Over 350 DRPG team members from across the organisation’s global offices came together for our annual global summer conference on Tuesday 23 July at the Hilton Metropole, Birmingham.
Our theme for this year was wellbeing and resilience, which we got stuck into with a full day of learning, workshopping, and adventure. Rebecca Mander delivered a inspiring workshop on gaining your confidence and achieving your lifetime goals.
Nick Elston delivered a thrilling session on finding your voice and forging positive mental health, which is so important to us in this busy global period. Speaking of global, we were also joined by our latest and greatest people, The Special Event Company from the North Carolina, USA and OWB from Birmingham, UK. Our fabulous German Cologne colleagues also made the trip over.
Group CEO Dale Parmenter shared, “This conference was an opportunity to put our creative tools down for a day, to take stock of our successes and acknowledge the great work we’re pushing out for our clients globally. Most importantly it was to look inward as a team and build our resilience for another busy half-year.
“We’re doing as much as we can within our own workplace culture at DRPG, but we also want to ensure that our team feel suitably equipped to deal with the various stresses of everyday life – including the present economic, environmental and socio-political current affairs that are happening across the world. It was fantastic to learn of numerous ways to look after ourselves and one another.”
We were absolutely wowed by the Next Gen board, a group comprised of eight team members aged between 18 and 24 from across the wider business. The young team announced a relaunch of the in-house learning and development function, The Academy, initiating a new range of tools to help with team development and growth.
Alicia Wilson, Head of People at DRPG added, “Our team’s skills are varied and often niche to the different creative services that DRPG offer its clients, from event project managers through to digital developers. It was important that the new phase of The Academy was constructed to accommodate a tailored learning model that is far more than isolated, online training. The Next Gen Board threw themselves into this challenge and we are proud to launch the new initiative.”
In the afternoon, we were invited to test our advanced resilience skills at The Bear Grylls Adventure, located within Birmingham’s National Exhibition Centre. After a drinks reception on the lawn overlooking the lake hosted by the NEC, it was back to the Metropole for dinner, ending the event with a colourful Drag Bingo experience courtesy of Berry Productions Ltd.
