In October we gather for our annual conference organized by co-chairs from our membership. Each year focuses on a theme such as disruption in our profession, the effects of technology on leadership, defending reputations in an age of spurious claims and the demand for predictive power from the CCO. Sound interesting? Good! We convene excellent speakers who include CEOs, futurists, venture capitalists, renowned authors, and other influential peeps. We workshop how to apply leading-edge ideas to age-old problems. And we network like mad. It’s an intense two or three days of learning and fun.

Each year our sponsor organization, Page, holds two major events – an Annual Conference in the fall exclusive to its members and a Spring Seminar open to both its members and those of us in Page Up. In addition to bringing in top-rate speakers, thought leaders, media and industry celebrities, and all manner of major muckety-mucks, there are usually more than 500 CCOs and agency CEOs in the room. Hello, networking!

So, you don’t live in New York or Chicago? No worries, neither do a bunch of us. We organize numerous regional networking events that can include dinners with special speakers, lunch around a controversial topic, or breakfast with a couple of aspirins and a double espresso. The point is, we get together all over the place for engaging conversations about topics that matter.

In 2018 we’ve initiated a new recurring event: notable speakers on the issues with which we are contending every day. We thought our first speaker would be either Bono or Oprah, but since they couldn’t make it, we’ve landed politicians, publishers, industry influencers, technological leaders, and CEOs from the industries grabbing the headlines of the day. Brace yourself for a candid, off-the-record conversation with some of the most compelling thinkers of the day.

In late 2018 we will initiate a mentorship program that taps into one of our most prized assets. Wait for it . . . Ha! Bet you thought we were going to write “our members” again. Well, close. But this time, it’s the membership of Page, to which close to 800 CCOs of Fortune 500 companies and CEOs of top tier agencies belong. Access to these leaders is priceless (that’s why mentorship is included in your membership to Page Up).

If you’ve come this far in life, chances are you eat many meals at your desk. Alone. Well, that’s just depressing. But it doesn’t have to be! At least not on Thursdays. As a member of Page Up, you can attend – and can volunteer to host – as many Think Thursday sessions as you wish. Essentially, we all get on the phone around the lunch hour (East Coast time) to discreetly and privately discuss a specific topic related to our work. These off-the-record conversations have covered everything from social media strategy to budget planning, to difficult stakeholder management issues to crisis communications. Call it a support group for recovering communicators if you like. We’ll call it Think Thursday.