ACG St. Louis Elite Speaker Series: How Well Do You Know Yourself? Tools for Self-Awareness and Communication

Dr. Zach Schaefer is a highly touted management consultant, talent optimization expert, and award winning professional speaker who advises companies on strategy execution. Dr. Z's mission is to help companies execute with excellence through clear communication.

His award-winning consulting firm, Spark The Discussion, is St. Louis, MO's Certified Partner of the Predictive Index®, where the Spark Team provides talent optimization solutions that drive results in the following areas:

• Executive Conflict Facilitation
• Selection Optimization
• Team Development and Fit
• Team Alignment and Calibration
• Leadership Succession Planning

Spark's hand selected team members are expert coaches, consultants, and process experts who have provided solutions to hundreds of companies. By building on the best practices of businesses in multiple industries, Spark drives additional value for its clients. Crisis circumstances in companies Dr. Z owns and consults with have honed his empathy across all levels in an organization.

The Spark Team has optimized talent and solved challenges related to conflict management, reorganization execution, leadership development, and workplace culture implementation. Because many of Spark's projects focus on resolving conflict between organizational leaders during change and growth, Spark signs non-disclosure agreements and keeps these professional relationships and coaching partnerships 100% confidential and non-publicized.

Additionally, Dr. Z is a recently retired Associate (tenured) professor, where he taught and researched in the areas of organizational communication, Org. culture, conflict management, mediation, and negotiation. At his core, Dr. Z wants to help people see communication as he does...a tool to discover our full potential and development.

Dr. Z lives in St. Louis, MO with his beautiful, patient, and talented wife Kizzy, his tenaciously curious and bright daughter Claudia, his awesomely-stubborn, rock climbing son Benjamin, and his 3-year old boxer dog (Baxter).