Behind the Scenes at Bunker Day
Many of you would have heard the content team talking about ‘Bunker Day’ and we are sure you will be wondering what actually happens over the course of these two days. So, for the 2018 MWC Conference campaign we will be giving you a behind the scenes look at how the conference agenda for MWC is formed!
The content team have spent the summer informing ourselves on the latest trends, barriers and emerging tech that is shaping the mobile and digital sphere. We have done this through desk research, attending events and conducted research briefings with over one hundred companies around the world.
Following these months of research, each team member is assigned a theme, some larger themes are split between two or three team members to introduce variance. The seven themes for the 2018 agenda were announced in late summer as:
1. The Future Service Provider
2. Networks
3. The Digital Consumer
4. The 4th Industrial Revolution
5. Immersive Content & Media
6. Technology in Society
7. Applied AI
The process by which these seven themes were confirmed is available to view in a dedicated article piece at http://cc.gsma.com/mwc-2018-conference-themes/
Informed with the research, facts, figures and news from the summer, each team member builds out 6-10 sub topics under each theme that they believe will create a relevant, informative and exciting 60 minute conference session at MWC.
So herein then lies the challenge; we have collectively created a list of 54 sub topics, each one equally as important, but we only actually have 40 conference slots available.
Our answer to this problem?
Bunker Day
The team are locked away for two days to battle out which sessions make it into the final line up of the MWC 2018 Conference Agenda.
This year we were delighted to be hosted by Startupbootcamp in their Rainmaking Loft office in London. Startupbootcamp provided a creative space for us, tucked away from the distraction of our office and equipped with a constant supply of caffeine.
Most of us would argue that Georgia is the real reason why we get anything done within the timelines we have.
Each team member took it in turn to pitch each of their sessions to the rest of the group. Think mental Hunger Games; each person’s passion is fuelled with the months of research poured into shaping these sessions.
Before we can confidently present the programme back to the market we need to make sure it is an agenda we can all defend, agree with and get behind. So each of these sessions are challenged and pulled apart by the team as each presenter, armed with research, is given the opportunity to defend the topic and convince the team to accept the session.
The majority of sessions are voted in fairly comfortably through team democracy. But as the number of session slots are whittled down, the air thickens with tension and Nick Spencer has to step in and pull rank as the final adjudicator.
Amongst the tension of the day, Alejandro takes a moment to reflect out onto London Bridge
By the end of the two days, despite a few bruised egos, we have the final agenda line up for MWC Conference ready!
Next step is then to just build the session programmes and recruit speakers….
