How did Jimmy Fallon get his big break on SNL as an unknown kid from Upstate New York? How did change makers turn Finland’s school system around? How did YouTube tycoon Michelle Phan, the fastest-rising U.S. presidents and the second African American shoe designer in history all climb to the top and achieve incredible things faster than expected? In this high-energy session, award-winning journalist and entrepreneur Shane Snow brings research and stories to life, showing attendees a framework for finding smarter paths to big goals and breakthroughs and how to beat the plateau and generate momentum in work and life.

Southwest Airlines has given the business world a textbook example of how providing fabulous customer service and maintaining high employee morale in a low-cost environment is possible and even profitable in corporate America today. But what’s the real story? As a key developer of Southwest Airlines’ legendary customer service and leadership training programs, Jason Young knows that great culture does not “just happen.” A customer service value can be created and nurtured to flourish into a customer service culture. Employees can be treated as true partners in the success of the business through shared values, shared vision, and shared efforts. Young shares the inside story behind the success of Southwest, consistently rated No. 1 in customer service and employee satisfaction. Best of all, learn how to take these proven organizational principles to your team or company. You won’t want to miss this inside edition from the man who knows it best.

The 20th anniversary of SpeechTEK is a good opportunity to reflect on how far speech technologies have come—and what has potentially been lost along the way. This presentation explores how the mad dash to go digital has caused many customer experience professionals to take their eyes off the IVR and what this means to the customer experience. It also offers suggestions on how to turn disjointed interactions into satisfying customer journeys.

We will soon be floating in a sea of devices. Most of them will be part of the interconnected Web of mechanisms that will constitute the Internet of Things (IoT). The overwhelming majority of them will talk to each other but not to humans. This presentation focuses on the much smaller set of devices that are articulate. Some articulate mechanisms translate information that bubbles to the surface of the IoT into natural-language messages for humans and they transmit spoken commands given by humans to other IoT devices. One union of speech-enabled and machine-to-machine IoT devices is the smart home. Specifically, this session explores smart-home technology for eldercare. Other connected devices communicate directly between the Internet and humans. This session also focuses on a rapidly growing group of such devices: toys. Combined, these discussions will reveal emerging opportunities for speech and language processing.