Our Brave Conference: a dozen extraordinary stories

1. In July 1911, the polar explorers Apsley Cherry-Garrard, Henry Bowers and Bill Wilson endured hideous conditions in perpetually dark Antarctica. They were all part of Scott’s ill-fated expedition the following year, which was described in Cherry Garrard’s famous book: “The Worst Journey in the World”. In 1911 they were looking for emperor penguin eggs. Some people do very brave things for very odd reasons.
2. The free rock climber Alex Hammold scaled the 3000 foot sheer rock El Capitan in Yosemite without ropes, and just  the video of him doing this on the huge screen at the Science Museum was terrifying.  But he had assessed the risk beforehand - and had done the climb first with ropes. And he didn’t tell his mother till afterwards.
3. Hassad Akkad was living happily in Damascus teaching English until 2011. Then he was tortured and put into solitary confinement for protesting peacefully against the government, and he knew in 2015 that he had to escape – and film his journey. He survived two failed sea crossings, walked from Greece to Calais and spent 60 days in the “Jungle” there. He only got let into the UK because he flew from Brussels to Heathrow with a fake Bulgarian passport – that deceived our border control. Since then we have awarded him five years asylum in this country, and a Bafta for his film. Meanwhile ten thousand more people like him have died, and he longs to go back to Syria. No wonder we cried - and felt ashamed of our inadequate response.
4. Syl Saller cried every night for six weeks after she agreed to take on the challenge of leading all of Diageo’s marketing worldwide. “I don’t self-refer as brave” she told us. But she was brave to share this.
5. The first Saudi Arabian woman to climb Everest – Raha Moharrak – has now climbed the highest peak on each of the world’s seven continents. She said her motivation to do it started with the word “no” – from her father.
6. Frances O’Grady is the first woman to be General Secretary of the British Trades Union Congress, and the first trade unionist to address The Marketing Society conference. She believes that today we should: “Speak up for the people that have no voice. Joining a union is brave”.
7. In 1998, when the Russian economy collapsed, the Mars company decided to continue supplying all of its products to their distributors free. That’s strategic thinking from a company that likes to see itself as “106 years bold”.
8. Pedigree Petfoods in the US demonstrated that a love of dogs could make Trump and Hilary supporters, who detested each other, come together during last year’s really bitter election campaign.
9. Min Kym still hasn’t recovered from the loss of her Stradivarius violin in 2010. It was stolen at Euston station and eventually recovered, but by then the insurance company owned it. She has written her story in “Gone: A Girl, A Violin, A Life Unstrung”  to try to exorcise her demons.
10. Ali Parsa who has a brave plan to bring healthcare to the 50% of the world who do not have access to it, told us that artificial intelligence will significantly increase the accuracy of medical diagnoses. One in eight doctors’ diagnoses in the UK and one in two in Nigeria are currently wrong.
11. Donald Trump’s attacks on Twitter against the “fake news” of The New York Times have dramatically increased its number of subscribers.
12. The big wave surfer Garrett McNamara hit the water so hard two years ago when he wiped out that he smashed his shoulder to bits. But he still holds the world record for surfing the highest wave ever at Nazare in Portugal. “ Choose to be in the moment,” he says, “choose to enjoy what you are doing. You can process fear or excitement”.                   
     

This piece was written by Marketing Society Global Ambassador Hugh Burkitt. Follow him @hughburkitt