---What is it that pushes us to perform at our best? Which people on our teams thrive in high-stress/high-stakes environments and which are always cool, and calm under pressure? Why does this matter and how can you use it to drive peak performance? After 3 years of interviewing more than 200 people including professional athletes, military officers, poker players, and psychologists, Rafi Kohan offer insights into the psychology of gamesmanship and how mental stress can be used to drive performance and behavior. This work, which culminated into the lively and hilarious read Trash Talk, The Only Book About Destroying Your Rivals That Isn’t Total Garbage, offers anecdotes from some of the world’s top competitors and the mind games that push them to outperform their opponents.

Molly Fletcher is a trailblazer in every sense of the word. She is a rare talent of business wisdom, relationship brilliance and unwavering optimism. As a CEO, she shares her unconventional and unique techniques that made her one of the first female sports agents in the high stakes, big ego world of professional sports and now a successful entrepreneur. As president of client representation for sports and entertainment agency CSE, Molly spent two decades as one of the world’s only female sports agents.

Combat tests you. Being a beat cop tests you. Life tests you. Three brothers and being the only girl...tests you. Vernice “FlyGirl” Armour has been tested her whole life. A gutsy trailblazer, her resume is an impressive collection of “firsts” including America’s first Black woman combat pilot. She served two tours of duty in Iraq as a Marine. She was also a diversity liaison officer to the Pentagon for Headquarters Marine Corps. After her military service, FlyGirl revved up her career in the private sector as an entrepreneur, consultant to business, and author of Zero to Breakthrough, The 7-Step, Battle-Tested Method for Accomplishing Goals that Matter. As a speaker, FlyGirl unleashes hard-hitting advice and amazing anecdotes from her adventures on the battlefield and in business. She helps individuals and organizations Get Gutsy and build a sustainable inner force and conviction, that results in accomplishing significant goals.

A senior leadership/board advisor, educator, executive coach, and bestselling author, David Nour is internationally recognized as the leading expert on applications of strategic relationships in profitable growth, sustained innovation, and lasting change. The author of eleven books, including bestsellers Relationship Economics® (Wiley), and Co-Create (St. Martin’s Press), as well as the forthcoming Curve Benders (Wiley, 2021), Nour serves as a trusted advisor to global clients and coaches corporate leaders. He is an adjunct professor at the Goizueta Business School at Emory University and was named to the Global Gurus Top 30 Leadership Professionals and the Thinkers 50 Radar Class of 2021 lists. A Forbes Leadership contributor on the Future of Work, and an Inc. contributor on Relationship Economics, Nour’s unique insights have been featured in a variety of prominent publications, including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Fast Company, Huffington Post Business, Entrepreneur, and Knowledge@Wharton. He’s also the host of the popular Curve Benders podcast. Born in Iran, Nour immigrated to the U.S. as a teenager with $100, limited family ties and no fluency in English. He graduated from Georgia State University with a bachelor’s degree in business management and went on to earn an Executive MBA from the Goizueta Business School at Emory University. He resides in Atlanta, GA, with his family.

Afterburner Inc is a team of elite fighter pilots who help your team pursue flawless execution and take performance to the next level. The combination of sound organizational development and combat-proven methodologies has made Afterburner Inc one of the fastest growing training and consulting organizations in the country. The Flawless Execution Model is a proven process used by elite military professionals around the world to execute missions when the stakes are high and failure is not an option. Corporate success, like success in combat, depends on execution.

Rick Smith is a serial entrepreneur, leadership strategist, best-selling author, inspirational TED speaker, and one of world’s foremost authorities on innovation, leadership, and corporate transformation through disruptive technologies such as industrial 3D printing (additive manufacturing). His latest venture, Fast Radius, is an on-demand production platform which leverages 3D printing for global distributed manufacturing. In person, print, and practice, Rick inspires individuals and organizations around the world with leading edge insights on a number of topics surrounding disruptive technology, such as the predictable patterns of technology disruption, and the behaviors that enable leaders to successfully navigate complexity and change.

Murph, the Founder and CEO of Afterburner, Inc., has a unique and powerful mix of leadership skills in both the military and business worlds. After years in the military, Murph returned to his love of business. Prior to his service in the U.S. Air Force, Murph had a successful career in imaging equipment sales, where he helped increase his company's sales by 500%.

Early on in my career, when my company was in the aftermath of a $5B acquisition, I almost quit. Fueled by frustration and stress, I found myself on the precipice of walking out of the office and never coming back. Had I done so, I would have become another statistic. Yet another African-American female departed from a STEM-driven industry. Top talent voluntarily resigning during a time of significant organizational shift. Another change victim. But I didn’t. Instead, I woke up one day and decided to view those feelings as a signal that I was sitting in a moment of opportunity. An opportunity to transform that chemistry, that feeling into something better. To choose every day to do something, say something, behave in some way that would move the needle of my work experience towards a better feeling. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was cultivating a teachable strategy to inspire anyone to become enthusiastic about change, to find their unique power of resilience during turbulent times. Today, I help organizations disrupt ‘change as usual’. Through a practical and repeatable framework, I show them how they can transform their culture from surviving change to growing through change.

Ozan Varol is a rocket scientist turned award-winning professor and #1 bestselling author. He is one of the world’s foremost experts in creativity, innovation, and critical thinking. Ozan has been called a “true original” by Adam Grant and dubbed a “superhero” by Dan Pink. His work has been described as “must read” by Susan Cain and featured in the Wall Street Journal, Time, BBC, CNN, Washington Post, and more.

Dr. Kim Hires is an international Keynote Speaker, Strategic Consultant, and Coach who is dedicated to leadership development and helping leaders achieve their highest potential. Her work focuses on burnout prevention and cultivating cultures of well-being which she has been doing for over a decade. Her client portfolio includes individuals and organizations across a variety of industries and sectors that generate over $1 billion in annual revenue. Dr. Kim is also the host of the Leadership Antidote Podcast and author of The Leadership Innovation Manifesto. When not working with leaders, Dr. Kim enjoys spending time with her husband and son in Atlanta, Georgia, USA.

Kathy Varol is an expert at driving profit with purpose. Kathy created the Global Purpose (corporate social responsibility) strategy for adidas, a 22 billion dollar global company. Now Kathy helps her clients use purpose to stand out in a competitive environment, attract the best talent, gain consumer loyalty, and fully harness the innovative brainpower of their employees (innovation that keeps them miles ahead of the competition). She shares her deep knowledge and “how-to” with clients, so they can skip the hard lessons and go straight to strategies that work. Kathy has 20 years of experience across brand marketing, strategy, and impact, working at established brands like adidas, MillerCoors, and Microsoft. Through her experience, Kathy has developed a repeatable 4-step process to become a purpose-led brand: The Brand Purpose Model. When businesses embed purpose into the heart of their strategy, they don’t just disrupt their industry. They also bring humanity into the workplace, shape the future, and impact the world.

Greg “Boss” Wooldridge was first selected because of his demonstrated ability to build teams where communication, trust and teamwork took precedence over rank and status, Greg’s heart-driven approach proved a perfect match for the Blue Angel’s culture of excellence, and he was called back to lead two more teams through times of difficult transition. Since his success with the Blues, Greg has been inspired to share his methods in order to empower individuals and teams on their journey toward High Performance. Greg’s one of a kind experience resonates with audiences of any size, background, or culture. From leaders searching for an inspiring “how to” approach, to full scale corporate engagements, Boss simultaneously creates that “spark” with his from the cockpit, and fans it into flames by providing the nuts and bolts of Blue Angel methodology.