Circle of Wisdom: Meet the industry experts shaping our dynamic content
As a summit dedicated to discovering new ways of doing business, we’re often asked: How do we stay ahead of the curve?
This year, we have assembled a Circle of Wisdom – 19 industry experts driving change in their respective fields – to ensure we deliver informative, forward-thinking, and inclusive content that makes the biggest impact.
Our dynamic content programme is powered by experts with diverse backgrounds and experiences. From Channel 4 and ITV News Reporter Keme Nzerem, who brings insights from global affairs to Bianca Pitt, an advisor to environmental charities and co-founder of SHE Changes Climate.
We’re also gaining unique perspectives from pioneering sports marketing consultant Dan Macaulay, who told us: “Accelerating action on climate, nature, and the environment is imperative, and business is well placed to take the lead. The opportunities are multifaceted. I’ll be at Blue Earth to make the case clear: Good business is good for business. It’s as simple as that.”
Here, Programme Editor, Rosie Riley, shares how the Circle of Wisdom strikes a balance between providing practical, actionable advice and inspiring attendees with big-picture ideas and visions for the future.
How would you describe your role at Blue Earth Summit?
As Programme Editor, I am responsible for curating content across Blue Earth Summit stages. I work with the team to identify and reach out to the people, projects, and organisations making real positive change in the world, asking them to share their experiences and insights with the Blue Earth audience. We believe in the power of the outdoors to inspire environmentally-conscious business practices. There are so many inspirational stories among the Blue Earth community – the difficulty comes in choosing which to give our platform to.
What is the Circle of Wisdom and how does it help ensure a dynamic content programme?
The Circle of Wisdom is a group of 19 individuals – business leaders, sustainability experts, adventurers, athletes, and community leaders – who review our content proposals, suggest speakers, input decision-making, and hold us accountable. Working with such a diverse group ensures our content stays ahead of the curve, bringing new perspectives, challenging our existing approach, and giving depth to specific topic areas. We’re a relatively small team at HQ, and this group spreads our wings wider.
Can you give examples of some key topics shaped by the input of the Circle of Wisdom?
The Circle of Wisdom is helping to develop some exciting new formats and topics for this year’s summit. We have planned workshops, panels, and roundtables that will explore a range of important issues, such as circular economies, decolonising the outdoors, rewilding humanity, drawing inspiration from subcultures to drive transformation, the creative industry’s capacity for disruption, the effectiveness of activism in creating meaningful change, and many other thought-provoking topics.
How do you ensure the topics are forward-thinking and keep up with the latest innovation?
This is a constant task! The Blue Earth team is always looking for news, insights, and inspiration from different sources and unlikely spaces. We scan online sources, listen to podcasts, head to live events, talk to our Council of Wisdom, listen to the Blue Earth community, and follow up with previous partners and attendees. When sustainability and the outdoors are your passion, inspiration comes from conversations with friends while hanging out in the surf, on bike rides, and up climbing walls.
What steps do you take to ensure that the debates and discussions at Blue Earth Summit are inclusive and diverse?
Diversity is hugely important. Just look at the natural world! The healthiest, most resilient, and most flourishing systems are diverse. Monocultures are such a threat! In the same way, for Blue Earth Summit to achieve its objective of inspiring a better way to live and work, we need input and perspectives from people and projects with variety of lived experiences across all backgrounds, sectors, and ages.
Whether we like it or not, we have an editorial role. Ultimately we choose who we give the Blue Earth Summit platform to and a diversity of views and experiences make for the best learning and sharing event. We have a responsibility to do this. I’m proud to say that we’ve signed up to the Diversity and Inclusion at Conferences and Events charter this year. This holds us to account for diversity quotas on stage. We are doing well in this, but we can do better. It’s a constant process.
How do you balance providing practical, actionable advice and inspiring attendees with big-picture ideas and visions for the future?
We do both! All sessions this year must have clear objectives and outcomes for our audience. Clear, actionable advice and takeaways. Simple as that.
Find out more about our panel of experts in the Circle of Wisdom.
