In Response: COVID-19

Allies in Gender Equality: Opportunities for Corporate Champions

Twenty-five years ago in Beijing, China the UN Fourth World Conference on Women set forth a powerful global agenda to achieve women’s equality. While much progress has been made, millions of women and girls around the world still face discrimination, violence, and unequal access to resources. The gender gap in the economic sphere is particularly striking. The World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2020 reveals stubbornly low levels of women in managerial or leadership positions, and women’s wage stagnation, low formal labor force participation, and lower incomes. This conversation will highlight ways that men can serve as visible, vocal champions for women’s advancement in the workforce, with a focus on concrete actions that major global companies can take to achieve gender equality.

Cracking the Code of Online Learning

Tuesday, November 17 | 10AM EDT
A 20/20 Talk with Dr. Kristin Palmer

In the rapid transition to living in a virtual world due to COVID, there have been a wide range of reactions and questions around what is effective practice. In this talk, Dr. Kristin Palmer will review the essential research framework behind effective online education. She will illustrate this framework in action by walking through the African Scholarship Cohort (ASC) with Distance Education of Africa (DeAfrica). In the ASC program, over 20,000 scholarships have been provided with learners from every country in Africa over the past five years. Attendees will take away from this talk an understanding of how to design effective online courses with practical advice for building a sense of belonging and encouraging engagement.

Allies in Gender Equality

Twenty-five years ago in Beijing, China the UN Fourth World Conference on Women set forth a powerful global agenda to achieve women’s equality. While much progress has been made, millions of women and girls around the world still face discrimination, violence, and unequal access to resources. One major obstacle to women’s empowerment is societal norms that dictate who has power and privilege. It is therefore critical to enlist men and boys in changing these norms and acting as visible allies for gender equality. This discussion will explore creative effective ways to engage men and boys in understanding how gender equality is good for society as a whole and the role they can play in promoting equal rights and opportunities for women and girls.

Emerging Opportunities for Young African Leaders

COVID-19 is having a devastating effect on economies and employment around the world, including across the African continent. The world’s 1.2 billion young people have been particularly hard hit, with a sharp decline in job prospects and risks to their socioeconomic well-being. At the same time, young African business and social entrepreneurs are a tremendous asset for catalyzing economic growth, driving poverty eradication, and ensuring job creation. If provided with support, access, and opportunities to launch and grow their ventures, African youth can play a powerful role in driving positive change as we navigate this pandemic and meet important societal needs for the future. During this conversation, participating experts will highlight examples of how young people are changing the face of entrepreneurship in Africa and discuss ways to unlock their potential.

ONE's Secret Sauce to Campaigning

Tuesday, August 4 | 10AM EDT
A 20/20 Talk with Gordon Wong

For 16 years the ONE Campaign has led innovative and highly successful global campaigns to eradicate poverty and preventable disease. But what are the factors that led to these wins? ONE’s Regional Organizing Manager Gordon Wong will share the kind-of, sort-of “secret sauce” to ONE’s global advocacy work and how you can apply them to your work.

Data for Action and Social Impact

Around the world, change makers and communities are increasingly harnessing the power of data to advance social and economic development priorities. This Campfire Conversation will help demystify this “data revolution” by providing inspirational examples of how data can be used for the public good. Speakers will give their first-hand insights on the skills, tools, and mindsets needed to gather and leverage data for policymaking and action, and offer strategies for how to build a culture of data-driven decision making.

Removing Barriers and Ensuring Hope for People with Disabilities

Tuesday, June 23 | 11AM EDT
A 20/20 Talk With Grace Jerry

This 20/20 Talk features Presidential Precinct Alumna Grace Jerry - a music artist, disability rights advocate, and peace promoter in Nigeria. Since coming to the Precinct in 2015, Grace has remained consistent in her passion to mainstream disability in development issues. She will share best practices for leaders working to promote inclusive responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, along with examples of effective advocacy for people with disabilities. Grace will also share how she has used music as a tool to share key messages in her community and bring hope to our world when we need it most.

Sustainability and Growth Strategies for Entrepreneurs

Thursday, May 21 | 9AM EDT
A 20/20 Talk With Aziz Ullah

This 20/20 talk will focus on sharing key concepts, insights, frameworks, and strategies to help entrepreneurs sustain and grow their startups. In today's competitive and advanced technology world, entrepreneurs already face abundant challenges in sustaining and growing their startups. The recent global COVID-19 pandemic has changed the global market and is badly impacting small businesses and startups across the globe, adding even more challenges. In this new context, startups and entrepreneurs often need to revisit their business model, redesign their organization, restructure their teamwork, diversify revenue streams, and focus on efficiency and productivity to sustain and grow in the local and global market.

Coping With Crisis

Exploring the Impact of COVID-19 on the Unseen and Marginalized in Our Communities

Tuesday, April 28 | 11AM EDT

As we all respond to the pandemic through our work and community engagement, how can we ensure that the poor and vulnerable are not overlooked? What can COVID-19 teach us about our community’s strengths and weaknesses, and how can we use this unprecedented time to highlight and address longstanding injustices?

Protecting & Promoting Your Brand

Wednesday, April 8 | 10AM EDT
A 20/20 Talk With Brett Bruen
President, Global Situation Room
Former Director of Global Engagement at the White House

Risk has gone regular. The speed, scale, and sophistication of the reputational threats faced by businesses today is challenging traditional crisis tools and techniques. Brett Bruen shares some of the latest skills and strategies companies need to adopt in order to survive and thrive. From building crisis communications infrastructure and countermeasures to identifying and tracking emerging vulnerabilities, he discusses how companies can be better prepared for the constant, complex challenges we are seeing in 2020.