Snap, Facebook, MTV Breaks and more digital brands are coming together to support this year’s Digital Disruptors programme, aimed at inspiring the younger generation in the digital industry.
This year’s Digital Disruptors initiative is aimed at encouraging more young people to investigate the opportunities within digital.
The programme kicked off over the summer with Snap, Facebook, Awin, Universal McCann, MTV Breaks, Found and Reverse Media Group all hosting bespoke inhouse workshops to give invaluable hands-on experience of social platforms, lens development, search tactics, mobile commerce, influencer marketing and online creativity.
A structured schedule of mentoring with representatives from these companies now follows to help the young attendees get ready to showcase their own digitally-disruptive thinking in a Dragons’ Den style pitch competition at the big PILive event in October.
Co-founder Tina Judic says: “The Digital Disruptors programme is all about supporting and nurturing our next generation of digital pioneers. Over three months, we are once again giving another group of London-based teenagers direct access to some of our industry’s smartest brains and businesses, showing them the many options digital provides as a career choice and, most importantly, empowering them to think dynamically about the opportunities it brings to our everyday lives.”
Ed Couchman, UK General Manager at Snap, says: “At Snap, we are passionate about giving our users the tools they need to express themselves and be creative. We are excited to partner with Digital Disruptor to help young people tap into their talents, realise their potential and explore the opportunities available to them in the future. The industry needs bright, creative and enquiring minds and we are delighted to play our part in empowering young people here in the UK.”
Susan Kingston-Brown, Chief Product Officer EMEA at Universal McCann, says: “We were delighted to support Digital Disruptors with our partners from Viacom, hosting the groups to learn new skills and develop their digital knowledge specifically around the commercial world of influencer marketing. As an industry, we are making great progress in diversity and volume of strong entry level talent, but we need more momentum for inspiring the new talent of the future. This programme brought us a really smart group of passionate young people who will definitely appear in our worlds again!”
Molly-Rose Price, Global Marketing Solutions Manager at Facebook, says “We’re excited to partner with Digital Disruptors to give more people the skills to leverage the power of Facebook: to connect business owners with the people who will love their business, meet people in the place where they explore their passions and scale their business.”
Co-Founder Julie York adds: “Digital Disruptors has the ability to harness the scarily huge expanse of creativity and innovative thinking that we know exists with our next generation. They have grown up surrounded by digital, are demanding of its capabilities and are forthright in questioning how else it can be used to help them. It is our aim to give these young minds the platform to showcase their own ideas, and judging by last year’s pitches, there will be plenty of fresh thinking about how our industry can continue to evolve.”
Organised in partnership with youth charity The Hebe Foundation, Digital Disruptors was launched last year in memory of Nicky McShane, one of our industry’s most exuberant and progressive digital marketers who sadly passed away at the end of 2017. She was passionate about encouraging others to enjoy digital and to think disruptively about the opportunities it provides us all. Her enthusiasm and hunger to always look beyond the obvious were infectious and it is now the co-founders’ mission to inspire our next generation to think and act the same.
