WHO IS THIS EVENT FOR?

People who do marketing strategy.

Advertising agency account planners, strategic planners, creative planners, engagement planners, connections planners, and strategically minded client service people. Digital strategists like UX planners or information architects. Design strategists. Innovation strategists. Market researchers. Corporate strategy & insights. Strategic consultants.

Interested in marketing strategy? Come on out.

WHAT IS THIS EVENT ABOUT?

This will hopefully be the first in a regular series of events for the strategic planning community in Toronto.

It will be equal parts socializing and inspiration, with some great guest speakers to provoke ideas and discussion.

There will be conversation breaks between speakers, and a cocktail reception afterwards.

WHY SHOULD I COME?

1. To help build a more vibrant strategic planning community in Toronto. There are a lot of smart people doing really interesting things here these days. Let’s showcase and celebrate it more
2. To meet other people who think like you. Over the past 10 years the marketing strategy discipline has exploded and fragmented. Lots of people do strategy now, from account/brand/creative/strategic planners to connections/engagement planners to UX planners to business model/strategic innovation planners. Each has its own community of sorts; but we haven’t intersected much. However, we are all doing strategy of one kind or another, approaching similar problems from slightly different angles. We need to cross-pollinate the various strategy disciplines more.
3. To get inspired. Marketing and business strategy today is a "wicked problem" – complex, interdependent, constantly shifting and changing, with issues that cut across disciplines and skill sets, and no clear right answers. Traditional methods often no longer work, and we need new ideas to help us see problems differently. And the lines between all of our disciplines are blurring. So we have a lot to learn from each other. In fact, we have to learn from each other, or risk irrelevance.
4. Perhaps most importantly, to have some fun. Life is short. Work is hard. Relax, have a drink, and meet some new people.

WHO IS SPEAKING?

Keynote Speaker:

Mark Earls

Mark Earls (AKA Herdmeister) is a recovering account planner who now works independently out of London under the banner of HERD Consulting, helping organisations of all sorts come to terms with our social or HERD nature and the implications of living in a connected world.

Mark’s writing is widely read and discussed: his blog is in the top 20 UK marketing list and is on the Adage Power 150 and the global planning top 20. His latest book - “HERD” (Wiley 2007) has won much applause, being described as “like Malcolm Gladwell on Speed” (the Guardian), “an essential guide to the new media landscape” (The Spectator), “one the 5 sexiest ideas in politics today” (The Times).

His writing also wins prizes: 3 WPP Atticus awards & Best New Thinking at MRS 2003 & Best Overall Paper at the 2007 ESOMAR Congress in Berlin.

Prior to HERD Mark was Chair of the Global Planning Group at Ogilvy Worldwide and Planning Director of the radical creative co-operative St Luke’s. He was Vice Chair of the UK APG and has advised similar groups around the world.

Other speakers:

Laurence Bernstein

Innovating market research using behavioural economics, the wisdom of crowds, and predictive markets.

Laurence Bernstein helps companies understand the people they deal with, internally and externally, and guides them on how to deliver meaningful experiences all around. He accomplishes it through the auspices of the company he founded 10 years ago, BC3 Strategies.

BC3 Strategies makes magic happen by finding new ways to understand how people integrate products and services into their lives. As researchers, BC3 has always been a thought leader, trying to develop innovative, robust and interesting methodologies to learn about people and stuff in the maximum depth with the minimum effort (i.e. cost). Together
with Professor Bruce Barnes, BC3 lead the way in applied Jungian psychoanalytics with the extremely successful Inner Directives methodology. Lately BC3 has been developing ways of applying behavioural economic to insight gathering, using thin slicing and predictive market theories. BC3 has made magic in a number of countries (UK, Germany, US, Denmark, Canada).

Matthew Milan and Michael Anton Dila

Innovation Parkour: a new method to find innovative answers to complex strategic problems.

Matthew Milan is a partner and Director of Design with Normative, a design strategy studio based in Toronto. Over the last ten years, Matthew has led teams of designers, analysts, researchers and strategists in the creation all types of interactive experiences. His work has ranged from designing 3D interfaces for web mapping tools to leading global innovation strategy initiatives.

A member of the Advisory Board for the Information Architecture Institute, Matthew speaks and writes regularly on topics ranging from interaction design to business strategy. He is active in the experience design and account planning communities, and harbors an unhealthy obsession for soft systems theory, maneuver warfare strategy and Lego.

Michael Anton Dila co-founded Torch Partnership in 2006 with Robin Uchida. Together, they shape strategic conversations and help their clients create organizational confidence so that they can confront their “wicked problems”.

For the last decade, he has brought intellectual rigor to the discipline of design thinking while working with creative teams to deliver effective designs that are clear, simple, and which honor the fundamental importance of ideas.

Michael is one of the founders of Overlap, which is an annual, peer-to-peer gathering for those working at the center of emerging theory, methods and practices of innovation. He is the Chief Strategist of Strategic Innovation Lab at OCAD, and also the chief catalyst of the Unfinished Business initiative.

Sean Howard

The Passion Economy

In his 13+ years in digital strategy development, user experience design and engagement marketing, Sean has been tasked to build better websites, expand empires, develop new identities, and re-launch brands. He co-authored the digital approach of one of the leading interactive agencies in Canada (ICE), led his own seven-person social engagement firm, and has worked with clients of all sizes to more effectively engage their customers using emerging technologies.

In January 2009, inspired by Saul Kaplan's writing on the "passion economy", Sean reached out to ten influential thinkers around the globe to write a book chapter on the topic of the "Passion Economy". Does it exist? Can it exist? And if so, what would it mean to brands, marketing, and the engagement work so many of us have been involved with? The Passion Economy e-book was published at the end of February.

Jason Oke

Event chair & moderator

Jason Oke is Director of Strategic Planning at Juniper Park, an agency that blends design, strategy, and communications. In just its first year, Juniper Park was recently named by Marketing Magazine as one of the top 10 agencies in Canada for 2008.

Previously, Jason has worked at Chiat/Day and Leo Burnett, where he rose to VP, Strategic Planning and played a leading role in the agency’s global planning network. Jason frequently blogs, speaks and writes about communications and market research, and has taught planning at Miami Ad School, Ontario College of Art & Design and Humber College.

You can find him online at http://www.jasonoke.com

WHO ELSE IS ATTENDING?