Carolyn McCall, ceo Guardian Media Group was the first keynote speaker. She says we are entering a new economy where competition comes from everywhere. For instance the Guardian’s Trader site makes £120m profit a year and eBay has just changed its business model to compete head on. Life is much more simple if you are a pure play she says; media companies may have to make decisions which are not obvious from a finanial standpoint. One of the biggest management challenges is that some people find this incredibly scary.

However there is a real opportunity:-

1. from words and pictures to film
2. from national to global
3. from passive to active communities (brands without active communities will die).

Five big challenges:-

1. Build on your brands and your talent
2. Stay close to your users
3. Innovate to learn (being scared of screwing up is fatal)
4. Excel at software development (delivery is everything) (“our best developers are as important as our best journalists”)
5. Drive digital revenue growth. Scale is important – first for respect internally and second because we know there will be a slow down and we need to be at the highest possible base when it happens.