Speakers and Topics

Michael Hayes
Director, NADA Academy

Michael brings 40-plus years of auto-industry experience to NADA. Throughout his career Michael’s greatest satisfaction has come from helping build teams and sharing tools to promote growth and success. As a franchised auto dealer, he supported a team that led the market in sales penetration and Distinguished Service awards, culminating in the coveted Chairman’s Award. Michael has been honored by Time magazine and served the Vermont dealers as state association president; legislative and NADA PAC director; and member of the NADA Board of Directors. Working in the remarketing industry as chief operating officer of the National Auto Auction Association and as vice president of dealer development with an electric vehicle startup has given Michael unique perspectives on opportunities for graduates of NADA Academy, where he focuses on variable operations and marketing instruction.

Ronald Brownstein
CNN Senior Political Analyst, Senior Editor for The Atlantic and Contributing Editor for National Journal

Part journalist, part historian, and all shrewd political observer, Ron Brownstein explains the complexities of American politics with lucid precision. As a senior editor for The Atlantic, a Contributing Editor for National Journal, and a senior political analyst for CNN, he produces sharp analysis on politics, policy, the electorate, media, healthcare, and the range of issues informed by his strong sense of American political and national history.

Steve Greenfield
Partner of Automotive Ventures

Steve is General Partner of Automotive Ventures, an early-stage automotive technology and mobility VC fund that helps entrepreneurs raise growth capital and accelerate their businesses and delivers outsized returns to investors in the fund.

Steve served as TrueCar’s Senior Vice President of Strategy and Business Development, and AutoTrader.com’s Vice President of Product Management and Business Development, overseeing the acquisitions of vAuto, Kelley Blue Book, HomeNet Automotive, VinSolutions and DealerScience.

Earlier in his career, Steve served as Manheim’s Director of international Development, overseeing Manheim’s overseas investments, including establishing new joint ventures in Dubai, Istanbul and Beijing.

Steve is author of two books: The Future of Automotive Retail, and The Future of Mobility.

For fun, Steve likes to ride his three motorcycles on the racetrack (his personal land speed record is 180 mph on a Yamaha R1 at Road Atlanta) and hang out with his ten rescue cats.

Mitch Joel
Technology and Innovation Expert & Best-Selling Author

When brands like Google, Walmart, TikTok, Deloitte, Shopify, Microsoft, Procter and Gamble, Twitter, and Unilever want to know what’s next for them (and their customers), they call tech an innovation expert Mitch Joel.

Is your company or industry association trying to figure out how to move forward in a world of transformation and disruption? How do you decode the future, see what’s coming next, and innovate accordingly? What changed about your business during, what Mitch called, “The Great Compression?” Every industry and business is dealing with disruption in different ways. And every business is trying to figure out how to best innovate and transform. This is where Mitch Joel fills in the gaps and helps organizations position themselves for future success.

Melissa Stockwell
Veteran, Paralympian

If you ask Melissa Stockwell to describe herself one of the first things you’ll hear is, “I am a Patriot, a lover of the red, the white and the blue.” So much so that she had an American flag stitched to the inside of her wedding dress.

Melissa proudly wore the uniform of the United States Army, where she very nearly made the ultimate sacrifice for her country. Today, she proudly wears the uniform of Team USA as a World Champion athlete.

Melissa shares her remarkable story, from the battlefields of Bagdad to the Paralympic Games, in an emotionally powerful presentation that leaves audiences inspired to see ability not disability, to maximize what you do have and forget about what you don’t and to apply, as she details, “…the amazing power of choice.”