Registration + Welcome Breakfast
2026-06-03 08:30 - 09:30 (America/New_York)

Welcome
2026-06-03 09:30 - 09:45

Opening Keynote: Culture as Currency (Featuring: Detavio Samuels, CEO, Offscript Worldwide)
2026-06-03 09:45 - 10:30
Overview: Culture is not a marketing strategy. It is the most powerful business asset of our time. As CEO of REVOLT, Detavio Samuels has put that belief into practice at one of media’s most culturally driven companies. In this opening keynote, he will challenge conventional thinking about media, content, and leadership, and lay out what the next generation of industry leaders must understand to stay not just competitive, but relevant.

Networking Coffee Break
2026-06-03 10:30 - 10:45

Panel Discussion - The Culture Shift: How Content, Community & Connectivity Are Changing Everything
2026-06-03 10:45 - 11:45
Overview: The rules of media, entertainment, technology, and sports are not just changing, they are being rewritten in real time by the communities that consume them, the creators who produce them, and the platforms that distribute them. In this fireside chat, industry leaders will explore how the convergence of content, community, and connectivity is dismantling traditional power structures and creating new ones, and what that means for the professionals, brands, and organizations trying to keep pace. This is not a conversation about trends. It is a conversation about transformation.
Audience Takeaways:

How community is emerging as a driving force in content distribution and audience building
The evolving relationship between connectivity, sports, and cultural storytelling
What the shift in traditional gatekeeping means for professionals navigating today’s media landscape

Break
2026-06-03 11:45 - 12:00, 2026-06-03 16:30 - 16:45

Breakout Session 1 - Your Voice, Your Culture: Building a Podcast that Moves People
2026-06-03 12:00 - 12:45
Overview: Podcasting is one of the most accessible entry points into media today but the shows that break through don’t just sound good, they stand for something. In this session, we’ll explore how to turn your voice into a cultural platform by leading with authenticity, building intentional formats, and thinking beyond just audio. Whether you’re starting from scratch or refining your idea, this session will challenge you to think bigger about what you’re building and why it matters.
Session Structure:

Why cultural perspective is your greatest competitive advantage
What it really takes to launch and sustain a podcast
Building formats, not just episodes
Thinking about audience, platform, and distribution from day one
Interactive: Define your show, your audience, and your first move
Open Q&A

Breakout Session 2 - AI Meets Culture: Who Controls the Narrative?
2026-06-03 12:00 - 12:45
Overview: Artificial intelligence is reshaping how stories are told, who gets to tell them, and whose cultures are being used to train the systems doing the telling. For communities that have long fought for representation in media, entertainment, technology, and sports, AI presents both a powerful opportunity and a sobering risk. The tools are more accessible than ever, but access alone does not guarantee equity. Who benefits when AI generates content rooted in Black culture? Who owns the narrative when an algorithm decides what stories get amplified and what voices get marginalized? And what responsibility do the creators, executives, and technologists in this room have in shaping what comes next?
What We’ll Explore:

How AI is changing who gets to create content, and who still gets left out
The bias embedded in AI systems and what it means for cultural representation in media and entertainment
What creators, executives, and industry professionals can do right now to ensure AI serves culture rather than exploits it

Networking Lunch
2026-06-03 12:45 - 13:45

Fireside Chat: Culture Doesn't Follow Trends – It Creates Them
2026-06-03 13:45 - 14:45
Overview: Every major shift in media, entertainment, technology, and sports can be traced back to a cultural moment that the industry didn’t see coming until it was already here. Hip hop didn’t follow a trend. Streaming didn’t follow a trend. Athlete empowerment didn’t follow a trend. Culture moved first. Business caught up. In this fireside chat, we sit down with a practitioner who has spent their career not chasing culture but living inside it and building from it. This is an honest, unscripted conversation about what it means to lead from culture, why the brands and organizations that get it right are the ones that listen before they speak, and what happens when you trust culture as a strategy rather than a response.
What We’ll Explore:

What it looks like to build something rooted in culture before the market validates it
Why the most powerful cultural moments are never manufactured and what that means for how we lead
How professionals across media, entertainment, technology, and sports can develop a sharper cultural instinct in their own work

Breakout Session 3 - Built To Climb: Claiming Your Voice, Power, and Path
2026-06-03 14:45 - 15:30
Overview: Success is not a straight climb—it’s an internal transformation. Leadership is built through resilience, self-trust, and intentional growth, not titles or permission.
Story Arc: The book traces a journey from personal loss and early adversity to breaking into male-dominated field operations, navigating career pivots, and ultimately rising into executive leadership. Each chapter blends real career moments with leadership principles, emphasizing that the climb is as much internal as it is professional.
Key Takeaways:

The Climb is Internal First: Growth begins with self-worth, not external validation
Lead Before You’re Ready: Leadership starts with behavior, not title
Alignment Over Comfort: The biggest growth comes from leaving what’s safe
Intuition is Intelligence: Trusting your internal compass is a leadership advantage
Transferable Power: Your skills travel across roles, industries, and challenges
Activated Leadership: True influence comes from humility, emotional intelligence, and presence
Purpose Fuels Performance: When aligned, results follow naturally

Bottom Line:
You don’t climb by waiting- you climb by deciding.

Breakout Session 4 - The Cultural Advantage: How to Lead Up Without Losing Your Seat
2026-06-03 14:45 - 15:30
Overview: You are sitting in a meeting, and you see it happening in real time. A decision is being made that you know is culturally tone-deaf. A campaign is being greenlit that will miss the mark. A moment is being misread by the people in the room with the most power. You know what they don’t. The question is, what do you do with that?
For mid-level professionals navigating largely homogeneous leadership structures in media, entertainment, technology, and sports, cultural intelligence is often the sharpest tool in the room. The problem is knowing how to use it without it being used against you. This session is an honest, unfiltered conversation about how to turn cultural fluency into leadership currency, how to speak up strategically, build influence authentically, and move up in organizations that may not yet fully understand the value of what you bring.
What We’ll Explore:

How to use cultural intelligence as a strategic leadership asset rather than a personal burden
Practical frameworks for managing up in environments where your cultural perspective is undervalued or misunderstood
How to build influence, credibility, and allies across an organization without losing your authentic voice
What the next generation of culturally intelligent leaders looks like, and how to position yourself there

Who This Session Is For: Mid-level professionals who are ready to move into senior leadership and want to use their cultural perspective as a competitive advantage rather than navigate around it.

Networking Break (Coffee Refresh)
2026-06-03 15:30 - 15:45

Panel Discussion - Beyond the Game: How Culture Is Reshaping Careers in Sports & Entertainment
2026-06-03 15:45 - 16:30
Overview: The sports and entertainment industries need the same skills yours does, storytelling, strategy, technology, marketing, content, and cultural fluency. The difference is the jersey. This session is for professionals who are curious about what a career pivot into sports and entertainment actually looks like, and what it takes to make the move. We’ll hear from leaders who have navigated that transition, explore the new career pathways emerging at the intersection of sports, culture, and media, and get honest about what the industry is really looking for right now.
What We’ll Explore:

What transferable skills travel best into sports and entertainment careers
The non-linear paths that are opening up at the intersection of culture, media, and athletic power
How to position yourself for opportunities in an industry being reshaped by culture

Who This Session Is For: Professionals at any level who are curious about pivoting into, or moving up within sports and entertainment.

Closing Session: Culture Next – What We Build Together
2026-06-03 16:45 - 17:30
Overview: We started today with a simple but powerful argument, that culture is not a byproduct of media, entertainment, technology, and sports. It is the force that drives all of them. Over the course of this day, we have explored what that means for the content we create, the technology we build, the careers we pursue, and the organizations we lead.
Now we close where we should have always been headed…with each other.
Because here is what every cultural movement, every industry disruption, and every career breakthrough in this room has in common: none of it happened alone. Behind every shift in culture is a community that believed in something before the rest of the world caught up. Behind every leader who made it to the next level is a network of people who opened doors, told the truth, and showed up.
In this closing session three voices from across our industries will share one thing; a moment, a lesson, a conviction, about why culture and community are not soft ideas but the hardest and most essential work any of us will ever do. No panels. No debate. Just honest reflection on what today meant and what we carry forward from here.
Format: Three speakers. One prompt. “Tell us one thing you learned or relearned about the power of culture and community that changed how you work or lead.”

Culture & Cocktails Networking Reception
2026-06-03 17:30 - 19:30
