Growing Concordia in a Digital Landscape

Concordia CEO and Co-Founder Matthew Swift speaks to Thanos Dimadis on elevating marginalized voices, shifting to a“digital agenda”, building strong partnerships, and how he made his organization amplify its impact.

Concordia was created primarily as an investment in the interconnectedness of our world. How has Concordia responded to the new reality that emerged during this pandemic, and how did Concordia's initiatives adapt to this new virtual world?

Right at the onset of the pandemic, our team pivoted quickly to work from home—my foremost priority was ensuring everyone could stay safe. We also rapidly shifted to a fully-digital agenda. We never imagined that we’d be contemplating a digital Annual Summit, but we were cognizant of what the circumstances were and knew that we needed to push forward and create spaces for the global community to come together to collaboratively tackle this crisis. Thanks to our partnership with SpotMe, we were indeed able to hold our first-ever digital Annual Summit, which ended up being our biggest and most impactful yet. And we were able to successfully digitize our other flagship initiatives—our Americas Summit and Africa Initiative, to name a few.

What’s been so remarkable to us is the sheer power of a digital agenda. Making sure all voices, especially marginalized ones, are included is at the core of our mission, and what we found was that going digital has vastly increased the accessibility of our platform. It’s also greatly expanded our reach and afforded so much flexibility among different time zones—we’ve had people tune in to our programming from all corners of the world. Going digital has allowed us to get really creative with how we communicate with and bring together our audiences in service of collaboration—tools such as live chats, breakout sessions, targeted polls, and surveys have allowed us to generate audience engagement in ways we never imagined we could.

What was the riskiest part of your decision to establish Concordia?

We operate on a membership model, which means that we have to have a strong offering. I needed to get buy-in from the world’s top companies and organizations. And getting up there in front of scores of Fortune 500 executives and world leaders who are pulled in so many directions—and successfully convincing them to commit to us amongst all the other competing priorities they have—is no easy feat. What was critical to me was showing people that Concordia wasn’t in competition with whatever else was on their plate. Rather, our radically inclusive, nonpartisan forum only serves to complement their other responsibilities and, ultimately, allows them to show up for the constituencies they serve in a much stronger and more earnest way.

And on nonpartisanship—the past decade has seen unprecedented levels of division and polarization. In such a polarized world, creating an organization that really puts nonpartisanship at the center of its mandate is definitely a challenge. I’m immensely proud of how much we’ve stayed true to that mandate, especially with how divisive so much of the rhetoric has been over the past year.

What did it take for you to start Concordia from scratch and make it as successful as it is today in ten years?

Going into this, Nick Logothetis, Co-Founder & Chairman of the Board of Concordia, and I knew that building out the necessary infrastructure for Concordia to thrive would take years. You can’t build organizations overnight, much less galvanize long-lasting social impact overnight. It takes patience, drive, and the ability to continually adapt and bounce back from setbacks. It’s a long and iterative process, and, even now, ten years down the road, we’re still building and growing and adapting and shifting gears when needed.

And I’ve said this many times before, but it really takes passion, and the ability to communicate that passion in a compelling way. I’ve had hundreds of conversations and have gotten in front of scores of CEOs, heads of state, folks from across the political spectrum—and people can tell when you’re not passionate about what you’re talking about. I had to pitch Concordia to people in a way that not only piqued their interest but moved and inspired them to be a part of our community, our family.

And the last thing I’ll say on this is that there are so many incredible organizations out there that act as conveners or platforms moving the needle on lasting impact—the World Economic Forum, TED, the Aspen Institute, to name a few. We were entering a crowded space, and we knew we had to go into the playing field offering something different. So it took a lot of creativity as well as rigorous analysis to land on exactly what the uniqueness of our offering would be.

Could you describe to us one thing you are most proud of during the period of ten years that you have been associated with Concordia? Tell us one thing you regret not having done during these years?

When I think of moments I’m proud of, I’m constantly brought back to our 2017 Concordia Americas Summit. It really was a landmark moment for us—it was our first-ever international convening, and, that year, we put collaboration across the Western Hemisphere at the top of the Summit agenda. During this time we began sparking dialogue on the crisis in Venezuela and the imminent need for cross-sector collaboration to restore democracy and peace in the country. We also brought together three former presidents of Colombia—then-President Juan Manuel Santos Calderón and former Presidents Álvaro Uribe Vélez and Andrés Pastrana Arango—who represented different viewpoints on often polarizing issues. I’m also proud of the conversation we held in Greece in 2017 on the impacts of the burgeoning refugee crisis, elevating the need of partnerships in delivering basic services to migrant and refugee needs.

It has been ten years since the founding of Concordia. What criteria do you use to evaluate Concordia's success, and how would you define its impact in the last ten years?

When thinking about how Concordia has evolved over the past 10 years, one thing comes to mind: partnerships. Partnerships have been at the heart of all of our success. So when I evaluate Concordia's success and define impact, I do so through the lens of partnerships. Let me explain. Under our current model, we forge partnerships with leading organizations to support their impact goals and ultimately amplify their impact using our comparative advantage of raising awareness and providing a global platform. We focus on how partnerships are at the core of any successful social impact endeavor.

So, taking a deep dive at our flagship event last year, our 2020 Annual Summit, we see that our impact is rooted in bringing diverse voices together to tackle today's pressing challenges. At the 2020 Annual Summit, seven new partnerships and initiatives were officially launched, over 500 formal connections were made, and 55% of attendees said that they partnered or met a potential partner. The audience consisted of the following representation: 47% private sector; 31% nonprofit/NGO; 18% public sector; and, 4% for-benefit/social enterprise. Additionally, our 3000+ attendees came from all over the world.

During the past year, Concordia has partnered with the Association of Foreign Press Correspondents. What value do you see, and what message does this partnership symbolize for Concordia?

We were delighted to partner with the Association of Foreign Press Correspondents (AFC) over 2020 and were thrilled to welcome FPC talent to the Concordia stage, namely Thanos Dimadis and Benjamin Tetteh. The partnership symbolizes the importance of ensuring that these conversations continue beyond the summit stage, and is key to elevating our overall impact and reach. Each year we partner with leading global, national, and sector-specific media organizations to bring new audiences to our summits, and we’re grateful for AFC’s support.