Leading change and business transformation became a way of life for Chris Laping during his 8 years as CIO of Red Robin Gourmet Burgers. "We wanted a fast-moving brand. We needed a discipline around being great with change," says the author of the upcoming book "People Before Things." In this opening keynote, Chris will share some of the many lessons he learned about change leadership and explain how CIOs can enable the right conditions and coach for specific behaviors that will activate successful change throughout the organization.

"Authentic leaders establish trusting relationships with people throughout their organizations," writes Harvard Business School Professor Bill George, author of "Discover Your True North." His inspiring work on authentic leadership has a special resonance for CIOs who are struggling to close the IT/business gap while guiding the challenging transition to a digital enterprise. What will the IT organization look like in three years? With technology embedded everywhere, at the heart of every business process, should IT remain a separate group? What are the leadership hurdles in building these more trusted relationships? Our panel of LA-area CIOs will talk about their expanding partnerships with business leaders as they tackle these questions in this lively interactive discussion and workshop session on the future of IT.

• Secure DevOps: Combining Speed and Security In Data Management, hosted by Delphix
• The Modern Enterprise: Redefining IT Needs, hosted by Dropbox
• Business Transformation, hosted by OSSCube
• Accelerating Insights from the Data Lake, hosted by Platfora
• The SDDC and SDN: How to Define and Deploy in Your Existing Network, hosted by Pluribus Networks
• Why Containers Have to Be Part of Your Next Generation Architecture, hosted by Red Hat

As IT expands beyond its traditional back-office operational role, CIOs in even the most conservative industries have a unique opportunity to use technology to drive business growth. At AECOM, a $20 billion global design, engineering and construction firm with 100,000 employees, CIO Tom Peck is in the midst of that convergence of back- and front-office IT. "This convergence puts a premium on CIOs and IT leaders to get beyond walls of the company," he says. "We need to differentiate our companies in the market. We need to sell and call on clients. It's a new skill and an opportunity that we all need to embrace." In this afternoon keynote, Tom will talk about his challenges and successes in transforming IT at AECOM into a business accelerator.

Security breaches happen to companies – every day, around the world. It is an unfortunate reality in today’s data-driven economy. Because most companies will feel the impact of a security breach at some point in time, says tech attorney Matt Karlyn, it is critical that companies prepare in advance to minimize the impact to the assets, employees, and customers. “The entire C-suite and board is on the hot seat for security these days,” he says. As a result, “board members, CEOs, CFOs, and other senior executives are laser focused on understanding corporate information security. In this closing keynote, you’ll hear Matt’s expert legal analysis and practical advice on how to prepare the company for and protect the company from information security incidents.