IAA Summit, Bucharest, 2007 The learnings

1. Romania is not there yet. We are some good years behind the Western capitalist advertising world despite our hectic tour de force where local advertising has grown in 15 years as much as other in three decades (it's the Prislea way - Prislea = local version of Prince Charming)
1.1. their speakers are better than ours. Even when it's formal, academic and long, their presentations are full of content, relevant examples and conclusions. They were raised to make presentations and public speaking is a must for any high profile representative of the communication industry. This doesn't really apply to our local Heads of comms/agencies/professional bodies.
1.2 they have great study material. Great work. Real unconventional media. Breakthrough solutions.
1.3 our market is not yet that ready to embrace out of TV communication. But it will be so we'd better prepare
2. some speakers did not know where they were. But they didn't have to salute either so no "Good afternoon Budapest!" this time.
3. CSR is really being taken seriously abroad whilst, in my opinion, in Romania it's just something fashionable to talk about. the branding guru did say "giving is the new buying" and it makes sense in their world. In ours it's not that vital to support a cause to make your products sell. U still get through with a TV ad and an aggressive media strategy. That explains why the local cause branding initiatives I know didn't care as much about getting results as about owning a theme/stealing it from the competitors. This translates pretty much in themes that have been confiscated and that are never-to-be embraced by any other company. Well, CSR practitioners at IAA summit talked about how everyone (every company) is responsible to add up to a CSR theme until it becomes a general trend, making more and more people react and starting to generate effects. Out there there are campaign ridiculing SUVs found on the city streets. In Romania you are being laughed up if it occurs to you to support a theme. There are, of course, exceptions. Vodafone bought helicopters for SMURD, Whirlpool employees spent one week building houses for those in need, other companies are recycling paper. ..