This short film collects the reflections of participants in IRG’s Real Growth Leadership Program. The premise they start from is that marketing needs a reboot, moving away from an overly narrow focus on marketing communications toward driving meaningful, consumer-driven growth.
Key findings
- One participant joined because their industry was under pressure from several directions at once, from government regulation to consumer sentiment about the product.
- The motivation was a different model of growth rather than better execution of the current one, and specifically growth that could be sustained.
- The program works on the participant’s own situation. People bring the real growth challenges of their organization, and the program helps them benchmark the opportunity and identify where the big growth opportunities are.
- The most valued element for several participants is the peer group rather than the content: an open and honest setting with other marketing leaders, and the chance to share what is working.
Peers from other industries
One participant describes the collegiate nature of the interaction with peers from other industries, and the fact that people are there to support each other and to learn.
The content is credited alongside that, as speakers and thought-provoking stimulus, but the value is placed in the chance to reflect and to leave with something actionable.
Business growth and personal growth together
Another participant points to the mix in the program, which pairs business growth discussions with personal growth. The reason they find it interesting is that the two are linked, and in their view you cannot have one without the other.
What they tell people who have not been
The recommendation offered is framed as a way of seeing beyond your own company: getting a view of what is happening in the world outside your own organization.
Another sums up the experience as fun, challenging and stimulating, producing a network of new friends and the chance to contribute something meaningful to the path marketing needs to take.
Scope and limitations
These are participant testimonials, not evaluation. Some speakers were only a few days into the program when they were recorded.
Source
This page summarises IRG – Real Growth Leadership Program Testimonials, by Marc de Swaan Arons.