Connected Path has joined forces with Acceleration Partners to launch a new initiative called Turn the Talk.
It’s time we turned the talk to matters of diversity…
In the last year many events in the performance marketing industry have received criticism for their lack of diversity, shortfall of new voices on the stage or general failure to showcase a representative view of the people in the industry.
This issue has often diverted attention from the quality of content and insight being presented. However, people are tired of seeing the same faces on the stage or writing the headlines.
This initiative isn’t about disparaging those familiar faces who have important roles to play to drive the industry forward, it’s about broadening opinions and contributors.
The Mission
The initiative aims to raise industry awareness to ensure that its properly representative of the people that work in it. This awareness is vital to broaden the talent that we can attract and retain in the industry.
People from all parts of the industry are calling, sometimes quite vocally and publicly, for change. Turn the Talk is an initiative created to support this call for change, empowering more diverse and wider ranging access to speaker opportunities.
Its mission is to empower individuals and broaden voices in Performance Marketing.
How will Turn the Talk drive change?
After launching The Unconference last year it became really evident to us just how many barriers people faced when considering taking to the stage. We received a lot of feedback from friends, contacts and colleagues who felt for a myriad of different reasons they couldn’t take to the stage. The event was informal and no-one was under pressure to speak on behalf of their company, or even tow a party line. Yet the idea of getting on a stage made a lot of people decline the invite to speak.
This highlighted a much bigger problem, that the performance industry is failing to showcase the different voices that exist because many of those voices are struggling with one specific area - getting on a stage and speaking up.
Turn the Talk plans to address this in three ways:
Empowering People
As an industry we need to empower more people to nominate themselves to speak up. This starts at an individual level by encouraging people to overcome whatever obstacles they may face.
Raising Awareness
Collaborating with businesses to change how they nominate their staff to speak at events, making opportunities more widely available and nurturing those that wish to take on those opportunities, by providing time, resource and support.
Supporting Events
Helping event organisers in the industry to ensure they offer their audience a broad range of speakers, challenge the way they approach speaking opportunities and create stage formats that appeal to different voices.
We’re proud to have joined forces with performance marketing agency Acceleration Partners to launch this initiative. Acceleration Partners have a strong heritage in supporting their staff and creating a dynamic and empowering company culture. Helen Southgate, EMEA MD of Acceleration Partners says;
“It’s time that we called out the lack of diversity, pushed for change and helped people of all experience levels feel included. Turn the Talk aims to widen the speaker submissions at industry events, driving more balance and diversity. We need to change the way we do this, and this starts with trying to understand why more people aren’t applying for speaker opportunities.”
Whilst speaking at events is the first hurdle, the initiative is a wide-reaching movement, with goals to ‘turn the talk’ to other areas as the project develops, including accessibility to senior positions in the performance marketing industry, coaching and career progression.
Get Involved
The initiative has launched this week with a survey and we’re asking people to fill it in and give feedback. This feedback will help shape the events and projects we build throughout the year.
Turn the Talk isn’t just about two companies, it needs to be a collaborative effort by the industry and we want to invite partners and companies who believe in the same mission to get in touch.
Anyone interested in supporting the initiative or finding out more can email turnthetalk@outlook.com
The initiative launches today with the survey, which can be completed up until Monday 15th March.