speaking Archives

By Shannon DiGregorio Abram, Relationship Manager at The Community Roundtable.

Winter is a great time to plan to be away from snowy (very snowy today) Massachusetts. Our co-founder Rachel did just that and spent last week at IBM Connect 2014 in sunny Orlando, FL, and will be jetting off to Paris (which might not be balmy, but it’s Paris) next week for the Enterprise 2.0 Summit.

These are two very different events and I wanted to get the scoop from Rachel on what drove her interest in each. Below is a short interview with Rachel – highlighting her views on both events and recommendations for conference goers in general.

The focus of this year’s IBM Connect was “Energizing Life’s Work,” – how did you see that theme play out through your experience there?

There were literally hundreds of events – from panels like “Avoid Being a Social Zombie in a Global World” to multi-day innovation and design labs; the event definitely had a hands on feel. I got to take part in several interactive events, really targeted at applying expertise and case studies to real-life challenges. Personally, I walked away energized by the number of interactions I had that are already lending themselves to collaboration. One quick example – I took part in a great lunch roundtable celebrating Community Manager Advancement Day and walked away already discussing the possibility for an ebook. Everyone there was focused on applying the discussions and interactions back to their life and their work immediately, and it was exciting to see – and energizing!

Seeing a large enterprise like IBM shine a spotlight on social business is refreshing. What do you think was the key social take-away for attendees?

The event was so large I don’t feel like I can pinpoint the key take-away, but there was a sense of “this is now” in every meeting I had and every session I attended. Enterprises are focusing of social business as a vital component of a successful strategy – certainly a shift from where they were five or even three years ago.

Worth noting is the Social Business Symposium – an education package for undergrad and grad students. I took part in an interview focused on internal collaboration that will be distributed on the Social Business Symposium platform (a newly launched website) with interviewer/host Peter Cardon, Professor at USC. I haven’t seen the finished product yet but I love that the discussion of social business and community management is making its way into the curriculum of both undergraduate and graduate programs.

You interacted with a lot of new faces through some of the events you took part in. Can you share a highlight?

I was lucky enough to host the CMAD roundtable and a “Social Buzz chat” in the IBM Connect Social Cafe. But as with many events, a lot of the conversations came from one-on-one discussions as part of bigger events. At lunch we had fun discussing what creature our communities reminded us of – and what creature we would prefer it reminding us of. My favorite response was that one community culture was like a bunch of monkeys – very intelligent but just wanting to have fun – and the community manager said their preferred creature would be ants – individuals working in concert to do something they could not do alone.

I also got the opportunity to catch up with some of our members and clients and dig more deeply into their challenges and opportunities, which I can never get enough of as I find the process of transforming businesses and cultures to be fascinating.

I’m already looking forward to Connect 2015 – and thinking about trying to plan my calendar to fit even more in. There were so many sessions that I would have loved to take part in and want to take advantage of next year.

The Enterprise 2.0 Summit is next week in Paris. Can you give us an overview for anyone not familiar with the event?

The Enterprise 2.0 Summit is held in Paris and is primarily focused on enterprise and social business practitioners in Europe. This year the main theme is “Getting Social Enterprise Ready” which I think will include how organizations adopt and adapt technology solutions, as well as how companies implement social business across the organization. As part of that, I will be running a workshop on internal community management training – something I’m very excited to deliver as we recently finished developing this course with a client and I believe it is the first of its kind focused on addressing the needs of community managers focused on internal employees.

You’ll be speaking on a panel “Driving the Engagement & Adoption” can you give us a sneak peek on the discussion?

In an interview with Rogier Noort on the Enterprise 2.0 blog I share that the three hashtags that best describe my talk are #motivation, #ability and #triggers. I’ve found that striking the right balance between those things will increase engagement and they are part of a template we’ve built called an “Engagement Recipe” which uses the research of B.J. Fogg, founder of Stanford’s Persuasive Technology Lab.

The panel also includes some great social business names – Björn Negelmann, Claire Flanagan, Guillaume Guerin and Laurent Pantanacce. More than anything I’m looking forward to the different perspectives on engagement that each person brings to the discussion.

Final question, a softball. Besides the great conversations and connections at the Enterprise 2.0 Summit what are you looking forward to in Paris?

I truly am most excited about connecting with new and old friends in Paris – Enterprise 2.0 Summit is chock full of experts and peers that now have lots of experience to share. However, our team member Maggie has spent a lot of time in France and she’s been psyching me up with the talk of macarons and wine bars – I’ve already planned a number of fun dinners with clients and partners that will be a little bit business but more than a little bit fun.

Thanks Rachel! Have a great time in Paris – we’ll post a recap when you’re back!

I had the opportunity to present at South-by-Southwest Interactive this year for the first time. I shared the stage with three friends and former colleagues for “Lurkers: Your Most Valuable Community Members.” We offered up this description:

Your lurkers are a vital and necessary part of your community and they often make up a majority of your membership but are dismissed as valueless members of the community. Treating your lurkers as if they have no value could be a fatal mistake in managing your community. Many community managers discount the value of lurkers when in fact, they are usually the cornerstone of your community. The panelists will help you understand the measurements you need to use to both understand the value of your community lurkers and how to translate that value back to the business. We will also share ideas on how to keep lurkers engaged and coming back to the community and how they can turn from lurkers into contributors. In this panel, you will learn why your community lurkers are valuable and how to measure their value by understanding how they are contributing to your community, what they are learning from your community, and how they are providing value back to the business. This will be a moderator-lead discussion with plenty of time for Q&A. Learn from a panel with a combined 32 years of community building and management experience.

To say it was an excellent experience is an understatement. From the moment we were accepted, Mike, Mark, Heather ** and I took our obligation to the audience seriously. We met every other week for an hour, starting in early January. We also utilized a private Facebook group to share links, debate ideas and follow up with one another on action items. I think we were all a bit terrified of falling short of the audience’s expectations.

We were conflicted when we found out we were speaking at the Hyatt at 5pm on Saturday. Late afternoon is typically a better slot than the morning, but being out of the flow of the “main tent” in the Austin Convention Center meant people might not make the extra effort to take in our session. Saturday afternoon is certainly better than Tuesday afternoon. As the schedule of parties started to hit, I became even more pessimistic since a lot of them were scheduled to start at 5pm. The thought of having to circle 10-20 chairs in the rooms and holding an informal q&a crossed my mind.

As I walked over to the Hyatt on Saturday afternoon I was surprised to see all the activity in and around the hotel. It was supposed to be the hub for the “Social Graph” track and it seemed to have a great group of people sticking around to take in sessions. My enthusiasm balloon was punctured when we went to the green room and found we were speaking against Drew Olanoff and another panel called “Zombies Must Eat: How Genre Communities Make Money.” Sandwiched between the guy that started the #BlameDrewsCancer meme and Zombies… damn, that’s some tough competition.

In the end we didn’t have to circle the chairs. We didn’t cancel the session because no one showed up. Instead we had fun, shared some stories and (I think) proved that lurkers are a really important part of every community. The room was close to capacity (100+) and we had a lot of interaction and questions from the audience. I had more than a couple people come up to me later in the week to tell me it was the best panel they’d attended so far. That feels pretty good.

My takeaways on my first SXSW panel experience?

Your preparation doesn’t end when you submit your panel proposal. Sure the panel submission process is pretty thorough, but it’s just the beginning. The panels that fell flat for me seemed like a bunch of individuals who didn’t really know each other and what they brought to the panel. You may be brilliant, but if you’re on a panel you owe it to the audience to get to know your fellow panelists. Getting together the night before for dinner *might* work, but I *know* connecting with your panelists multiple times beforehand will help you hit it out of the park.
Respect your audience and the other panelists. I was thrilled to see all the people in the seats when we got started. I must have thanked them five times for choosing us vs. a short nap or early party. Even though you’ll probably have the opportunity (SXSW parties are all day long), don’t drink alcohol ahead of your panel. Sure you can wing it, but you’re not as sharp if you do. Support your fellow panelists and don’t dominate the microphone. Following #1 will help you build a relationship with them in advance and make this a lot easier.
Have fun and don’t take yourself too seriously. I hope this one pretty much speaks for itself.

I hope you get chosen to do a session/panel at SXSW next year. I’m sure you’ll kill it!

What have you learned in speaking at SXSW (or any other conference)? What would your top tips be for new presenters? The comments are yours.

* PHOTO CREDIT: Derek Peplau. See the entire slideshow from our session here.

** Three of the best friends and fellow panelists a guy could ask for. Thanks guys!

Events On Our Mind: IBM Connect and Enterprise 2.0 Summit

#SXSWLurkers – My Experience on a Panel at SXSW