Arun Sudhaman 15 Jan 2017 // 11:01AM GMT
Always a polarising event, this year's World Economic Forum already appears more loathed than loved, after a tumultuous 12 months that appeared to upend the established political order.
The Davos elite consensus, often criticised for being too smug for its own good, was spectacularly debunked in 2016, thanks to such events as the Brexit vote, the failed Italian referendum and — of course — Donald Trump's election victory.
Trump was certainly a topic of conversation at last year's event, but few of the world's business and academic leaders took his prospects of winning seriously. A notable exception was Sir Martin Sorrell, who presciently warned that Davos' "rarefied atmosphere' should not distract from the way that disaffected people have thrown their weight behind Trump, allowing the businessman to "create the biggest brand in the world."
That populist backlash makes it hard to describe Davos as a harbinger of things to come. The World Economic Forum also failed to forecast the financial crisis of 2008, and Harvard professor Kenneth Rogoff believes that "the conventional wisdom of Davos is always wrong."
Is Davos, and its champagne-swilling devotion to frictionless capitalism, part of the problem? Perhaps. Although several communications leaders I asked — including Richard Edelman, Ketchum's David Gallagher and Tata Consultancy Services CMO Abhinav Kumar — believe that WEF's unique combination of business, political and NGO leaders is the only forum that can credibly address the intractable problems the world currently faces.
Quartz reporter Jenny Anderson, on our Echo Chamber podcast, believes that Davos can hardly be deemed irrelevant, but cautions against taking the event too seriously. It is above all, says Anderson, a forum for deal-making and networking.
Maybe so, but the event's optics do not necessarily lend themselves to the notion that the global elite is in touch with the rest of the world's problems. And Davos could certainly benefit from demonstrating that it can move from soaring rhetoric about responsible leadership and workforce challenges to concrete action that addresses profound volatility and inequality.
It is, in short, a classic public relations problem, albeit one that requires some rather sophisticated skills in today's "post-truth" information landscape.
So it is no surprise that senior agency and in-house communications executives will again flock to this year's event. Much of their activity is focused on supporting the various business leaders in attendance, but the Davos agenda — always rich with discussions about the purpose of business — can offer considerable insight into the bigger public relations issues that are likely to dominate the corporate agenda in 2017.
Those issues, you could argue, are more important than ever — at a time when corporate values that may have seemed safe and relatively anodyne a few months ago — tolerance, diversity, inclusion — are suddenly controversial, and potentially expensive.
Thanks, once again, to some excellent work from David Yanofsky at Quartz, I've researched exactly who is on the official attendee list. The results, in no particular order, are below, and demonstrate the event's geographic diversity and its ability to attract senior figures from the corporate and agency worlds, spanning public affairs, corporate communications, marketing and CSR. Note that many of our Influence 100 list are present, for example.
Bear in mind that these are only official Summit attendees, there will be many more industry names taking part as 'unofficial' delegates. Here is my working list, please do let me know if I've left you off, and follow along with all of our Davos coverage here.
In-house
Kate James
Chief Corporate Affairs Officer
Pearson Plc
Yutaka Shimazaki
Corporate Officer; General Manager, Executive Secretariat, Corporate Communications
Marubeni Corporation
Mark MacGann
Group Chief External Affairs Officer, Member of the Group Executive Committee
VimpelCom Ltd
Jennifer Scardino
Global Head, International Communications
Santander
William Sheedy
Global Executive, Corporate Strategy, M&A, Government Relations
Visa Inc.
Mette Fossum Beyer
Director, Global Communications, Government and Corporate Social Responsibility
REMA 1000
Andrey Shtorkh
Member of the Executive Board; Director, Strategic Communications
Renova Group
Elaine Weidman Grunewald
Senior Vice-President and Chief Sustainability Officer
Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson
Keith Weed
Chief Marketing Communications Officer
Unilever
Joseph Naylor
Vice-President, Policy, Government and Public Affairs
Chevron Corporation
Tony Cervone
Senior Vice-President, Global Communications
General Motors Company
Marcela Hawn
Senior Vice-President and Chief Communications Officer
Centene Corporation
Henry Gomez
Executive Vice-President, Chief Marketing and Communications Officer
Hewlett Packard Enterprise
Michael Mendenhall
Chief Marketing Officer and Chief Communications Officer
Flex
Julie Louise Gerberding
Executive Vice-President, Strategic Communications, Global Public Policy and Population Health
MSD
Neill Coleman
Vice-President, Global Communications
The Rockefeller Foundation
Elizabeth G. Chambers
Chief Strategy, Product and Marketing Officer
The Western Union Company
Elinor Steele
Vice-President, Global Communications and Women's Initiatives
Tupperware Brands Corporation
Penelope Naas
Senior Vice-President, International Public Affairs and Sustainability
UPS Europe
Rosemary O'Brien
Vice-President, Public Affairs
CF Industries Holdings Inc.
Kim Metcalf-Kupres
Vice-President and Chief Marketing Officer
Johnson Controls Inc.
Burke Norton
Chief Legal Officer; Chief, Corporate and Government Affairs
Salesforce
Elliot Schrage
Vice-President, Communications and Policy
Facebook Inc.
Regine Sixt
Senior Executive Vice-President, International Marketing
Sixt SE
Miki Tsusaka
Senior Partner, Managing Director and Global Marketing Leader
The Boston Consulting Group
Lauren Flaherty
Executive Vice-President and Chief Marketing Officer
CA Technologies
Elaine J. Dorward-King
Executive Vice-President, Sustainability and External Relations
Newmont Mining Corporation
Karim A. Lesina
Vice-President, International External Affairs, EU, Caribbean, Central and Latin America, Trans-Atlantic Relations
AT&T
Yoshitake Yamaguchi
General Manager, Government and External Relations Office
Toshiba Corporation
Michael Goltzman
Vice-President, International Government Relations and Public Affairs
The Coca-Cola Company
Jeremy Goon
Chief Sustainability Officer
Wilmar International Limited
Niklas Gustafsson
Chief Sustainability Officer
AB Volvo
Elaine Weidman Grunewald
Vice-President, Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility
Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson
Abdullateef Al Sharikh
Head, Corporate Communications
Alghanim Industries
Mark Henderson
Director, Communications
The Wellcome Trust
Svetlana Mironyuk
Senior Vice-President; Head, Marketing and Communications
Sberbank
Liu Mingsheng
President of Corporate Communications
Dalian Wanda Group Business Management Co. Ltd
Ainojie Irune
Director, Strategy and Communications
Oando Plc
Jamie Smith
Chief Communications and Marketing Officer
BitFury Group
Michael Gonda
Vice-President, Corporate Communications and Public Affairs
Chobani LLC
Mark Klein
Senior Vice-President, Corporate Communications, Public Affairs and External Relations
Dignity Health
Aida Greenbury
Managing Director, Sustainability and Stakeholder Engagement
PT Purinusa Ekapersada
Christopher Lake
Vice-President; Head, International Government Relations
S&P Global Ratings
Krysta Harden
Vice-President, Policy, Government Affairs; Chief Sustainability Officer
DuPont
Steve Howard
Chief Sustainability Officer
IKEA Group
Marcia M. Smith
Senior Vice-President, Sustainability and External Affairs
Teck Resources Limited
Niall Dunne
Chief Sustainability Officer
BT Group Plc
Consultancy
Steven H. Gunby
President and Chief Executive Officer
FTI Consulting Inc.
Chris Osborne
Co-Chairman, Europe, Middle East and Africa
FTI Consulting
United Kingdom
Almira Zejnilagic
Managing Director
FTI Consulting
Matthew J. Harrington
Global Chief Operating Officer
Edelman
Richard W. Edelman
President and Chief Executive Officer
Edelman
Russell Dubner
President and Chief Executive Officer
Edelman
Barri Rafferty
Senior Partner; Chief Executive Officer, North America
Ketchum Inc.
Kathy Bloomgarden
Chief Executive Officer
Ruder Finn Inc.
Margery Kraus
Founder and Chief Executive Officer
APCO Worldwide Inc.
Roland Rudd
Chairman
Finsbury
Sir Martin Sorrell
Chief Executive Officer
WPP Plc
Michael I. Roth
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Interpublic Group
John Wren
President and Chief Executive Officer
Omnicom Group Inc.
Serge Dumont
Chairman, Asia-Pacific; Vice-Chairman
Omnicom Group Inc.
Rishad Tobaccowala
Chief Strategist
Publicis Groupe
Maurice Lévy
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Publicis Groupe SA
Steve King
Chief Executive Officer
Publicis Media
Arthur Sadoun
Chief Executive Officer, Publicis Worldwide
Publicis Groupe SA
Tetsuji Hirose
Executive Officer
Dentsu Inc.
Nigel Morris
Chief Executive Officer,
Dentsu Aegis Network Americas, Europe, Middle East and Africa
Jerry Buhlmann
Chief Executive Officer
Dentsu Aegis Network Ltd United Kingdom
Valerie Scoular
Group Human Resources Director
Dentsu Aegis Network Ltd
Andrew Robertson
President and Chief Executive Officer
BBDO Worldwide
Troy Ruhanen
President and Chief Executive Officer
TBWA Worldwide