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Speakers

Michael Murray

Michael Murray is Vice President and General Manager of AOL’s New Ventures and Innovation Team. Over the last seven years he has held several positions at AOL, including Vice President of CRM Solutions and Marketing Operations, and Vice President of Consumer Loyalty and Retention.

Mr. Murray comes to AOL from Targetbase Marketing, where he built and managed the company’s Internet division from 1993 to 2000.

He has published a number of articles on the topic of internet solutions and customer loyalty.

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Featured Speaker

Richard Florida

Professor Richard Florida is the author of the 2002 best-seller, The Rise of the Creative Class and the 2005 must-read follow-up, The Flight of the Creative Class.

Thomas Friedman

Three-time Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the New York Times , Thomas Friedman is the author of the runaway best-seller The World is Flat: A Brief History of the 21st Century.

Alvin Toffler

Author of the book Revolutionary Wealth and former associate editor of Fortune magazine, Alvin Toffler literally invented the roll of the futurist with the publication of his seminal work Future Shock.

David DeLong

MIT AgeLab research fellow and and adjunct professor at Babson College, David DeLong is the author of Lost Knowledge: Confronting the Threat of an Aging Workforce. His firm, David DeLong & Associates, helps companies solve performance and staffing problems caused by an aging workforce and skills shortages.

Joe Watson

Joe Watson is CEO of Without Excuses and StrategicHire, located in Reston, VA. Without Excuses delivers professional development programs across a wide swath of executive skills. StrategicHire specializes in the placement of diverse middle- and senior-level management personnel across a broad range of industries. Watson is the author of Without Excuses: Unleash the Power of Diversity to Build Your Business, published in 2006 by St. Martin's Press.

Anne Fisher

Anne Fisher is a Senior Writer for FORTUNE magazine, where she covers workplace and management topics. Fisher also writes the popular weekly career-advice column "Ask Annie" at CNNMoney.com and is the author of two books, If My Career's on the Fast Track, Where Do I Get a Road Map? and Wall Street Women.

Frank Sesno

Frank Sesno has been chronicling world events as a journalist for more than 25 years. He serves as a Professor of Media and Public Affairs at The George Washington University (GW) in Washington, DC, and he is a Special Correspondent for CNN where he makes documentaries and works on special projects for the network.

Creativity Quotes

“Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.”

— George S. Patton

“The only things in my life that compatibly exist with this grand universe are the creative works
of the human spirit.”

— Ansel Adams

“The creative process is not controlled by a switch you can simply turn on or off; it's with you all the time.”

— Alvin Ailey

“If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking.”

— George S. Patton

“It is the supreme art
of the teacher
to awaken joy
in creative expression and knowledge.”

— Albert Einstein

“The question
is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be... The nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.”

— Martin Luther
King, Jr.

“All creative people want
to do the unexpected.”

— Hedy Lamarr

“Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort.”

— Franklin D. Roosevelt

“Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try!”

— Dr. Seuss
(Theodore Geisel)

“There is one thing stronger than all the armies in the world, and that is an idea whose time has come.”

— Victor Hugo

“We are not creatures of circumstance; we are
creators of circumstance.”

— Benjamin Disraeli

“It may be that those who do most, dream most.”

— Stephen Leacock

“Discovery consists of looking at the same thing as everyone else and thinking something different.”

— Albert Szent-Gyorgyi

“Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that's creativity.”

— Charles Mingus

“Whatever creativity is, it is in part a solution to a problem.”

— Brian Aldiss

“Creativity makes a leap, then looks to see where it is.”

— Mason Cooley