Thoughts from the back left table at the 4A's Transformation Conference
This was originally posted on the McKinney 5Words blog on April 2, 2012. I was then informed that McKinney's blog is being discontinued this week (can't blame them, it's rarely contributed to/read) So I thought I'd re-post here so that my words do not become homeless.
I arrived in LA last Sunday afternoon, surprised to find that the weather I left in North Carolina was much more welcoming than the cold, wet rain that only graces southern California a few times a year. If it wasn’t already obvious to everyone in the Beverly Hilton lobby that I was perhaps one of the youngest people attending the conference, I’m certain I gave myself away by my first amateur move– when I checked-in as soon as the registration desk opened and picked up my free tote bag full of media propaganda.
I ate my complimentary M&Ms and then did what all young advertising professionals do when they’re at their very first conference – hit up the free cocktail party.
After several awkward conversations with media salespeople, who realized a little too late that I have zero influence over the vendors my agency uses, I called it a night.
Bright and early on Monday morning the unofficial start of the conference began with a “workshop” for small and mid-sized agencies. Eager to soak up as much knowledge as I could I attempted to blend in with the middle-aged CEO’s of America’s small (and sometimes forgotten) yet determined ad agencies.
Throughout that first day McKinney was mentioned more than once as a mid-sized agency that smaller shops aspired to be like – for our culture, our clients, and our work. Day one ended up being less of a workshop for small and mid-sized agencies and more a forum for independent agencies to share the struggles and triumphs that come with not being owned by a holding company. It was my favorite part of the conference and it technically hadn’t even begun yet.
On Tuesday, the main event took place in the International Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton – the room that annually hosts the prestigious Golden Globe Awards. In other words, plenty of space to hold the 1,300 registered attendees.
Of the hundreds of tables and chairs that filled the space, I chose to park myself at one of the round tables in the back left of the ballroom, one that could have easily sat twelve people, but never had more than 6 at any given time.
The speakers that morning started things off with good momentum, but as the day dragged on I noticed more and more people around me losing their attention to iPads and e-mail. The crowd slowly began dwindling, and the outside noise got increasingly distracting as more attendees left the room to mingle and make phone calls during the “less interesting” panels.
There were some pretty big names on the two-day agenda – Lee Clow and Steve Hayden, Jason Kilar –the CEO of Hulu, panels featuring Winston Binch, Jeff Benjamin, Tiffany Rolfe, Susan Credle, and even the creator of CSI – Anthony Zuiker (AKA the man responsible for all those Sundays I spend watching marathons of crime procedural dramas).
With such a promising line-up, I was shocked to see how few people were actually in the audience at any given time. Sure, 1,300 people might have been registered, but I’d guess that 200 just came for the networking events, 500 left after the first day, and on day two from the back left table, I watched with my mouth open as a wave of hundreds of people stood up and walked out after Lee Clow spoke; Right in the middle of Adam Braun’s inspiring talk about the for-purpose organization he founded, Pencils of Promise. He was a wonderful speaker with a great message, who also happened to fall into the under-30 minority demographic at this conference.
Why did this annoy me so? Well, now is probably a good time to explain that I was not just a young, hopeful planner from the Southeast attending the conference to network and capture tweet-worthy quotes, but I was also a speaker.
I was one of four young strategists invited to present after speaking at the 4A’s Strategy Festival last Fall in NYC.
It’s one thing to be the youngest person in attendance, but it’s quite another to walk up on a stage and try to captivate an audience that’s only interested in hearing from people who have been in the business for 20+ years.
It didn’t help that those who were tasked with introducing us to the crowd failed to explain the format of our unique 5-minute talks. The four of us were there to perform Pecha-Kucha style presentations – 15 PowerPoint slides automatically timed to advance every 20 seconds, focused on any topic that inspires us. It was as much the content and delivery of the presentations as it was the strict format that made our talks such a hit at the strategy festival.
But here, no one knew our names or why we deserved to be there, so we couldn’t just stand on the stage and ramble for as long as we liked. We had to rehearse for weeks, appear mature beyond our years, and prove our worth. We were perhaps the only four people who took the stage without having any technical difficulties because we took it seriously and came prepared. But unfortunately, very few people stuck around to see us.
To close out the conference, Sharon Panelo, a strategist at McCann Erickson in NYC and fellow inspire presenter, gave a flawless and captivating talk on the power of social media. It wasn’t a repetition of the same old bullshit that everyone else talked about that day, it wasn’t full of marketing buzzwords or self-promotion, and it wasn’t boring —it was the definition of inspiring, and there were probably less than 50 people still in the room who were lucky enough to see it.
In a write-up on Ad Age this morning, the staff wrote that there were several comments from attendees about how few young people were in attendance and how the 4A’s needs to do more to attract a younger audience if they want to compete with events like SXSW. From my perspective, I’m not all that convinced that us young people were that welcome.
I can’t even count the number of times I heard a panelist or speaker say something about how young people are going to change the industry, shake things up, transform the status quo (After all, Transformation was the theme of the conference…) It’s a little ironic when you walk by those same people and when they don’t recognize the name on your lanyard, they don’t even give you a second glance. But who can blame them? They’re there to network. With people who are far more important and influential than us young people.
Don’t get me wrong, it was an amazing opportunity to be invited to speak and I’m very grateful to the 4A’s for making it happen, but I came back to North Carolina with an immense feeling of disappointment at the amount of hard work that went into preparing for those precious 5-minutes, and the complete lack of interest that this industry showed for young talent. If indeed the 4A’s hopes to attract a younger audience comparable to SXSW, they need to do more than hire Ryan Seacrest to do a guest appearance; They need to transform the way this industry thinks about “conferences.”
