From Leo Burnett to NYSE: Career path from advertising internship through major holding companies, Facebook, NBC Universal, X, to leading media partnerships and content at the New York Stock Exchange 💼  NYSE Beyond Finance: The 233-year-old institution represents more than capital - it's innovation, community, and storytelling, riding every technology wave from telegraph to AI 📈  Building Media Partnerships: Serves listed companies, VCs, and PE firms by partnering with every media platform to create maximum options and scale for customers 🤝  Listen First, Speak Second: Rashad Tabaka Walla's advice - "You don't need to be the loudest person in the room. You need to be the most informed" 🎧  Hard Conversations Matter: Sheryl Sandberg taught the importance of seeking feedback from all perspectives across the company and regularly having difficult conversations to challenge your thinking and change your perspective 💬

Marketing's Most Important Moment: ANA Masters finds itself at the most critical time for the industry - a transformative moment where nobody has mastered new technology yet, making it exciting for marketers learning daily 🎯 Industry Leaders Share Insights: Marketing experts and brand leaders gathered to discuss how marketing delivers measurable results and see where it's heading, covering AI redefining talent to CTV full-funnel impact plus so much more 🎤 Experiential Connection Strategy: Sports, entertainment, and experiential events capture captivated audiences and build authentic connections with fans beyond traditional advertising 🏟️ Solutions Over Problems: Industry shift is noticeable - people talking about solutions now instead of just identifying challenges, showing proactive approach to marketing's evolution 💡 Reinvigorated Industry Energy: Feeling excited despite uncertainty, with new technology creating innovation opportunities that nobody's figured out yet ⚡

Ruth Mortimer started her career digging up history as an archeologist in the Middle East, loved storytelling while piecing together the past, retrained as a journalist because I didn't want tent life with bad hair and zero makeup 🏺 Education Meets Entertainment: Attracted to Advertising Week's marriage of education and entertainment - excited people pay her to create the stories in her head and make them real across all formats 🎭 Sports Programming Pioneer: Launched Playmaker Awards as sports open to more brands, including beauty, women's sports becoming huge, creating a moment where audience, commerce, and field play come together 🏆 Global Cross-Pollination Strategy: Events in Mexico City, Tokyo, and Europe in early 2026 focused on cross-pollinating learning territory to territory to supercharge knowledge across continents 🌍 Leadership Philosophy: "Be brilliant at something, not everything" - lean into what you're brilliant at and forget what you're not good at (like working the photocopier) 💡

Jennifer Kattula started coding websites in the web 1.0 era but loved communication more - business school led to marketing at American Express, Microsoft search ads, then 6th person on Facebook's marketing team 💻 AI Early Adopter: One of the first to try ChatGPT and mid journey, serendipitously reconnected with a Microsoft colleague for a head of marketing role where AI expertise became crucial 🤖 Zero Click Revolution: Four out of five people use zero click search results for almost half their searches - AI interfaces becoming the primary way people get information in one personalized place 🔍 Conversational Commerce: Microsoft building conversational, personalized, agentic experiences - experimenting with ad formats, business tools, and brand agents for 2026 🚀 Hidden Talent: Can still do handstands, splits, and back bends while binging podcasts like "Not Another CEO Podcast" about billion-dollar exits 🤸

Dana McGraw coached college basketball for 8 years before pivoting to data, starting in search engine optimization and moving through analytics at Yahoo Sports to now leading measurement science at Disney 🏀 Measurement Philosophy: Believes measurement isn't finite but fluid, with no single metric answering if you've driven value. It's the combination of all measures together creating the full picture of advertising outcomes 📊 Cross-Platform Reality Check: Debunking the misconception that cross-screen, cross-platform measurement is impossible. With audience graphs and identity resolution capabilities, it's absolutely achievable 🌐 Outcomes Over Reach: The big industry trend is shifting focus from reach to outcomes, with more collaboration between agencies, brands, and media companies all driven by creating value and customer-first experiences 🤝 Bold Leadership Advice: "You never lose when you lead with compassion and give people a bit of grace" when leading teams. Would tell her younger self to be bolder and more confident while making sure her voice is heard 💪

Megan Graham was obsessed with Nancy Drew as a kid and decided to become a reporter, worked her way from high school newspaper editor through college paper to eventually landing at WSJ after 4 years at Ad Age 📚 2012 Graduate Persistence: Graduated during a tough time for journalism jobs, applied to 75+ positions before Kokomo Tribune in Indiana hired her as a business reporter 📊 CMO Today Focus: Covers how companies break through noise and into the zeitgeist at WSJ - "companies just want people to be talking about them positively" - writing for CMOs who can't get enough AI content 🎯 Anti-Pitch Philosophy: Best stories don't come from pitches but from seeing something and noticing social media chatter - companies need to be more proactive before moments happen 💡 Cooking Content Creator: Still sends cooking pics to her mom for approval (even though she now cooks for her boyfriend) - recently made crispy rice with smoked salmon and ate all but two pieces 🍳

Greg Licciardi published book on achieving optimal marketing success using AI and beyond, teaching the framework at Fordham and Seton Hall universities for years - concept inspired by Wendy's targeted ads during the pandemic 📚 Wendy's Epiphany: Got hooked on fast food during pandemic and noticed Friday 11 am ads in social feed, realizing "this is the holy grail of marketing" - framework: right person, right message, right environment, right time, right outcome 🍟 AI + Human Element Advocate: Features Microsoft's Vera Hsu on the importance of AI enablement while maintaining human connection and emotional strategies - warns AI's speed can't replace authentic brand purpose 🤖 ANA Event Leader: Bringing top brands together in Orlando at Rosen Shingle Creek with Steven Van Zandt and the Disciples of Soul (E Street Band members) 🎸 Holiday Book Discount: Offering the ATM audience a special holiday discount on "the must-read modern-day marketing book" - content focused on helping audiences do their jobs better 🎁

Mike Laband is a self-described "dinosaur" for staying at the same company for 15 years, came from the SpotX team through mergers and acquisitions, starting in quality assurance and working his way to revenue 🦕 Curation Hot Topic Leader: At Advertising Week, focused on curation as an evolving tactic leveraged by both buy and sell sides, with Magnite positioned to enable more through their Clear Line tool set 🔥 Agentic Workflows Future: Discussing where agentic workflows will fit into the curation evolution and how buyers are increasingly leveraging supply-side tools at the cusp of continued growth 🤖 Golf Enthusiast: Pretty decent golfer on the side, uses it to check out from work, meet people, and travel to great places ⛳ Sit Back and Learn Philosophy: Career advice is to take time to read the trades and understand market shifts - remembers 2014 when mobile programmatic integration wasn't even forecastable, now the business is heavily programmatic 📚

Leadership Legacy: The main word that defines him as a New York Jet is "leadership" or "captain" - his nickname, which he holds "very, very dear to my heart," shows who you really are when things are tough 👔 Campbell's Chunky Connection: Most memorable ad is the Donovan McNabb and his mother Campbell's Chunky commercial, he partnered with Campbell's two years ago, where his parents came out to support and give back to the community 🥫 Sports Agency Surprise: Recently launched his sports agency, Legacy Trust Sports Group, surprising people who thought he'd go into coaching - explains being a player takes a lot of hours and hard work, so imagine what coaches go through 🏢 Teammate Characters: Compares Quincy Williams to Jack Nicholson's Joker (witty, charismatic, friendly comedy) and praises Joe Flacco as the old man that won't leave, always fighting for the job, always there to save the day 🃏 COVID Wire Binge: When he opted out during COVID, he watched all 6-7 seasons of The Wire - at least four or five episodes a day, which was his highlight of COVID 📺

🚨 BREAKING🚨 TiVo x Comscore Partnership: Major industry announcement as Comscore's Chief Commercial Officer reveals strategic partnership with TiVo to redefine the future state of video investment and cross-platform measurement Metadata Spine Investment: Comscore investing in TiVo's metadata infrastructure to unlock new addressability capabilities and hyper-local data needs for tech platforms and advertisers transacting at scale 📊 Measuring Up: Leading measurement transformation at Comscore (2.5+ years), focusing on cross-platform narrative, addressability, and hyper-local data needs for tech platforms and advertisers 🚀 Dentist to Ad Tech Journey: Originally thought he'd become a dentist, then did a marketing internship and fell in love with the industry, landing at an IPG agency before moving into ad tech during digital marketing's emergence 🦷 Seinfeld Superfan & Fast Mover: Was a huge Seinfeld fan who had to keep current with sound bites, and his career advice is simple - "Speak freely, move fast" 🎬

Axios Communications Reporter: Eleanor Hawkins the opposite path of most journalists - started in communications, then joined the Axios newsroom to cover the role she used to do, reporting from a place of authority as a former practitioner 📰 Jungle Gym Career Philosophy: Describes her career as a "jungle gym, not a ladder," bouncing from US Senate politics to defense policy to media, covering how comms, PR, and marketing impact business 🎢 Community Merger Leader: Part of merging Axios Communicators Pro with Mixing Board to combine premium content with thriving peer networks for corporate affairs, comms, and brand marketing leaders 🤝 Audience-First Advocate: Champions the shift toward an audience-first mentality and "cult building," emphasizing showing up authentically where audiences are rather than traditional broadcasting 👥 Sister Trip Coordinator: Last text was coordinating annual sister trip with her three sisters who live across the world - "let's get serious about Sister trip" as the oldest, herding the cats ✈️

MKG Chief Creative Officer Lauren Austin is a self-described creative person with no actual creative skills who found a path in creative thinking without creative making, leading brand experiences at an agency specializing in action over ads 🎨 Anti-Advertising Advocate: Argues nobody wants to be advertised to (not just Gen Z) because we're constantly inundated and surrounded by advertising - consumers want entertainment and exchange instead 📺 Brand Weirdness Champion: Biggest macro trend she's tracking is brands willing to get a little bit weirder rather than chasing specific aesthetic or tactical trends 🎭 Industry Conversation Changer: On a mission to change industry conversation by proving the power of brand experiences over traditional advertising channels that "people are literally paying to avoid" 📊 White Lotus Experience Creator: Produced HBO Max project that brought White Lotus to life for super fans, press, and influencers - stepping inside the resort without the murders 🪷

Advertising Week Global Expansion Leader: From employee #5 at Stilwell Partners to Chief Client Officer, Louise DiIulio expanded Advertising Week across five continents before 2022 Emerald X acquisition 🎭 Accidental Career Architect: Canceled her first interview claiming she was sick, planned to stay "about a year" for experience, but built a 13+ year career journey from knowing nothing about Advertising Week to planning its 21st edition 📅 CMO and Creator Experience Innovator: Created closed-door CMO Experience at secret high-end location and Creator Experience/Creator Lounge presented by Meta for creators who've been "flying under the radar" 🎯 Future Female Awards Co-Chair: Co-chairs free, accessible awards program recognizing women across the industry regardless of age or title, from CEOs to emerging talent 👩‍💼 AI Buzzword Reality Checker: Says while AI remains hottest Advertising Week topic with everyone claiming "I know the future," reality is "no one knows" - which she sees as "the beauty" of industry collaboration 🤖

Craigslist to Conde Nast Pioneer: J. Brooks started in 2004, answering a Craigslist ad for pop-up ads, learned to code, then helped Conde Nast build their early online advertising architecture 💻 Emotional Intelligence Innovator: Founded GlassView, partnering with Cogware to analyze how audiences neurologically respond to commercials for better ad targeting 🧠 Beyond Clicks and Conversions Advocate: Believes the industry lost sight of advertising's true purpose - increasing the connection between brand and consumer 🎯 AI Optimist and Human Connection Defender: Not worried about AI replacing jobs, sees it enhancing efficiency while human elements remain crucial for authentic connections 🤖 Hidden Musical Talent: Played piano for seven years through high school but dropped it for his career, now wants to return to music theory 🎹

"Long Dinner Table of Life" Philosophy: Uses this metaphor for career relationships - some people come for appetizers, others stay for all meals, focusing on who truly supports you when things get tough 🍽️ Grit and Resilience Advocate: Learned from mentor Moon at Ogilvy South Africa that when you can't go on, find grit within yourself to surround yourself with the right team 💪 Cultural Power Expert: Built M&C Saatchi's value proposition around cultural power - understanding geopolitical shifts, generational changes, and how people consume information 📊 Business Transformation Consultant: When clients ask for campaigns, she asks, "Are you sure?" and redirects them to focus on transforming their business instead 💡 Work-Life Balance Wisdom: Advises her younger self to give herself grace, recalling being so focused on not making mistakes that she wasn't learning ⚖️