Reinventing Events for HR Leaders with Robbie Jones

Big HR conferences often promise valuable networking, but how many meaningful conversations actually happen with the people making strategic decisions?

In this episode of the HRchat Podcast, Bill Banham is joined by Robbie Jones, CEO and Co-Founder of Double Centurion Events and a global advisor in HR technology and people platforms, to explore why the traditional conference model is evolving and what senior HR leaders are looking for instead.

Drawing on experience from both the events industry and the HR tech sector, Robbie explains why many CHROs and CPOs have grown tired of crowded exhibition halls and generic agendas. Instead, they're seeking curated, invitation-only experiences where they can have honest conversations with peers, build trusted relationships, and tackle the biggest challenges shaping the future of work.

The conversation explores the thinking behind the Leaders Summit for HR & People series, including its concierge-style delegate experience, executive think tanks, and carefully selected mix of HR leaders and solution providers. Bill and Robbie also discuss the growing impact of AI on HR, the importance of trust and authentic networking in a post-pandemic world, and why memorable venues—from Lord's Cricket Ground to Niagara Falls—can help create stronger business connections.

Whether you're an HR executive, people leader, HR technology provider, or event organizer, this episode offers fresh insights into what makes executive communities thrive and how live events can deliver genuine value beyond the exhibition floor.

In this episode you'll discover:

•  Robbie's journey from global exhibitions to HR technology and executive events 
•  Why many senior HR leaders skip traditional expos in favor of curated experiences 
•  How invitation-only summits create stronger conversations and better ROI 
•  The biggest topics dominating executive HR discussions, including AI, leadership, wellbeing, and workforce transformation 
•  Why relationship-building has become more important than ever in today's HR landscape 
•  How the Leaders Summit for HR & People is rethinking executive networking 

Connect with Robbie Jones: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robbiejonesdce/

Learn more about the Leaders Summit for HR & People series: https://www.theleaderssummitforhr.com/canada/

 If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to HRchat, leave a review, and share it with a colleague who wants more meaningful HR conversations.

Transcript

Welcome And Guest Introduction

SPEAKER_05 0:02

Welcome to the HR Tech Show, one of the world's most downloaded and shared podcasts designed for HR pros, talented, tech enthusiasts, and business leaders. For hundreds more episodes and what's new in the world of work, subscribe to the show, follow us on social media, and visit hrgazette.com.

SPEAKER_04 0:25

Welcome to another episode of the HR Chat Show. Hello, listeners. This is your host today, Bill Banner. And in this episode, I'm going to be talking with, for the first time on the show, Mr. Fantastic Robbie Jones, CEO over at DCE and global advisor for HR Tech, people and culture platforms. Robbie has spent much of his career at the intersection of HR Tech and Events, helping create spaces where senior HR leaders can learn from one another, discover new solutions, and build meaningful partnerships. After leading some of the HR industry's best known event brands, Robbie is now the CEO and co-founder of Double Centurion Events, the team behind the Leaders Summit for HR and People, which is a new international series of invitation-led events designed specifically for senior HR and people executives. This event series is expanding across the UK. So the first event, which is happening in September, is at Lord's. What a venue. And then they're going to be in Canada alongside myself. Thank you very much, Robbie. We'll talk about that later. At Falls View Casino and the power station in Niagara. What a venue. And beyond. They're going to be going all over the place. And they have an emphasis on creative experiences, executive level networking, collaborative discussions, and practical conversations around leadership, transformation, AI, of course, we can't get away from AI. And the future of work. Rather than focusing on crowded exhibition halls, the events aim to create an environment where HR leaders and solution providers can have deeper, more valuable conversations. And Robbie joins the HR Chat podcast today to share his thinking behind the new events, what makes them different from traditional HR conferences, and why he believes that the industry is ready for a fresh approach to bringing together HR leaders from around the world. Robbie Jones, how are you doing today? Welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_01 2:21

I'm okay. I'm a big fan of the podcast. So uh very honored to be to be on here and chatting with you, Bill. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:28

Thanks for listening to this episode of the HR Chat Podcast. If you enjoy the audio content we produce, you'll love our articles on the HR Gazette. Learn more at hrgazette.com. And now back to the show.

SPEAKER_04 2:44

Thank

Robbie’s Path Through HR Events

SPEAKER_04 2:45

you very much. And everything I just mentioned there, of course, in the intro are things that I'm passionate about. Local uh regular listeners of this show will know that um I also get involved with doing various events, including uh lots of the disrupt uh summits in the UK and Ireland in the US, and uh do other bits and pieces in Toronto. So um this is something that I'm very much looking forward to. Let's get into it, Robbie. You've you've built a career around bringing together HR leaders and tech providers, of course. Tell me a bit about your professional journey and what inspired you to launch Double Centurion Events and the Leaders Summit for HR and people.

SPEAKER_02 3:22

Yeah, so uh I worked uh in the exhibitions, large-scale trade show sector for 15 years.

SPEAKER_03 3:31

Lots of both pleasure and pain along the way, along that journey. And I suppose my my most recent role and my entry into the HR space was uh launching a show alongside a uh a brilliant expo guy called Nick Powell. At Closest Steel Media, we launched a show called HR Technologies UK, um, alongside a brilliant show called Learning Technologies UK, um, with thousands of people attending on the edge of London at London XL, uh, which was a fantastic experience at the time. Um, I then uh quit my career in trade shows to go and be on the other side of the table and actually become uh a sales and marketing leader for an HR Tech vendor uh who are also a healthcare company called Adagio VR, uh, which is an unbelievable futuristic approach to sort of clinical mental health and well-being in the workplace and high performance, uh, run by a fellow at the Royal College of Psychiatrists and a consultant with the United Nations, so really special organization. Um, and my job there was to take an HR Tech vendor from a startup through to a scale-up business development, and we did it, but really not with uh much help um from the exhibits that we did uh as an organization. And it was the first time in my life that I was able to understand a lot of the feedback that I'd received for a decade or more from uh exhibitors uh in this space um who uh can sometimes understandably uh feel very frustrated whether it's lack of return on investment or brand awareness opportunities or seniority in a room. So I came up with an idea, and this is how every uh startup begins, but I came up with an idea for a new formula, a new approach to event organizing that better suited the leadership, both from a practitioner side of things for uh HR leaders around the world, but also for those vendors who need that return on investment and and need to justify what they're doing and execute their their brand objectives.

SPEAKER_04 5:40

I'm gonna stop you there, Robbie. I'm I'm gonna stop you there because actually that's quite a new uh lead in to my next question before you give the full game away.

The Gap In Traditional HR Conferences

SPEAKER_04 5:47

Um and and that's around that's around what is the USP. There are obviously already plenty of HR conferences out there. Um what what gap did you feel existed in that market and and what makes the leaders summit for HR and people genuinely different from more traditional events?

SPEAKER_03 6:06

Yeah, absolutely. So there's three ways to no three ways to answer this question, I suppose. The first is that the um the first category of event that is best known to everyone is is the large-scale trade show, which was the one I was always most familiar with. Issue that a large-scale trade event organizer has when it comes to this space is that it's very different from a big yield-focused event where you've got packaging or retail hardware or uh products, you know, food, drinks, stuff that needs to be physically demonstrated at an event. Our industry is increasingly so much more focused on, if not technology, than actually even even less than that, on strategy and in conversations about how to transform culture and workflow processes. Um, so that the challenge that those large-scale trade event organizers have, of course, is that increasingly what we see is that senior HR practitioners will send junior staff on a on a learning mission, which is fab for those junior professionals trying to develop their career, or they can be great uh job uh recruitment playgrounds, but less and less do you have people that are actually making decisions and transforming the future of work who can traipse out to a big venue on on you know at the edge of a city somewhere for for a day or two. It's it's a huge ask and it's it's just not happening, as I found when I was at a Dajo VR exhibiting. So that's the one aspect. The second aspect is yes, there are smaller, more intimate focused events, but most of those are either fabulous parties or very small tabletop events in in kind of old hotels, and and what we wanted to do finally, I suppose the third aspect is to create that ROI ring-fenced senior leadership identity to a to an HR event model so that we can actually change the world for the better through through the people attending our events. Um, and secondly, do it in a way that is iconic. You know, all of our events are in, you've mentioned Niagara Falls and Lords Cricket Ground, but in natural or historic civilized wonders of our world, um where people will never forget the conversations that they have when they bond, never forget the experiences they have at a party either. Um, and and that iconic message is so important when we look at HR Tech now, and you see service now being advertised by celebrities on on television, you see you know, Formula One, work day everywhere, on on the caps of you know PGA tour winners in golf. Um, it's it's high time that the events space in HR in HR Tech had that that level of glamour or for want of a worse or better word, sexiness to what the these brand ambassadors are trying to achieve and keeping up with the world.

SPEAKER_04 8:52

I just gotta say uh one thing that I loved from the answer there is we do our events at wonders of the world. Uh I thought that was brilliant. Um hey, just

Why Senior HR Networking Matters Now

SPEAKER_04 9:00

um between two guys who organize events in the HL space. One one thing that I keep hearing from people, and I think it's showing itself that certainly the disrupt events that I organise is it seems like there's a there's an interesting window of time at the moment, maybe taking us through to 2030-ish, something like that, where a few years ago, a lot of the senior HR folks maybe wouldn't come to an event unless it was uh an association event, a CIPD, an HRPA, a shot sorts of events. But right now, what I'm seeing, Robbie, and I'd love to get your take on this, is actually they're much more willing to come out there and do that networking. Partly, I suspect, because they're terrified for their jobs. Everything's being replaced by AI. Um, we've already seen the first fully AI company, of course. Um, and therefore they need to get out there, they need to network, they need to make sure they've got opportunities to move into different roles or indeed move into consulting. Are you seeing that? Is there a kind of a different attitude towards non-association HR-related events at the moment?

SPEAKER_03 10:01

100%. It's actually related to one of the big topics within HR, which is to do with you know remote, hybrid, and in-person working. Um, in as far as a big challenge that people have had, and it's a post-COVID hangover, is is trust. And if you look at what's happening with AI as an accelerative and very unknown concept to someone who's worked in HR their whole life, is now a leader. It's what what does my job now look like? You know, how how can I speak to other people who are in the same position as I am, who might have the same sleepless nights or brilliant opportunities that are ahead of them, they just don't know what to do with it. And I think that's the beauty of a model like this is obviously people do want to come together, but they want to be alongside peers and they want to be able to bring each other up into that place. There's another aspect to it, Bill, as well, which is that, and it's got nothing to do with vanity or narcissism or anything like that. It's to do with um professional ambition and exposure and people wanting to become successful leaders in their industry. LinkedIn is an amazing platform for it. We live in a very online world. Um, and that bleeds into the in-person side actually really well, because a lot of those leading HR practitioners, leading HR tech vendors, they want to be seen to be the thought leader in that particular area and be alongside their peers. So there has to be a way for people to have productive conversations in, for example, elevated think tanks uh on on keynote stages, where they're ring-fenced alongside each other, and not just being nominated and or or awarded um at you know, influencer and awards type ceremonies, which are also important but serve a very different purpose.

SPEAKER_04 11:47

Okay,

Inside The Leaders Summit Experience

SPEAKER_04 11:48

excellent. Let's talk a bit about what your delegate delegates can expect at the uh event at Lourdes, and indeed the fabulous event that I'll be involved with in Niagara. Uh, I don't want to lean you guys towards either one, but you know, it'd be nice to hang out with you people in Niagara, I'm just saying. Um the formula is quite um yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_03 12:07

I'll sort of talk you through um how the events are structured. Um, and it's not super similar to a kind of a traditional events formula in this aspect. Um we approach our events very much as leadership community-led events, right? So, you know, we're double centurion events, that's the name of our organization. We look to have 200 senior executives at every conference that we run around the world for that market. Um, we we treat those delegates the way they should have been treated for a long time when they go to events um, you know, beautifully catered for, gifted, all of those things that are actually relevant and come back to their own roles in HR as well and making the workplace better. Um, and on a on an educational note, and in terms of fixing perhaps problems in organizations and gaps in in their own jobs and in their own thinking, we basically put on three different elements of our two-day conference. The first is a networking and exhibition area of the event. Um, this is extremely important. Typically, when you arrive at an event as an HR practitioner, you're faced with 200 exhibition stands, you're faced with sort of 500 different seminars to choose from. We've got rid of all of that. There's there's no spamming, there's no sense of trying to work out arriving in that chaos. And how does this how does this work for me and my job? Um, when people arrive at Lords Cricket Grand or at Niagara Falls, the first thing they're greeted by is actually people like Bill Bannon, people like Ben Eubanks, people like Perry Timms, Geth and like so many others. Uh, we're really lucky who who really have got behind this concept as the future of HR uh conferences. And um they're greeted by these thought leaders who are able to provide that concierge from the beginning. And this goes back to the reason we we built this organization. People don't care what an exhibition organizer, an event organizer like myself has to say to them about HR necessarily, but we're putting all of the right people in front of them that do know exactly how they should be spending their time at an event. So that concierge element is super important, and that'll guide them through the uh agenda. Um, as well as the exhibition networking area, we have these elevated think tanks where we have so many leading practitioners already who are signed up to both events who will be leading subjects from the compliance and implementation of AI through to more controversial titles like why well-being sucks and and having a proper clinical, clinically underpinned approach to mental health and high performance in the workplace. Um and also another topic which is which is fantastic for these individuals, which is what do you do after you finish as an HR leader as well, and and what are the next steps in life and and how can you keep being fulfilled along along your professional journey right to the end? Um, and a lot of people struggle with that thought. Um, and we have lots of people at our event that are there to give that career guidance as well as fix company uh challenges.

SPEAKER_04 15:06

Okay, love it. We are flying through this conversation today, which is good because we've only got five minutes left. Let's make it let's make it count. So uh here's me. I'm about to get mean like I sometimes do uh on in these episodes, but I'm gonna start challenging you to answer in let's do 60 seconds or

Who Attends And What They Gain

SPEAKER_04 15:24

less for the next one. Okay, so in 60 seconds or less, and I think it's kind of a recap of some of the things we've already said. So in 60 seconds or less, Mr. Jones, who should be attending these events then? What what kinds of HR people and leaders, technology providers, and partners will our listeners today have the opportunity to meet and build relationships with?

SPEAKER_03 15:42

Yeah, so two types of uh attendees at our events. The first, uh, which we call sponsors, are uh HR tech vendors right across the five key pillars or challenges in an organization from operations, workflow, payroll, etc., through to talent recruitment, through to learning and development, onboarding, um, well-being as well, um, and employee engagement. Um, but as I said earlier, it's not 200, 300, 400, 500 exhibitors. Our mission is not one of yield for its own sake. Um, we want to put the best people and the most innovative products in front of you and not have people pull you off a floor and sell to you, but actually to have really constructive conversations around tables around how to fix those challenges. Um, so on the one hand, you've got the sponsors who who are going to do a great job of that, product managers, um, the best in design for HR tech in the world. And then on the other side, most of the attendees at the event, of course, are HR practitioners. Uh, day one at Lord's is uh dedicated to chief people officers, HR directors, CHROs, and day two, the agenda is built around um sort of C-suite minus two, so heads of learning and development, HR, payroll, uh, employee engagement, DEI, so people that are on that journey to become the next C-suite, the future C-suite of the industry. Um, those are the two biggest profiles, and obviously we work with some partners as well who are incredible consultants and thought leaders to help all of you practitioners out there, and and so you can spend some proper quality time um and uh and unpaid for in terms of those consultancy services over the course of that day or two. Um, and that's that's that's critical.

SPEAKER_04 17:22

Okay, excellent. Uh I had so many more questions that I wanted to ask you today, Robbie. However, um, we do have a little sweet spot of about 22-23 minutes for this particular show, and I had a very long intro. Sorry, listeners. Uh so just one more question for you to put today.

How To Connect And Name Origin

SPEAKER_04 17:37

Um, and that's how can folks connect with you, Robbie? So is that LinkedIn? Do you want to share your email address? I I bet you're super cool and all over TikTok and places. And of course, for those listeners today who uh maybe interested in attending or speaking or sponsoring uh or simply they want to learn more about the leaders summit for HR and people, where should they go and what can they expect over the coming months?

SPEAKER_03 17:58

Yeah, absolutely. We're actually not that cool in terms of we're not we we try not to bombard people in their personal lives, so we're very much focused, and lots of people on here will have come across us on LinkedIn because we have a huge amount of engagement on there. So the Leaders Summit for HR and people is the page for all our events, and uh my name's Robbie Jones, I'm the CEO of Double Centurion Events, the organizer. Um, so best way is to get in touch on LinkedIn or by email at Robbie at double centurion events uh dot com. And we look forward to supporting you.

SPEAKER_04 18:31

Look at that. We've still got about a minute to go. So um actually I'm just gonna throw in more one more question. Robbie, where did the name Double Centurion Events come from?

SPEAKER_02 18:38

Well, it's it's 200. Well, it's it's because it's sort of 200 people per event, I suppose, and we do quite a lot of we we wanted to create um a name where all being well, we can create a kind of a legacy.

SPEAKER_03 18:53

So you know, we gift bags where all of our our members, the HR practitioners that come to our events will have their own legacy number from which number person they were to come to any of our events um with each double century that comes and goes with all of our events, and there's a connection to cricket there as well. So yeah, we're uh our our inaugural event is at at Lord's Cricket Grounds, and and Gray and my co-founder and I are are are big fans of of the sport. So um, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 19:21

Um for for our North American listeners, that's um that's baseball, but they have a funny stick. Okay, well, that just leaves

Final Thanks And Where To Subscribe

SPEAKER_04 19:27

me to say for for today, Robbie Jones. Uh, I'm sure this won't be the last time, but for today, thank you very much for being my guest on the HR chat board. Legend. Thanks, Bill. Appreciate it. And listeners, as always, until next time, happy working.

SPEAKER_05 19:43

Thanks for listening to the HR Chat Show. If you enjoyed this episode, why not subscribe and listen to some of the hundreds of episodes published by HR Gazette? And remember, for what's new in the world of work, subscribe to the show, follow us on social media, and visit hrgazette.com.