etc.

If I do not provide permission, I understand I will be seated outside of the field of video.

AI. Green technology. Augmented reality. All these topics are popular nowadays. Companies are either using them directly or developing products that incorporate them. Organizations need people who have the aptitude to learn technically complex topics quickly. The technical staff are these people. For a variety of reasons, though, technical professionals can struggle with effectively communicating these topics, especially to non-technical audiences.

Talent Development leaders can help overcome this challenge by developing speaker training programs for the technical staff.

In this session, we will discuss why developing a speaker program makes sense, what developing a speaker program entails, and how to track the usefulness of the program.

This session is for Talent Development professionals who recognize the issue of their technical staff struggling to convey technical information that others in the organization can understand and appreciate and are open to the idea of establishing speaker training programs to address the issue.

By the end of this session, members will be able to:

1. Identify and address specific challenges technical staff face in public speaking.
2. Discover effective methods for providing opportunities to practice speaking and get constructive feedback.
3. Understand the importance of tracking progress and measuring the impact of speaker training programs.
4. Receive reasons to implement speaker training programs for the technical staff.

Agenda:

6:00 PM — Welcome / Informal Networking 

6:10 PM — Structured Networking

6:25 PM — A Little Chapter Business

6:30 PM — Main Event

7:30 PM — Closing/Informal Networking

What To Bring

The Administrivia

Your assignment: gather 5 new connections at ATD International Conference and Exposition 2026.

The ATD International Conference and Exposition is landing in our backyard (Los Angeles), and it represents a massive investment in your professional development.

But: An investment in skills without an investment in relationships is incomplete.  

Yet many of us dread the "work" in "network." Swapping business cards or reciting a rehearsed elevator pitch feels transactional, not relational. And frankly, it doesn't work. You end up with a pocket full of cards from people you don't actually know.

Tonight, we are going to explore how to strip away the corporate veneer and show up as your genuine self.

Embrace Serendipity: Break the ice and open up to chance connections by dropping preconceived notions.

Understand Authenticity: Understand why being authentic is crucial for building genuine, long-lasting trust and authority in your network.

Refine the Connection: Apply this authenticity to a core networking tool—the elevator pitch—making it powerful and memorable because it's genuinely you.

By the end of this session, members will be able to:

1. Identify 

Agenda:

6:00 PM — Welcome / Informal Networking 

6:10 PM — Structured Networking

6:30 PM — Main Event

7:00 PM — Structured Networking

7:30 PM — Closing/Informal Networking

What To Bring

The Administrivia

Join us for a day of improving communication, leadership, and collaboration through fun, laughter, and a few well-designed games. Yes, And for Business leaders is an interactive workshop that introduces improvisation and storytelling as practical tools for modern leadership. This session uses structured creativity exercises to help participants build presence, adaptability, and trust.

This experience is built specifically for professionals, especially HR leaders, who want practical takeaways, not performance pressure. Every activity is guided, purposeful, and immediately applicable back in the workplace. And you'll probably have a few laughs too!

Part 1: Warming Up to Presence:

We begin with light, engaging games like Pass the Clap and a One-Word Group Story. These exercises gently bring participants into the room mentally and physically while building: real-time listening, awareness of others, letting go of overthinking, and co-creation without control. Participants quickly experience an important leadership truth: being present matters more than being clever.

Part 2: The Power of "Yes, And"

At the heart of improv is a simple concept: Yes, And. This isn't about blind agreement. It's about acknowledging a contribution and building on it. Through small-team storytelling and partner-based fun and games, participants practice: supporting ideas instead of correcting them, moving conversations forward, shared ownership, nonverbal communication, and trust and adaptability. HR professionals often see firsthand how quickly ideas die in meetings. This section gives them language and exercises they can bring back to teams to improve brainstorming, feedback conversations, and cross-functional collaboration.

Part 3: Storytelling Under Pressure

Clear communication is a leadership superpower. Participants learn a simple framework of Who/ What/ Where to anchor conversations, presentations, and high-stakes discussions. Through "heightened storytelling" and scene-based exercises, they practice: structuring ideas quickly, staying grounded while adapting, listening under pressure and responding instead of rehearsing

By adding creative constraints (changing pace, tone, or physicality), participants break rigid thinking patterns for fast-moving organizational environments.

You will leave with strengthened:

This workshop doesn't end in the room. You walk away with:

Where leaders are constantly responding to change, the ability to listen, build, and adapt in real time is a competitive advantage. And it turns out, you can build it through play.

Pricing:

Lunch, snacks, and coffee will be provided.	Early Bird thru 3/24	Regular 3/25 to 4/15	Just in Time after 4/16
Member	$150	$170	$190
Members of all other ATD chapters	$170	$190	$210
Non-Member	$200	$220	$240

About our Presenter:

Erica Mesirov is the Founder and President of Joy At The Top, where she partners with organizations to prevent burnout, strengthen team connection, and build resilient, high-performing cultures. As a corporate wellness consultant and strategist, Erica works with leaders and teams in high-pressure environments to implement sustainable stress management practices that improve focus, engagement, and performance.

With a master's degree in Holistic Nutrition and advanced certifications in meditation, sound healing, Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), and hypnosis, Erica brings both scientific grounding and behavioral insight to her work. She equips teams with practical, accessible tools to regulate stress, increase presence, and restore energy. Her workshops and programs blend neuroscience, mindset training, and experiential learning to create measurable outcomes: reduced turnover, fewer sick days, improved productivity, and stronger team cohesion.

Erica's approach is also shaped by her unique creative background. A former professional actress, she completed a two-year intensive program in performance and improvisation at the New Actors Workshop, studying under legendary director Mike Nichols, director of The Graduate, and improv pioneer Paul Sills, founder of The Second City. This training deeply informs her work today, where she integrates storytelling and improvisational techniques to help leaders communicate more effectively, adapt quickly, and build authentic connection within their teams.

Her belief in workplace wellbeing is also personal. Erica met her husband while on a six-month theater tour across the United States and Europe. Today, he works in Human Resources and led the leadership and employee development program at Los Angeles International Airport during the COVID-19 crisis. This gave Erica a close-up view of the pressures HR leaders and organizations face during times of disruption and change.

Erica believes joy at work isn't a luxury, but a company advantage. Through keynotes, workshops, and long-term wellness strategies, she helps organizations create environments where people stay sharp, resilient, and fully engaged in even the busiest seasons

Earn Professional Professional Development Points

This program is worth 4.5
Professional Development points. 

Find out more about APTD/CPTD Certifications here.

ATD Capability Model

This program aligns with the following Domains and Capabilities: 

Building Personal Capability

Developing Professional Capability

Impacting Organizational Capability

Talent development professionals should be able to implement a multilevel, systematic method for gathering, analyzing, and reporting on information about the effectiveness and effort of learning programs.

To find out more about the ATD Capability Model for the Training and Development Profession, visit http://tdcapability.org.

Accessibility

ATD-OC events are accessible to all participants. If you have questions or require special accommodations or auxiliary aid related to a disability for you to participate in the event, please notify us at least three weeks in advance by message to ocoffice@atdoc.org, with subject line "ADA Accommodations," outlining your needs and request for accommodation.

We will make every effort to work with you to accommodate your need.

PHOTOGRAPHY RELEASE

As part of your registration, you will be required to indicate your acceptance or rejection of the statement below:

By registering for this event, I hereby give the Association for Talent Development, Orange County Chapter, its clients, agents, and assigns, full permission to use, publish and copyright photographic images, film images, video images, sound recordings, and any reproductions from these materials of me and/or my property or any part thereof, either in conjunction with or without using my name, and make changes or alterations therein and/or alterations thereto Worldwide in perpetuity. Some places these images and recordings may be used and posted include, but are not limited to, the Internet, emails, social media, etc.

If I do not provide permission, I understand I will be seated outside of the field of video.