Earlier in September, Brian Chesky, AirBnB CEO, stood before a rapt audience and delivered a speech that inspired Paul Graham to write this article called Founder Mode.
Brian's speech, and Paul’s subsequent article, viral and controversial, have injected Silicon Valley with a long-missing sense of excitement once again.
I opened with that example to show you that a conference, when done right, can be a crucible for ideas.
Sadly, there's a large consensus on the 'uselessness' of conferences. Call it fatigue, call it jadedness. But several hours of uninspired keynotes, presentations that feel like ads, and horrible coffee is not a good way to spend your day.
For those who attend conferences just to network, these may be trivial issues.
But for those of us who dream of hosting events that ignite genuine transformation in the financial sector, this mediocrity is untenable.
Big stage, bored room
Many conferences fail because their objective is skewed — they exist primarily to showcase products, services, or worse, to tick the box of corporate obligation.
A conference is, or ought to be, a theater of ideas — a place to build consensus, spread awareness, and inspire. If you have that many people in the same room, it is a huge missed opportunity to bore everyone to death.
I've seen people try to build an entire conference around a single speaker. This is another misstep.
A single perspective, however brilliant, cannot sustain the weight of diverse ideas, nor can it produce the rich dialogue that truly ignites progress. A conference must be a symphony, not a solo performance.
Start with the Theme
Everything begins here. A theme should feel like the opening chapter of an epic—a narrative that draws attendees into a shared journey.
In 2019, Clayton Christensen and Efosa Ojomo published The Prosperity Paradox, a masterwork that explored unlocking markets and fostering shared prosperity. Its resonance with our work at SIDFS was immediate, and by December, we hosted a conference inspired by its core ideas.
We spotlighted the success of Dufil Prima Foods, the creators of Indomie Noodles, drawing compelling parallels between their approach to market-creating innovations and the strategies needed to overcome Nigeria’s financial inclusion challenges.
I dare say it was a success. We had over 350 people in attendance, the feedback was positive, think pieces were written and we closed the year with a big win of an event.
And then, nothing happened.
For months, I puzzled over this, as I had imagined our conference would be the spark that should ignite lasting change.
Until a few weeks ago. I heard a financial leader reference market-creating innovations in a presentation even as he drew on the Indomie example.
I beamed like the Cheshire Cat. 5 years later and we have a believer!
I have since realised that conferences are one of the toolsets we use to achieve a common industry goal. You just have to play the long game.
Inspire, or Don’t Bother
The financial industry, with its dazzling potential, cannot afford the monotony of dull gatherings. We cannot afford to host events that make attendees mentally switch off till it's time to exchange business cards.
Conferences should not merely inform but inspire, offering attendees a vision of what could be - whether in their own field or in other industries and regions.
The financial inclusion target has been moved twice. It will probably be moved again (or they might just give up setting targets altogether).
Financial exclusion in Nigeria is intricately tied to poverty. To put it another way, it's a wicked problem. And wicked problems have a way of wearing everyone out till they give up and move on to another project.
To rally an industry toward an inclusive financial future—a goal that eluded us in 2020 and 2024—requires an injection of hope, an infusion of belief that this wicked problem of exclusion can be unraveled.
Conferences are the perfect stage for this alchemy.
Bonus point
Give your attendees cool merch - I still have the mouse and pad I got from an MTN event a decade ago. Same thing with a mug from a tech event in 2016. Grand ideas and insights are good, but you see good merch is eternal. 😁
I enjoyed reading and learnt so much from this piece, that I have shared it with the team in charge of preparing for the Conference my company is hosting in January.