Leonard Brody

Everyone fails. The world’s most recognized leaders, celebrities and business people have setbacks both large and small on a daily basis. Yet, when it happens to you, it is instinctual to feel alone and embarrassed. The truth is that failure is a fundamental part of our society and is an important step toward success. The problem is that most people don’t have the skills to get past the hurdle and drive it through to its destined completion. Every organization suffers deeply when it’s members fail and have no means to overcome it. It manifests itself in many forms of paralysis in the workplace. Learn how navigate any setback (personal or professional) towards innovation and growth.

Science and pundits have been pre-occupied with dissecting, analyzing and dividing us into generational buckets. Gen Y, Gen X, Baby Boomers, Zoomers, Millenials – its hard enough to keep track of who belongs where, let alone trying to understand their idiosyncrasies. It’s hard not to feel like we have turned ourselves into a kennel club for human beings where we each belong to a breed with certain characteristics. The truth is, that there are certainly differences between age groups and much of the discussion around this is very valid. However, it misses a very important point. For many reasons, for as much as we have dividing us by generation, there is even more uniting us – particularly a shifting sense of values which seem to be shared across generational lines. While Gen Yers may be more likely to manifest their values differently than Boomers, the underlying foundation is actually very similar. We have moved sharply away from the paradigm of top down leadership. Across all age groups, people are looking for leadership that fundamentally involves them. This was the great leave behind of Web 2.0. People see themselves as part of the chain of command, not a rung on it. Almost all facets of life have changed because of it, but particularly, that of work. Money is not the main driver of why people show up to the office every day. People want their professional lives to be connected to their values, to the things that matter to them. This isn’t a world that wants to be led anymore. That doesn’t mean that we don’t need leaders, it simply translates into the reality that we are all leaders now. The question is how we will handle the task when called upon.

We are standing at one of the most challenging crossroads in human history. One that may not enable our past to predict our future. Technological evolution has, in less than a decade, connecting every human being on the planet at the touch of button. Matched by demographic growth at both ends of the age continuum, we are fundamentally different people than we were only a few years ago. Combine this with the earth receding around us and the very foundations of our financial markets decaying and it is easy to feel disoriented, if not dismayed. Futurists are going to continuously be challenged by the pace of this metamorphosis thereby struggling in being able to predict where we are headed. Ten year, and even five year plans, are almost impossible. There are three drivers in this maelstrom that, if properly understood, can help one prosper in this chaos – mastering the concepts of the compression of time, the plentitude of access and the removal of value economics. This talk will help you put a plan together to master these concepts, to navigate the world around you and, most importantly, to be prepared for the next 730 days of your life.

Over the last five years, our personal and professional worlds have gone through more dramatic change than any other period in history. The Industrial Revolution was a blip on the radar compared to where we are now. This monumental shift has been so anticipated and talked about that we have overlooked the fact that it has actually arrived. We are not the same people we were a decade ago. We don’t communicate in the same way and our concept of self and work has entirely changed. Those that do not understand these underpinnings will simply be left behind. Technology and the Web in particular, has left us completely exposed as human beings. We have learned more about ourselves as a species because of the connectivity of the Web than anything known before it. It has taught us a lot about ourselves. Some of it is good news, some of it is bad. We have entered an era of a true global dialogue. Participation is no longer optional. Not joining the conversation will mean difficulty in hiring and retaining talent. More importantly, it will create massive dissonance between an enterprise and its customers. Do you know the new rules and trends to watch for?

We are living through one of the most complicated and transformative times in human history; a period in time which will be seen to be a magnitude more significant than any other period before it. We have experienced more change in the previous 17 years than we saw in the critical 195 years from industrialization to the end of World War II. There is no doubt technology is a big part of the metamorphosis we have gone through. But it is not the complete explanation. What is important is not the technology (social media, the web, etc.) itself, but what it has done to us as people. Technology platforms have unlocked layers of human desire and behaviours that were previously dormant or thought unattainable. We are simply not the same people we were a decade ago. Many of the structures developed around institutions like Government, Education, HR and Marketing were fundamentally designed hundreds of years ago and no longer reflect the needs of the people they were intended to serve.

There are lots of people that offer their services around the ‘how’ of social media and the web. The much more pressing question is ‘why’ engage in the first place. The answer has nothing to do with concepts like reach or efficacy or volume. It has simply to do with one fact: social media and the web are as a medium, a collective reflection of who we have become as people. As a two-time Emmy nominated entrepreneur that has been building companies in the space for over a decade, Leonard will teach you not only some of the fundamentals of the genre and tricks of the trade, but more importantly enlighten you about the intricacies and changes of the most important currency in social media – human beings.