Why panels are rarely your best option

With Climate Week upon us, you might expect me to post about my passion for sustainability, its intersections with social impact, and the power of cross-sector collaboration. But today, I want to focus on the how of transformational change—and believe it or not, that means I have a bone to pick with panels.

Climate Week in New York City has long been a gathering place for global leaders, activists, and corporate executives to discuss the planet’s future. This year, it’s expected to attract 100,000 attendees and feature over 900 events on topics ranging from financial opportunities to carbon markets and new technologies. Yet, this year, critics are asking: why burn through all that carbon to fly to New York, only to sit through a few panels and return home with little to show for it?

The irony of expending so much energy on conversations about reducing emissions is becoming more apparent to many participants. While side conversations can certainly advance efforts, the event is largely built around panels. Magali Anderson, Chief Sustainability Officer at Anglo American, shared in a LinkedIn post that she sat on 22 panels at a previous Climate Week and decided she needed a break—saying the results didn’t justify the carbon footprint.

Panels, as the Financial Times article "The Problem with Panels" points out, often fail due to poorly managed chairs and disengaged participants. Though they can offer value through diverse speakers and networking opportunities, they frequently fall short due to ill-conceived lineups and lack of meaningful interaction. Panels tend to be one-sided, with a small group of speakers dominating while the audience, often full of experts and innovators, remains passive. This format misses the opportunity for dynamic exchanges that could foster deeper understanding and more actionable outcomes.

Now, consider that dynamic in the context of Climate Week, where 100,000 participants are attending. What if instead of being passive spectators, those attendees were actively engaged? Rather than relying on chance encounters to make valuable connections, what if we intentionally designed more interactive sessions?

Here are a few alternatives to panels that could drive more impact, starting with what you want to accomplish:

1. When you want experts to learn from each other, shift from Panels to Salons: Wayan Vota has successfully used this format for years, and I’d argue that the Principles for Digital Development emerged, in part, from the Technology Salons he leads globally. In this format, panelists become Lead Discussants, but the entire room is encouraged to contribute. By curating the attendee list and focusing on key questions, the session becomes a collaborative exploration, allowing for deeper conversations afterward and fostering meaningful collaboration.

2. Multi-Stakeholder Initiative Co-Creation: Bring together key decision-makers to share objectives and develop joint strategies, leveraging each other's resources. To ensure broad participation, create structures where stakeholders can contribute to decision-making throughout the process. While this requires more upfront effort, the results can be transformative, allowing every attendee to act as a change agent.

3. Location-Specific Site Visits

   Instead of just talking in a room, bring participants to a site where the location itself is part of the solution. Demonstrate technologies or strategies in action, allowing attendees to understand real-world applications. Follow up with a design session where participants can discuss how the showcased solutions might address challenges in their own contexts.

4. When you have built something with a coalition of partners, and you want more people to join in

   Commitment Announcement Events: These are often part of events like Climate Week and involve months of preparation. However, simpler versions could involve predefined commitments and work planning sessions where participants outline how they’ll achieve specific goals. These sessions should end with concrete actions that attendees can commit to, driving momentum beyond the event.

5. Convene people interested in my message, and provide an opportunity for us to talk about further collaboration

   Host a Meet and Greet: Many attendees come to panels hoping to network with speakers or others in the community. Instead of passive listening, create spaces for smaller group discussions where participants can connect with the people they need to speak with, facilitating deeper collaboration.

6. Promote yourself, your message, or your recent success

   Ok this is often the real reason people serve on panels. A panel will get you 30-200 people in a room listening to you. But as panels are mostly one-sided, a well placed podcast interview with a substantial following will also do that, and not be time bound (or require all that travel). Why not think beyond the launch. What are you wanting to get people to do with the message you want to get out there, and how can you move one step forward by planning that event instead? There is a good possibility that one of the options above could help move that forward.

   
   

These kinds of activities already take place during Climate Week, but panels still dominate the agenda. While panels can be powerful, they often miss opportunities for greater action.

So, here’s my call to action: next time you’re planning an event and someone suggests a panel, challenge them to consider what they could achieve by engaging everyone in the room. You might find there’s a better way forward.