Rob Davidson: Reinventing Conferences for a Multi-Generational Audience

Automatically transcribed, so there may be the odd slip.

Alastair GreenerHello everyone. Welcome back to yet another Alastair Greener Generationally Speaking podcast, where we look at bridging the generation gap. And we do this by debunking myths, tackling stereotypes, and sharing some practical tips to help you connect with different generations and bridge that gap. Uh, today I'm talking to somebody who knows all about different generations in the event industry, uh, because, uh, it's really fascinating to talk about someone who, uh. I met first on a panel discussion on intergenerational communication. Um, I think that must have been about six months ago. He's the Managing Director of MICE Knowledge, and that provides research and consultancy services for MICE, which stands for Meetings, Incentive Travel, Conferences and Event Industries. Rob Davidson, great to have you joining us. so much for being here.

Rob DavidsonWell, Alastair, many, many thanks for the invitation. It's great to be here and to continue the chat. that we started.

Alastair GreenerOne of the things I'd like to start off with is you being a boomer. I always like to find out about my guests, whether they feel they are typical of their generation. Now you're a boomer, you were born somewhere between 1946 and 1964. We won't say when, uh, we don't need to, but there's a lot of different things associated with that generation. And one of the that strikes me particularly. is when it comes to communication being face to face and boomers are really a generation who love that personal contact. Would you say, A, that's true for you and tell us a bit about your upbringing and what made you you and whether you feel you are a typical boomer or not.

Rob DavidsonGreat, well, yeah, definitely I'm a, a boomer in my defense. I would say I'm one of the younger baby boomers, but I certainly grew up here and entered professional life. At a time when, really, face to face Communication was the only way to get information. Going to conferences face to face, there was no alternative to that kind of information gathering. Upbringing, you can probably tell from my accent, I'm from Scotland, so I was brought up in a working class family, in a working class town. In Scotland, which still had whole fields, uh, in those days. And basically down the coal mines was where most, uh, people from my school went, uh, to work. So I'm not sure what happened to me, but I went to university instead. And am I typical? Um, I don't think I am. And that's probably for the reason that in the work I do, I am coming into touch with. All generations, really, for, uh, from my students who are people at university, um, in their, well, late teens, early twenties, right up to, well, people our age, uh, that I meet, uh, in professional life, so, uh, and not typical, I would say, I would go on to add that the time I spend with students in particular, um, Gives me a particular outlook on life that I don't think I would have if I worked in another industry. Like, um, being an undertaker or a, or a divorce lawyer or something like that. Um, I love the fact

Alastair Greeneryou picked those two of any professions in the world you chose divorce lawyer and undertaker. Brilliant. Actually, I do want to pick you up though on something which was, which I think is always pertinent. I talk about us being framed by our generation and not defined by it. And I think that's particularly important when you come to someone like you growing up where you did because let's be honest, if you were born where you were, that was very different to being born in, say, London at that time, where you now live, you know, your whole outlook will have started very differently to other people in other parts of the UK.

Rob DavidsonAbsolutely. People growing up in Scotland in the 1950s and 1960s, London was a long way away psychologically. It was somewhere that you saw on television. And only, uh, the kind of middle class kids, uh, in our town would have even been there. And then they were stars, uh, and for most people it was somewhere that you saw on television. It was very, uh, kind of sophisticated people and, uh, something almost unattainable. And even when I came to London, uh, to work, which was 40 years ago, I was looking around thinking, this is the London. I'm in London. There's only one and I'm in it. And, uh, yeah, absolutely. Geographically, it's a, uh, a completely different perspective. And it's very odd to look back now in that time, because in my current job, I'm I'm traveling all the time and I'm forever on planes and, uh, waking up and wondering which country am I in today? Uh, but there's quite a contrast with how I, I grew up when, you know, it was a small town. Everyone knew, uh, knew each other and that was typical of that time. Really, our horizons were, were much narrower than they are now and there was no internet, uh, to broaden them. So your horizons were broadened by Reading books, basically.

Alastair GreenerAnd how different, you know, you're talking about going to London in the 80s. I mean, that was an era where the North and South divide was probably at its almost most prominent. And what a difference for you culturally to come from, from, um, you know, up in Scotland down to London at that time.

Rob DavidsonYes, it was. And now I find that when I go back to Edinburgh, which is the city nearest my town, um, to be honest, the differences between London and Edinburgh are much fewer now than they were in those days. So Edinburgh has become much more, uh, cosmopolitan. And, uh, you know, people from all over, uh, working there, studying there now, um, so it's a lot less kind of parochial than it was, uh, back in the eighties. And it's a, it's a very pleasurable place to go. And even now, whenever I go back, I come out of the train station and I have to kind of think, Oh, Why did I leave here again? And of course it's changed.

Alastair GreenerOne of the things that we recognize when it comes to generational communication, anything generational, is that everything's moving. Because not just where you now live is moving, but where you were is moving as well. And I'd like to talk a little bit more about what you do because it's, it's, you know, a lot of people always talk about niching what you do. I mean, yours is quite a niche, isn't it?

Rob DavidsonI work is almost a niche within a niche. Um, because, uh, I'm focusing on events management, um, teaching it, researching it, uh, training people, uh, already working in events management. Um, but even within that, I'm entirely focused on MICE or, uh, business events and, um, I find, for example, at most students coming to, uh, university to study events management, really, uh, what they have in mind are cultural events, sports events. They want to be wedding planners and party planners. And then, along comes Rob, and says, I'm going to speak to you today about business events. And even now, um, if I'm seeing them for the first time, it's a bit of a hard sell. You know, they imagine business events being a bunch of middle aged men in suits, sitting around a table, discussing Last month's sales figures, And it can be like that. It's true, it can be like that. But I see my challenge as being to inspire them, not only to educate them, but to inspire them and to let them see that actually designing conferences, planning, um, business events, uh, is just as exciting and just as important. Uh, as other types of events. I mean, the challenge is, they're 20 years old, they've been to weddings, they've been to sports events, and, and jazz festivals. But very rarely have they been to a conference or a trade show or anything like that. So in my teaching, I have to persuade them that this is exciting, this is important, and business events is an excellent career prospect for them. And it's true. I think when I see my students when they leave university, uh, the ones who are holding out to work in wedding planning or career planning, Cultural events, you know, they're still looking around for work when the business events people have found work very very quickly in venues and in Convention bureaus and and all the rest of it So it's a it's a hard message to get over but I can do it and I do it all over the world I'm teaching in the UK, but I'm teaching in other countries because it's such a niche subject and universities They understand that they need people to teach it, and sadly, there's not a whole bunch of us who can fly in, spend a week teaching about conference management, then fly out again, which is why I end up waking up in places like Azerbaijan.

Alastair GreenerWell, I'd like to talk about the generational aspect to that, because, you know, the, who's going to conferences today? How's it varying according to the generations? But in the meantime, we've got to mention the C word, because COVID was seen by many people as the potential death knell for Live conferences for events, because everyone thought, are we going to go online? Are we going to stay online forever? Meanwhile, you had a whole generation who are coming into the workplace, who had never been to any of these events. And then all of a sudden, they've been at work for a period of time. And someone says, Oh, events kicking off again, right? Let's go. And they say, I've never even, what are these things? As you said, could we, first of all, by unpicking that, look at the event industry itself and how that's changed, you know, pre COVID, during COVID, post COVID, and where are we now? Where are we looking at the industry?

Rob DavidsonWell, that's a great question because a lot of people, even educated people, think that, uh, Uh, online events and hybrid events, uh, were not, were not around at all until, uh, the pandemic, but they certainly were. And to be honest, even as someone who believes passionately about face to face events, I have to confess that, yeah, there are some meetings which are much better online. If it's a If it's a short meeting, half an hour, ten people who all know each other already and all they're doing is exchanging sales figures or some other kind of information. Sure, have it online. We were having those meetings online long before the pandemic came along. They're short, there's no need for networking because all the participants know each other, um, already. And then they're over when they're over. There's no need to hire a venue. put people on trains and planes. It's, that's, it's a complete waste, um, of resources. And of course, maybe something we should come back to, very bad for the environment. Um, the challenge for young people who came into employment during the, um, pandemic is that they only knew online meetings for those very dark years. Uh, they, all their meetings were online and therefore nowadays. When it's perfectly safe, 99%, to travel and attend face to face meetings, I'm still hearing from that generation of intake, why should we? We've been fine, uh, online during the pandemic. It worked okay, I got the information I needed. And there's an education to be done there, which we try to do, uh, as an industry, which is to tell them there's a lot more to conferences than simply getting information. You know, there's the whole business of networking, um, informal, uh, information being exchanged over coffee, this kind of thing. So, it's a hard sell, we're getting there, um, once young people have gone to a face to face event. I think they get it, I think they see the advantages. And interestingly, during the pandemic, when I was doing a lot of conference speaking online about the impact of the pandemic, I predicted a huge surge in team building events and kind of induction events after the pandemic. And that's exactly what happened. Companies realized we've got all these new recruits. We've never met each other, let's see, create an event, bring them together for a few days, team building, networking. And that was very good for our industry. We, we certainly needed some business when the pandemic stopped.

Alastair GreenerAnd what I like about what you said there was how the industry has changed, whether it was deliberately, whether it was. by default or whether it was COVID, whatever other reason it has changed, how much is it changing according to the newer generation coming into the workplace? In other words, we've got Gen Z coming into the workplace. They see things very differently. They don't know what they don't know. So we have to somehow overcome any. Kind of, I guess, prejudices they might have about meeting in person and almost rebrand the event industry. Have you seen that happening and has it been tailored towards that younger generation deliberately?

Rob DavidsonOh, yes. I mean, the events industry has always had to be very resilient. We've faced crises before, economic crises, 9 11, no one was traveling. We need to adapt. We are a people business and we need to adapt to our, our customers, our, our clients. So, yes, absolutely. We, I always say, if we continue to design conferences and meetings for people my age, Then the younger generations are going to vote with their feet and stay away. And they're going to say, well, you know, it can be online, or this is a hybrid event. Why should I, um, get on a plane, spend my time and money when I can follow it in my, on my kitchen table? So, if we want people to continue coming to conferences, we are constantly needing to adapt. We adapted to Generation Y. Um, a lot of my work, uh, when that generation was coming into the professional workforce, a lot of my work then was finding out what do they want. And similarly now, a lot of my personal research is into Generation Z, and what exactly do they want from, uh, conferences. So, They are telling us, of course, even Generation Y, we're saying, give us shorter presentations. They certainly don't want 50 minute presentations and 10 minutes for Q& A. They want 20 minutes, that's enough. They want it to be, the presentations to be shorter, shorter, to be punchier, um, they want more involvement in the event, much more participation. The days of, when I was their age, of speakers walking onto the stage, barely looking at the audience, speaking for an hour, and then walking off the stage. They will walk out. Gen Z people will walk out if that happens. They expect to be involved. They expect to be able to easily ask questions, possibly using a, an app like Slido or something like that. They expect to be able to voice their opinions. So, uh, they want to be part of the show. And I think modern conferences need to bear that in mind. Modern conferences, I think, acknowledge the fact that a lot of the learning that goes on in conferences happens outside the, the speaker sessions. It happens when people get together, um, in the breaks, in the evening, in the bar, uh, uh, in the evening. It happens then. Well, I'm conscious all the time, and I'm speaking at a conference, regardless of the generation. I stand on the stage, and I look at the people, and I think, there's so much expertise in this crowd. How do I harness it? How do I get them to express their, their opinions, their challenges, their solutions? Generation Z expect that a 100%. They don't want to And how are the older

Alastair Greenergenerations reacting to that? Because you're, because sometimes if you cater to one generation, you actually have a negative impact on another. So what's happening to Gen Xs and Boomers? How are they reacting to this new way of, of working conferences and events?

Rob DavidsonIt's a challenge for conference designers, conference planners. They're very conscious, the good ones. are not falling into the trap you're hinting at where let's do everything for, uh, Generation Z. Good conference planners understand that when they look at the workforce, there are many guys my age, should have retired years ago, uh, but who are still working, working because we either we have to, or we want to, we love what we do, which is my case, and I will do it. Until I drop. I've always said I'll probably pass out, pass away during a PowerPoint presentation. I hope it's not mine. I hope it's not this one. What a way to go. So, um, yeah, I think a lot of the technology, for example, that Generation Z enjoy, um, many people my age are looking at it and thinking, well, is this necessary? Do we need to download? This app. Do we need to upload our photo so that face recognition can be used? registration These things should be optional because yeah, there are people I've seen people at conferences People high up in hierarchies in their business who don't know how to write an email. They don't know how to type because they've always had other people to do it for them. So good conference planners are very mindful of the fact that we have three, four generations in the same room at the same time. It's a balancing act. It's a juggling act. But, uh, it's something that we, that we have to get right, because my generation, we're working, many of us, and we still want to go to conferences. We may want different things, and that's a very interesting generational phenomenon, where I noticed with my own eyes, I go to a conference, I don't, I don't need more work, I don't need to make new business contacts, I need to shake the hands of the people I've known for years. Catch up with the chat, the gossip. How are you? Blah blah blah. Younger people, they don't have those contacts yet. For them, a priority is making business contacts, which means learning how to network, something we may want to go into because they're not very good at it. Um, just to make their way in, in professional life. People, different generations clearly want different things.

Alastair GreenerSo how do we craft a, an event and to suit the generations, but also how do we craft the individuals so that they get the most out of it? Are you finding yourself almost teaching younger people how to benefit from a conference? You know, you talked about networking there, but it's also about how to absorb information, how to. Um, to make the event work for you, our organization's almost bringing you in to say, listen, can you show our younger people how to make the most out of these events?

Rob DavidsonThey are, and I work a lot with, um, professional associations. Uh, and that's for the simple reason that so many of them, and this is worldwide, are finding it a real challenge to recruit members of Generation Z. Uh, they're, uh, The young generations, they are not natural joiners. Remember, they've had so much information, they get so much information online, um, at the drop of a hat, and they don't see the value of joining an association. I'm a natural joiner. My father was a joiner, in another sense of the word. I really like associations because I admire the work that they do. I'm a real association animal, and I enjoy working with associations to give them advice on, number one, how to recruit the young generation. Crucially, number two, how to design conferences that the younger members will want to go to. Because you can recruit members, but you can very rarely, um, oblige them to come to the annual conference. And as we know, most associations depend on making a profit from the annual conference for their running costs. So it's simple, it's simple things Alastair, it's things like a buddy system. The one, the one thing I hear time and time again from the younger generation is this. Well, I went to the conference of my association and no one spoke to me. No, I didn't know anyone. It was very flaky. No one came near me. That should never happen. The Americans are better at this than we are. The buddy system, you know, matching up a well established older member with a newbie, someone coming to the conference for the first time, taking the newbie around and introducing him or her to other people. It's a simple thing, but it's something that's overlooked far too often, and then we are surprised that Generation Z say I tried it and I didn't like it, I'm not going back. You know, that shouldn't happen. We need to make them feel welcome and to feel part of it, you know, to And are you working with,

Alastair Greenerare you working with older people to teach them to do it? Because one of the challenges sometimes can be that the older generations, well, we had to manage it, we cracked on, you need to do the same thing. And we, we know, I know, and I know you do, given the work you do at universities and so on, is that actually we cannot treat the young in the way that we were treated, because it just isn't going to work. So how How hard is it for you to convince older generations that they've got to change their approach to be more inclusive in the way that they run their events?

Rob DavidsonYeah, this is a theme I really have to touch on whenever I'm speaking to people in the conference industry, you know, MPI or other meetings industry associations. And they, I would say on the whole, to give them credit, they're pretty receptive because they see the problem, they see numbers. Uh, dropping off, and they see the younger generation not signing up as they used to. And so, I give them these tips and emphasize the importance of involving, uh, Generation Z. Get a Generation Z speaker, for goodness sake, there's some amazing people around from that generation, who will light up the room and electrify the whole audience. It's not difficult to find these people. The Generation Z people in the audience want to see at least someone who looks like them. And we've been through this in the past in terms of, uh, women, for example. Women, treating them, uh, equally well as men, making them feel welcome, having women speakers. Um, we, I would say pretty much won that battle, although I, I still get invited to appear on panels where six men are sitting on the stage speaking to an audience largely composed of women. That should never happen. There's an education required there. Um, but we need to do the same now with the generations to involve them, make them feel this is a conference designed with me in mind, not. exclusively me in mind because they're not selfish, but they'd want to feel, um, design takes them into account.

Alastair GreenerBrilliant. I mean, that's some really, really good advice. And actually I'd like to finish up with some advice if I may, because you, you are in an unusual position where you are working across generations. You're bringing in a brand new generation into the industry and you're working with an industry to make sure that it. Ben's and flexes with the times. What advice would you give to different generations to say to them to increase the level of collaboration between generations where they actually listen to one another and that they realize that the sum of all generations is stronger than each individual one. So given your experience. Working in the industry and working with students, what are your top tips to help people bridge that generation gap?

Rob DavidsonIt's such an important point. I would say it all begins with mutual respect, acknowledging that every generation has something to offer. And we can lose sight of this. Well, the younger generation can lose sight of it, because what they see at a time when technology is so dominant, they see People my age struggling to get our brains around the latest device, the latest app, or whatever it might be, and the younger generation do it in the blink of an eye. Um, they have to understand that the other side of that is that the older generations have an absolute wealth of experience, um, which deserves respect. We, we haven't seen it all, no one's seen it all, but we've seen enough to be able to use that experience in situations, for example, uh, at a conference when things go wrong, um, people my age, we've seen the situation. Uh, we know what to do. And that deserves respect. But it works always. It works in the other direction too. But we have to acknowledge what the younger generation are. Um, they, they have many, many qualities. And I'm someone who feels very optimistic about the kind of world that the next generation will forge for themselves. They will, they will create it in their own image, just as the baby boomers. did. In our heyday, we were in charge. We were in charge of politics, uh, culture, uh, entertainment, everything you can imagine. We must hand on now to the younger ones, but I'm optimistic. They are much more egalitarian in their thinking. Equal opportunities is something comes perfectly natural. Uh. to them, um, they see fairness, they're a very ethical generation. My generation, we were quite happy to go to luxury conferences in, um, Rio de Janeiro, drink the champagne, eat the best food, and really not be terribly worried about the fact that up there in the favelas on the hill were children who'd never been to school, no shoes. Younger generation. I admire them for their social conscience. I respect them for it. And they are bringing that social conference, social, uh, etiquette into conferences. When you go to a conference these days, there's much more likely to be a corporate social responsibility action. It might just be passing around a hat at the gala dinner and everyone putting 20 quid in it. But it's a sign that the younger generation do care more about the culture. about people who are less fortunate than themselves. People will never walk into that shining.

Alastair GreenerI think that's a, that's a perfect place to finish actually, because that whole concept that you talked about there with mutual respect and understanding, inclusivity, and we hear inclusivity a lot when it comes to, to gender and to race and to faith. But actually, that also goes as far as generations is concerned as well. Rob, it's been fascinating talking to you, and I know we could have done this for a lot, lot longer, but half an hour is all I've allowed us. But thank you so much indeed for joining us. And I look forward to seeing what the evolution of the event industry is over the next few years. But I love the fact that you see it has been optimistic. So thanks so much indeed for joining us. It

Rob Davidsonwas a pleasure, Alastair. Many, many thanks again.

Alastair GreenerThanks, Rob. And thank you very much indeed for listening. We'll see you next time. Bye for now. The Alastair Greener Generationally Speaking podcast was presented by me, Alastair Greener. It was recorded at Granary Studios and produced by James Jones. Please follow us and leave us a review wherever you get your podcasts. To find out more, visit generationallyspeaking. co. uk