Conferences – Whose Education Is It Anyway?

Preparing for the 2025 GLOW Conference

The 2025 GLOW Conference promises a rich program of sessions, empowering attendees from every time zone.

This year, I join an inspiring roster of presenters drawn from every corner of the globe. As part of my contribution, I will be sharing insights into the critical, yet often hidden, work of Standards Development Organizations (SDOs) — exploring their pivotal role in enabling technological progress, fostering international collaboration, and supporting the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

SDOs are collaborative bodies that bring together experts from industry, academia, government, civil society and other groups to develop consensus-based standards. These standards are essential for facilitating global trade, ensuring product compatibility, promoting safety, and accelerating innovation.

In my 20 minutes session, I will quickly aim to demystify the standards development orgs and demonstrate how educators, researchers, and other professionals can get involved with SDOs to help bridge the gap between emerging technologies and real-world applications. I will also examine how SDOs work with educators to inspire the next generation of leaders.

Actionable Innovations Global YouTube for past sessions.

Registration for this year.

Connection

A few recent experiences have got me thinking again about the nature of interpersonal connection.

I was going to post here (or LinkedIn) to reflect on the all-encompassing nature of a work event. Being face-to-face (for me – it was also hybrid), 14 hours-ish days for a week and in a new environment (my first trip to India) meant this led to connection changes at an emotional level. This trip deepened existing relationships, built new ones and probably damaged a few too. Part of why I did not do a follow-up post was two weeks of (Covid?) sickness that followed the event. I was also struggling to articulate the benefits of such an event whilst not ignoring my own views on the power of online tools for connection building. I think most people attending the event would agree that the in-person nature amplified outcomes. However, as is the often the case with in-person training, meetings, conferences, etc. this amplification often comes from social time, coffee breaks, etc. that are too often ignored in online environments. Indeed, I even had a conversation with an attendee of one of my sessions on how we could capture just some of the same energy into online learning environments. Now, as someone with an online learning background, I argued that such energy can be captured online. However, it is difficult and time needs to be given to the design and intended outcomes (just as the hours that had gone into the in-person event).

Since that trip to India, I watched the documentary “The Remarkable Life of Ibelin“. I will start with a warning that the documentary is a tear-jerker and the rest of this blog post will be spoiler filled…

The documentary starts with the concerns of parents whose son has died aged 25. He has suffered from a condition that restricted his ability to perform activities that most us would consider “everyday”. His parents are particularly concerned that he does not have a group of friends (from school or elsewhere) during this time and that he, in their eyes, withdrew from life by playing World of Warcraft around 12 hours a day. However, they soon realize that many other players considered him their friend. What is remarkable on the topic of connection, is the impact this man had on the lives of others via only text chat and activities in the game world. This reminded me that lasting and impactful relationships are certainly not restricted to in-person activities and that we should not assume everyone has a preference for one medium over an other. As a side note, the bespoke kit that allowed him to do this, even as his muscular condition worsened, deserves a lot of credit as an example of assistive technology.

Then, in the last few days, I have finally met a colleague (from another organization) in-person after over a year of working together. They might disagree, but I would say we already had a good working relationship, had met deadlines, knew each other a bit, connected not just with each other but with others, etc. So, why then do I still tend to say I have “met” someone when I have met them in-person rather than “talked” if it is someone I have met virtually (email, Zoom, Teams, etc.). Perhaps I am an old-fashioned and my language here would not be what others would consider using. In this regard, I am reminded of a documentary I saw about Twitch and how some of the participants described the platform as equivalent to having those same friends in a living room with them.

Another reason I was slow to post about India was that I was not entirely sure on the conclusion. Indeed, I am not sure if there’s really a conclusion to this extended post either. Perhaps one take-away is that in-person activity can lead to a rapid acceleration of connection due to heightened emotion, also impacting on memory through sensory stimulation. However, long last relationships can be built digitally and should be maintained via those routes. Risks of non-engagement or lack of connection exist in all situations (in-person, hybrid and remote) meaning a remaining importance for human skills of facilitating, event design, etc. in our increasingly AI-powered social and workplace settings.

Skipping the Learning Technologies show (again)

Not all that long ago, a year without attending the Learning Technologies show would have seemed unfeasible. The exhibition (and occasionally the conference) was a key part of my annual networking, current awareness and personal development.

Instead I am now nearing a decade without attending – having attended the main exhibition in 2016 and the Summer Forum conference in 2017.

Covid has a played a role here in my low attendance of in-person events, but there has also been a shift in the focus of my roles to broader topics than learning (technology) as well as a move to webinars, podcasts (more on that coming in a future post), LinkedIn Learning, and other sources for personal development.

I post this as the end of day one of the conference/exhibition closes – predictably, from a quick look on LinkedIn, all the talk is about AI. That said, following events via LinkedIn is certainly not as good an experience as Twitter/TweetDeck used to be.

For those who are attending in April 2025: I hope you find it useful, and I will certainly try and be there in 2026 for my 10th anniversary of last time.

Reflections after being a visitor to UN HQ (New York) event

Prior to my recent visit to the UN Headquarters in New York I was not really sure what to expect. This was, in part, as it was difficult to get information online (Google seems to default to information on tourist/information tours rather than visiting for events). Therefore, I thought I would capture here:

some tips for anyone attending such events for the first time (akin to a first time visitor guide)
some reflections on this experience, including reflection on the UN, how to run events more generally, etc.

I should say these are from a position of ignorance – I do not have a qualification in international relations (or related discipline) so (as mentioned in the last post) these are the feelings of an “outsider” coming in. It is also fair to say that many organisations and events are confusing when you first attend and by day two many issues are resolved, this is true enough for a lot of the below but I thought there was some value in capturing this before I forget my time there.

The event I attended did have an “information note” of 17 pages. I will try and avoid repeating what was in that although I did find that too long, repetitive in places and (alas) inclusive of information that is not really needed anymore (e.g. information on local currency is Googleable – far better to focus on what is really needed and unique to the event/venue).

Things to know before you go

1: Passes/security

As you would likely expect, you need a pass to get through security. There are then some internal security areas you can and can not access based on your pass (for example you can get from the gift shop areas to the conference rooms but not beyond into the secretariat office space).

Temporary day passes for event: I was offered a one-day pass as I was presenting. It is worth knowing these seem to be deployed by UN staff literally handing them out by the guest entrance at the time they tell you to be there. How this works in bad weather I have no idea but when I was there you could see people handing out passes by the gate most mornings.

Longer term passes: as travel was an issue for me I wanted to register for the bigger event, rather than just go to present and then leave. This required registration online and there were multiple options – it was not clear to me which option was the correct one so you need to hope someone in your organisation is okay with UN-lingo and can guide you (kudos also to my side event’s UNITAR contact for helping with questions).

Once you are registered you have to attend the UN pass office, this is advertised as being open from 9:00-16:00 (Mon-Friday) and is roughly across the street from the entrance (although not with great signage and in one of the more rundown entrances, not a swanky building that many UN offices appear to be from the outside). When I arrived at 08:45ish, there was already a line being dealt with. Therefore, go as soon as you can, some people even mentioned they got their passes on the Sunday, I can not confirm if this is possible but it would 100% make sense for them to open on a Sunday before a big event. When I left at 09:30ish the line was out the door and down the street, none of those people outside will have made the opening session that started at 10:00. The line is slow moving but there is free Wi-Fi within the pass office. It is relatively painless to get the pass – you show your registration confirmation and passport. Note you get a photo taken there (I think you had to upload a photo in advance but this is not used for the pass) that is printed onto the pass (although the webcam approach to taking pictures was not great, I was too tall and had to duck whilst I saw other people who were too short for the setup).

Entrance security: Security guards at the gate do check you against your photo so if you are one of those people who changes hair, glasses, beard, etc a lot your photo might become out-of-date. I kept forgetting to take my sunglasses off much to the annoyance of the security guards. Unfortunately the entrance security does not differentiate between groups coming on tours and those attending events, therefore, I got stuck behind a large group of teenagers on one day which slowed passing through the airport-style scanners. Basically you do not want to be in a rush and should allocate plenty of time.

Pass returns: this was an odd experience – passes have an expiry date printed on the front (the Friday of the week for me) and instructions on the back insisting passes are returned. However, when I tried to return the pass on the Thursday, when I no longer needed it, I was told to keep it for any future events. This seems bad on multiple levels – the instructions on the card are wrong, the plastic cards are seemingly not recycled and presumably there is a level of security risk too. I presume the idea is that you can bring an old card for future renewals if you go again?

2: The UN as an organisation

The side events and different things going on during the week seemed very siloed, asking questions of UN staff seemed to reinforce this. Whilst those of us on the outside might think of the “UN” it is clear those more ‘in the know’ will see a series of entities. This is not unique to the UN, of course, I have worked for multiple organisations who have been going through their “one company x” phase of trying to bring units together, the UN no doubt has similar conversations internally.

One solution to the challenges put forward by a number of people during the session on the SDG related to water was that a “special envoy” was needed. I feel inclined to agree with the limited number of countries that said the UN should really already have enough powers to move the agenda forward without adding more layers/roles.

There was also a hint of cult of personality with a lot of António Guterres on videos on screens in hallways, photos around the place and references to him in talks. I found this odd for an organisation about humanity’s collective history and power.

3: The UN hierarchy

Few of the more senior UN, World Bank and other speakers stayed after sessions to discuss or network (in contrast to the external organisations who presented in the Learning, Teaching and Practice [LTP] event*). Meanwhile a lot of the work, such as laptop management and moving slides, was delegated to interns. Talking to a few interns it does not sound like it is the best place to work and in this regard the UN seems to take some bad practice from being based in the USA and their approach to workplace relations.

* Kudos to the diplomat from Switzerland who presented to the LTP side event (and did not just attend the main event as others seemed to).

I personally have a real problem with the approach of people being called “his/her excellency” and “distinguished representative”. I appreciate these are senior diplomats, heads of UN agencies, etc but it just reinforces elitism and self-importance. I would personally get rid of “right honourable” in UK politics too, as well as the honours system, because it all just feels like nonsense to me (do career diplomats/politicians deserve such praise?). On a very practical basis, with so many countries and many speakers in some sessions, you would save time by simply saying “country x next” rather than an elongated version (see also companies that insist on outros and intros on videos – time adds up folks).

Chairs of the main sessions also seemed to leave at the halfway point, I guess this is standard behaviour but it seems rude (to me) if everyone else stays for the duration. I appreciate this is “the day job” for UN staff and, therefore, not special but it is a useful reminder to us all that the mundane is often not so for everyone in the room. No doubt there will have been other people there, like me, where this might be a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

3: Ear pieces

This might sound stupid (maybe the whole blog post does? let me know in the comments) but I had always presumed the UN ear pieces (that you will likely have seen on TV) were for translation.

In reality, you also need them for the English speakers (the vast majority) as the sound system in the room is very quiet (I guess so you can hear the ear piece over the in-room audio). Unfortunately, not all the chairs in galleries seemed to come with an ear piece and they also had a tendency to get tangled up with the chairs and other ear pieces.

Ear piece

4: Expect dry

I am sure it is recommended, due to the diplomatic nature, but be warned – the vast majority of speakers and presentations are very very drily delivered. Even senior UN people seemed to mumble into microphones and most speakers read from scripts. Again, I suspect this is a failure of the system (rather than individuals) as statements are published – nonetheless there are ways to be better via presentation skills, storytelling, etc. The pre-prepared nature contributed to a lot of repetition between country speakers. There was also a lot of repetition when some people presented at a side event (report launch) and then a wider event on the same topic. Kudos to Tajikistan who seemed to break the mould and specifically said they were going off script to avoid being repetitive in one session.

The main sessions had different types of speakers – panellists, discussants and then the representatives from countries. The country speakers got 3 minutes each – when people overran their mics were cut, leading to odd giggles among some gallery attendees, you get your laughs where you can I guess.

5: UN as a conference venue

Some things about the UN experience were great; the Wi-Fi seemed very fast, rooms are setup with audio facilities (for translation but also for live coverage on UN TV and amplification in the room), everywhere was very clean, plenty of toilets and water fountains…

…less good was that screens in the bigger rooms basically are not viewable from the galleries, meaning, when slides were used they were pointless. This might be why slides were not used much in the bigger sessions. Ultimately a few additional screens in the galleries would have been great given download links and other resources were shared via PPT.

It was also very difficult to catch people’s names and organisations – this was okay when the electronic nameplates were used to show the name of the speaker (I even got one) but reinforced for me one value of Zoom – that you can see peoples names! (Yes the website had speaker details but not always easy to check on that).

The smaller conference rooms (I presented to about 50 people in a room for 120ish) were fine but ultimately a basement conference room is a basement conference room. I didn’t really enjoy having to sit to present but the setup of having the slides in front of you, rather than behind as normal, was quite nice as a presenter (if difficult when attending sessions in terms of knowing where to look). If you are reading this before presenting at such a session – keep your content high on your slides : the rooms are not setup for most chairs to see the bottom of slides once projected.

The space is not great for networking, the conference rooms have some seating outside but otherwise it is really just a couple of different coffee/food units. One of these is very badly placed as it creates a lot of ‘coffee machine noise’ every time a conference room door is opened (at least in conference rooms 5 and 6 where I spent a lot of time). The food was actually quite good and not too expensive (New York in general seemingly being very expensive) but I suspect most people disappeared off for lunch elsewhere (the high level event folks certainly disappeared off while side event people, like me, seemed to stick around in the limited time between sessions).

Final point, a lot of event management seems to be left to the security guards stationed on lifts, room doors, etc. I suspect there could probably be benefits from a few less international relations graduates and a few more event management people on staff.

6: A way forward?

Ultimately, the UN HQ is just a building.

Yes, it is a building with iconic architecture and history but I perhaps had too idealistic a view before attending.

I am perhaps reading too much into things but a few statements during the week hinted at a realisation of the problems in the UN system and the interactions with NGOs and other stakeholders including : “drop the egos and collaborate for real” and a need to “come out of egos and logos”. Not to mention countries with political problems using their 3 minutes to simply complain about each other (which of course predates the UN and goes back to League of Nations problems).

President Trump and others have threatened UN funding. Having attended for a week, you could certainly see room for improvement, alas, I guess voting through changes is unlikely to ever happen. At the same time there were hints of a lack of funding (or bad spending of money there is) with worn furniture, the screen issues, etc. Activities could certainly be reviewed, for example, is calling on banning mobile phones in schools a good use of resources?

Submitting a proposal

I am not sure how much of this experience is universal to other events but for the side event I spoke at (2023 SDGs Learning, Training and Practice), at least, the process was time consuming with a lot of tight deadlines implemented from the UN host side. Was the effort worth it? Questionable.

Steps included:

Submitting a proposal
Then being grouped with other organisations in a thematic session
Resubmitting a joint proposal with the others in the thematic session
Preparing slides and summary to summit
Presenting
Submitting final slides and a summary.

We found out at the event that we were 1 of 10 selected from 130 submissions.

Prior to the event it would have been helpful to see examples of submissions, to have support with being (force) grouped into co-presenting with organisations you had not met before, etc.

During the event it was a shame the #SDGlearning hashtag did not seem to get much use but it could have been promoted more. Another reminder for my own practice and the need to group/promote our activities better on LinkedIn as we know that helps drive an increase in our audience.

Summary

An eye-opening experience, whilst disappointing on some levels also one where I met a lot of interesting people.

“Show me the money”: Some personal reflections on the July 2023 UN High Level Political Forum

I recently spent a few days in New York City to attend the latest United Nations (UN) High Level Political Forum (HLPF). This event was focused on a subset of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and how the world is progressing toward achieving these goals (spoiler alert: not at all or not fast enough).

This was my first trip to New York since 1996. Some things were the same as then – Tom Cruise was still on Times Square billboards, in 1996 it was for Jerry Maguire, in 2023 it was Cruise driving off a cliff edge for the latest Mission Impossible. Perhaps the most long-lasting cultural legacy of Jerry Maguire has proven to be the “Show me the money” (NSFW) scene. In 2023, the UN sessions sounded similar, with near desperate calls for funding to fix the world’s problems before we all, metaphorically for some and literally for others, fall off the cliff. So, is achieving the SDGs, in fact, Mission Impossible?

The Outsider(s)

Based on my level of access, I basically spent the morning of the four days I attended watching from the gallery as the HLPF discussed topics. Day one was in the famous General Assembly room, the other days in a smaller conference room:

I will do a separate post on my reflections on the UN experience, and I will instead attempt in this post to just summarise some of the more interesting points from the sessions.

The three afternoons, for me, were attending the “Learning, Teaching and Practice” side event – which I spoke at on one day – plus an additional lunchtime event which took place to launch a new report. Again, I’ll do a separate post of the experience of submitting, resubmitting, and presenting a proposal to this event but will include some of the more interesting content and takeaways in this post.

Whilst this is my attempt at a write-up, daily write-ups were handed out and are available online from IISD (International Institute for Sustainable Development). These are less full of Tom Cruise related wordplay, than this post, and are actually very comprehensive.

Oblivion

As a Brit, especially as a child of the 1980s, there was only thing I could think of walking away from the event:

Indeed, the HLPF event left me largely dispirited and fearing that we may, finally, be facing oblivion as a species. Virtually every session stressed that the SDGs are way off target and there was limited confidence of achieving them without huge effort – the introductory session suggesting only 12% of targets are on track.

Since attending the event, I have watched the aforementioned Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning film and the plot, as has been heavily advertised, is that Tom and the gang faceoff against a deadly Artificial Intelligence. What is less well advertised (spoiler ahead) is that the American government (and others) are trying to control this AI in anticipation for, what the film outlines as, a third world war to control our dwindling world resources. Whilst this feels farfetched in some ways, we also have to consider that even if the AI threat is exaggerated the potential for wars over water, oil and other resources are all too real.

The start of the “SDGs Learning, Training and Practice” side event (the event I presented at) suggested that “shocks” such as Covid, war(s) and natural disaster have been negatively impacting the SDG agenda. In reality, given the event was focused on post-covid solutions, we surely face huge challenges given the post-Covid “new normal” is a normalisation of increasingly extreme weather and political challenges. Indeed, the eve of the event had seen horrendous flooding nearby in New York state and extreme temperature warnings in the southern USA, as well as much of the rest of the Northern Hemisphere.

Risky business

Many sessions called for something like we “can’t keep doing same things we have always been doing”. However, there seem to be no easy answers and even if the money/finance models that many sessions were calling for existed there is, of course, human nature to contend with from a corruption and waste perspective. Any investment, be it from an NGO, government, private sector or elsewhere will come with considerable risk unless based on global good practice.

Mavericks

Success stories and concrete ways forward were relatively few and far between, but there are clearly people out there managing to achieve the seemingly unachievable, some of the more interesting examples I made note of:

The SDG Atlas (https://datatopics.worldbank.org/sdgatlas) was one of the few tables with resources that could pass as “conference stalls”. It looks like an interesting site with access to SDG related data for transparency and comparison.
Whilst emission targets and other SDG challenges led to advocacy for renewable energy through out the week a number of speeches through the week still made the counter case and asked the world not to throw out gas and to include nuclear as options. Indeed Senegal, expressed a need to use its oil to fund improvements to the poverty situation.
If looking for mavericks the most impressive speech of the week came from Edward Ndopu, (SDG Advocate, youth representative) who stressed the need for diversity, inclusion of those with disabilities and more in our shared futures. You can see a transcript here.
Work being done on water access (outlined in this session, which I learned quite a lot from given I am not an expert in this area) and the point made that it needs to go beyond just water – that it makes sense to combine water projects with electricity access projects, etc. This was a good example of where the siloed approach of agencies, NGOs, etc needs to be challenged and many talks called for big picture “whole government” thinking. At the same time there were a number of sessions stressing real success is when local people and governments are empowered as they know their situation best. Overall, getting the balance correct will likely depend on existing government models and the balance between local/centralised. A Swiss diplomat, for example, making the case that the Swiss canton system is local-first and therefore, potentially, in a better position than some countries that over centralised power.
Fundação Antonio Meneghetti (a school in Brazil) outlined their education model which, whilst not too revolutionary in some ways, at least suggested that young people can be engaged with global issues and be better positioned to deal with world challenges (as well as helping tackle limitations from class/social status).
I personally liked a presentation from International Movement ATD Fourth World, this session made me think about the language we use. One key point was to consider people as “currently experiencing poverty” rather than calling them “poor” and “temporarily homeless” rather than “homeless”. The point being that these conditions can, and should, change and we should not classify people by them. You suspect this will become increasingly important as more of the world face flooding, fires and other disasters.
There was minimal mention of standards to ensure quality, but one or two people thankfully did mention them, otherwise you fear the calls for cash will lead to a lot of waste and probably dumping of poor solutions on the countries needing the most help.
There were some mentions of examples of good work being done, for example Denmark working in partnership with South Africa and India bilaterally on water projects. Similarly South Korea was one of relatively few countries to proactively offer support and data to others during the general HLPF sessions.
Morocco mentioned desalination as key to their water strategy given climate change, I remember this being the big hope in the 90s. This article suggests it is technology that is finally being used more and more.
The IFMA Foundation (who I shared a session with) did a really good presentation stressing the impact of building on lives and climate and the need for good facilitates management to help ensure the SDGs are met, including through their membership, education programmes, etc. A good example where an NGO or professional association have a clear link, via their profession, to SDGs and the common good.
The UN itself was called out for doing enough in a couple of sessions – specifically that peacekeepers do not use renewable energy when deployed and the UN HQ campus lacks solar panels and other tech.
Finland and others highlighted that investment in energy had been accelerated, in their case due to a decline in access to Russian resources but ultimately to a good result.
Sweden, interestingly, using Gothenburg as an example to convert a big city into a greener version with lessons to be learned for others (that would seem to be covered here). Nusantara (the planned new capital of Indonesia) was also mentioned as a city being built to be sustainable.
Some of the delegations handed over their slots to other parties – one advocated for https://www.climateview.global/ as a tool that is useful to tackle funding and capacity challenges.
https://www.resolve.ngo/healthgrid_sierra_leone.htm– Electrifying healthcare facilities in Sierra Leone, sounded like a really good project to combine water, electricity and healthcare services (I also liked another talk that said to focus on “services” not “access”).
The hope/potential for global south to develop through local supply chains was mentioned a few times, however, this sounded more aspirational than in place. What was more optimistic was that the tech is largely in place, the challenge is more the delivery due to financing and other resources. This included better deployment of open source solutions. Therefore, plenty of opportunity for learning and capacity building professionals!

After “I Disappear”ed

After leaving the event I did have chance to join “VNR Lab on Multi-Stakeholder Partnerships and Engagement (HLPF 2023 Special Event)” online remotely. This was a slightly odd experience having presented at HLPF just the week before. For this event (https://media.un.org/en/asset/k1v/k1v0qmae5q) discussions were held around how countries are engaging stakeholders in Voluntary National Reviews, reviews that may be presented at HLPF by diplomats but with lots of people working on them in advance. As with a number of the other events, there was a panel, “lead discussants” and contribution from the room.

For engaging stakeholders tips were shared, including from Portugal. Portugal sought to include all of government and all of society in their approach to the SDGs and VNR. It was said that this was leading to a national picture for sustainable development in Portugal with wide involvement and shared ownership.

A technical committee, with thematic structures [subcommittees?], is the approach being followed by the Maldives. The Maldives highlighted a few things still needed, including funding in general and capacity building around data management. A speaker from Tanzania, meanwhile, insisted for a need to focus on who the VNR is actually for and that if the SDGs are to actually ensure no one is left behind. It was a challenging presentation asking if we, globally, are achieving this with our policies and asking if people in villages, people with disabilities, etc. are being involved fully in the processes.

A speaker, with a remit of how the private sector can be involved, highlighted the major issue that the private sector have not been included in VNRs enough. From their perspective (Fiji) they highlighted the need for small and medium sized companies, in particular, to be involved via funding to support growth and success.

Interestingly, given Portugal were invited as an example, there was a point made in the Q&A from the Portuguese private sector, that they were not involved enough. All in all, a sign that it is problem for getting the right people involved, in making people engaged with the SDGs via the VNRs and still a lack of financing.

Show us the money perhaps.