Last night's 360 Summit was our eleventh anniversary of this amazing gathering of 200 senior officers and board directors of publicly listed corporations.
360 Summit , the 10th of November 2010
It's always a high energy event but last night's topped them all. A highlight was the 360 Leadership Award presentation to Chris Anderson, Curator of TED. Past honorees have been Queen Rania of Jordan; Christine Lagarde, the FInance Minister of France; Ann Lauvergeon, CEO of Areva (the world's biggest producer of nuclear power); and Helen Alexanderthen CEO of THe Economist Group. So Chris's Award is noteworthy on several levels, one of which is that he is the first man to receive the award. Another is that he is not a corporate leader, our traditional target. Instead, he runs TED which is a not for profit and a media phenomenon that is truly remarkable and game-changing in its focus on "Ideas Worth Spreading."
Chris Anderson, Curator of TED
Another highlight was the amazing energy at all the tables. This dinner is unlike any other New York dinner for high powered business types; usually the ritual is for people to buy a ticket, get seated at a table, have a ho-hum dinner while listening to a series of keynote speeches. The 360 Summit, instead, is designed so that the attendees shape the evening by their highly interactive table conversation focused on the "What if...?" questions posed by business and thought leaders throughout the evening.
There is always an impressive series of gifts that get raffled off, and a goody bag that's filled with cool swag. This year's prize goody bag piece is the digital frame from Ameriprise. Nice. Also in the bag was a bunny from Build-A-Bear Workshop. We've given teddy bears away for each of the past 10 years of the dinner, so this was a departure. In keeping with the "What if...?" theme, the bunnies bore tags that said "What if...you could start a conversation that proliferated--multiplying like rabbits--globally? What would the topic of that conversation be?"
People stood on the floor of the Exchange holding a drink in one hand and a bunny in the other...was a great sight.
Lou Rubin, a New York exec who like David Byrne rides his bicycle everywhere in Manhattan, did so last night as well. He sent this note after getting home...
"What if Bunny could bike home to the upper east side with his goodie bag on
the back?"
Author of I is for Intercourse: The ABC's of Conversation, Susan Bird is the visionary behind Wf360, and a sought-after speaker around the world for her views on leadership, the strategic importance of conversation, entrepreneurship, and the role of women business leaders.
The Summit this year was incredible. The conversation at our table was inspired and controversial. Just the way we all love it! Ours ranged from the aging population and the need to leverage the wisdom and resources of this group, to the apathy and disconnected culture of our youth population. This was bridged by a discussion of the "what if" possibility of Service being the solution to many problems.
During cocktails we discussed the lack of activism in the country. Why are people not up in arms and participating on every level? Why is this so different from the sixties? Here was the missing link...What If we had a draft? That was the thing that touched us all, and that is what compelled us to participate. So...a draft.
I met great people, took home the amazing goody bag, and have been thinking about how to harness all the great ideas. Susan Bird- you are a genius!
This event gets better every year!!
Posted by: Anne Chambers | November 12, 2010 at 04:52 PM