Diversity is a global problem, but it impacts right here in the B2B marketing industry, and we’d like to work with the industry to address it.
There are times in life when you have to accept that what you’re doing isn’t good enough; that you need to try harder and/or do better. And now is one such time for us at B2B Marketing. Prior to our recent Ignite event, we got called out for lack of diversity in the speaker line up. We responded to the individual raising this concern promptly and openly, stating that we’d review what we did and how we did it after the conference had concluded, and all the relevant post-event activity had taken place. That’s where we are now, in early July 2020.
Having reviewed the way that we create our conference agenda, and spoken to our internal and external advisors (both BAME and non-BAME) we’ve resolved that we need to make some changes – for the better. That’s not to say we’ve been consciously discriminatory in thought or deed in the past, but it is a realisation that what we’ve been doing isn’t sufficient to address a societal problem which will only be resolved by a collective effort. Everyone needs to do their bit to strive for and promote a more diverse B2B marketing industry.
This is a global and societal problem, so this isn’t a quick fix, and there’s no single solution. To pretend that there is would be misrepresenting the nature and seriousness of the challenge. We can’t solve it overnight or in isolation, and the most practical approach feels like a recalibration of priorities and requires a lot of small steps or nudges to move our own organisation, and hopefully the industry we were established to serve, in the right direction.
Right now, we don’t have all the answers – in fact, we’re probably only started to ask the right questions. We’d like to work with the industry to collectively address this challenge, and we’d welcome any thoughts or suggestions about what we can collectively do to encourage more diversity. We will provide further information about our approach as it develops. I would personally welcome dialogue or suggestions about this to my email address – [email protected]
