The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity
20-24 June 2022, Cannes, France
Cannes Lions Festival
Reunite with the global creative community, celebrate groundbreaking ideas, and get inspired at Cannes Lions: The International Festival of Creativity. Get ready for a not-to-be-missed experience and reconnect with your peers.
WHAT'S NEXT?
What's the future of creativity? How can we connect the dots and make sense of the seismic changes happening in the creative world? What's the secret sauce of creative excellence? How can creativity drive the progress of individuals, organisations, and societies?
These are some of the big questions we're aiming to address at the 2022 Festival.
The 2022 Festival Content Plan
We are putting the foundations in place to build a purposeful Festival that allows our community to come together in a meaningful way. Through highly curated content, community networking opportunities and agenda setting initiatives Cannes Lions will provide an annual forum for the global industry to address the most pressing issues the industry and world are facing today. In 2022, the programme will consist of a limited number of agenda-setting, action-inspiring, knock-it-out-the-park headliners, as well as curated, thought-provoking talks and discussions across the rest of the Festival. The creative community is reuniting after two years, so the content plan will aim to bring the community together to solve industry challenges and take the next steps towards progress together.
Submit your ground-breaking idea
The audience of the Cannes Lions Festival includes the crème de la crème of our industry - the most awarded creatives, game-changing brands and innovative business leaders. The content you put forward must aim to inspire the brightest minds. They want to hear from left-field thinkers, scientists, artists, those who are able to unlock a new way of thinking and inspire creativity, and not strictly those from within our industry but adjacent thought leaders. We are not looking for panels as they do not rate well with our audience and can easily be delivered elsewhere. Spaces on the main stage will be limited and highly competitive. We’re looking for thought leadership in the highest form, completely original thinking and something that will exclusively premiere and make the headlines on the main stage in Cannes.
Look out for The LIONS | State of Creativity Study we're planning to release in January 2022. Designed to uncover the industry's attitudes and approaches towards creativity, and paint an accurate picture of what will impact the creative economy tomorrow, the study will form the LIONS 2022 editorial agenda across all of its platforms and events. But, for now, here are some thought-starters and questions that our audience want to understand:
Recalibrating purpose What is the role of creativity in solving the world's biggest problems and how does purposeful work translate into profit? How can brands define their purpose and shift beyond altruism? Bring talent back How can we attract, retain and develop top talent in the wake of The Great Resignation? How do we need to change the industry so it serves the new and diverse talent better? Small steps - big actions What's the role of the creative community in driving positive change and tackling sustainability issues? How can brands embrace sustainability in a genuine, authentic, and long-term way? Deciphering the unknown of the industry What's the future agency model and how can we rebuild trust in agency-client relationships? How can you nurture collaboration in your creative team and how can we take diversity, equality and inclusion to the next level?
Future consumer How can brands connect with their consumers in a more human and authentic way? Gen X, Gen Y, Gen Z and Gen Alpha - how can we understand changing consumer behaviour and trends in the new-look world? The next big thing How can brands use gaming, streaming platforms, AR and VR to reach their key audiences in a more fun and engaging way? What’s the secret recipe for success in the new commerce reality? Focus on creative work What are the key ingredients you need to create a LION-winning work? How can we make creativity and effectiveness work better together? The new skillset How can you tap into your human side to lead better and braver teams? How can we tackle burnout, mental health issues, and post-Covid grief?
What we're looking for
When submitting a content idea to us, please consider the following principles.
Break out of the echo chamber
Consider liaising with speakers from fields as diverse as film, design, philosophy, music, art, fashion, gaming, and others. Break out of the echo chamber and inspire the global creative community with out-of-the-box thinking and original problem-solving.
Action over words
When drafting your content idea, make sure to exemplify your thoughts with some real-life examples and top-level practices. Ask yourself what you can do to make those ideas flow long after the Festival.
Let's reconnect
Think about different ways of how you can practically involve your audience. Surprise us with your innovative thinking and go beyond a panel discussion format or a traditional keynote.
Start with so what?
We encourage you to begin thinking around your content idea by answering a simple question - so what? What change will your session make? What will happen when you leave the stage?
Diversity, equality, and inclusion
At LIONS, all of our content has diversity, equality, and inclusion as part of its core values. We will not move forward with any content submission that does not live up to these values.
Ask the difficult questions
If you’re interviewing, ask the interviewee/s the questions that you know everyone’s dying to ask. Don’t play safe. Find the contention. “Love-ins” do not offer our audience any new insight.
Don’t just tell, show
People love to see examples of work. Creatives are visual people. Even if your piece of content is not in a visual format (for example, a podcast or article), think of how you share examples to bring your point to life. Be a storyteller.
Make them feel – joy, sadness, anger, excitement
Think of how you want the audience to feel and set out to make them feel it. They will remember you for it.
All content MUST premiere at LIONS
Don’t submit or rehash anything you’ve presented at another industry event or on another digital platform.
Serenade the audience, don’t sell to them
The thought leadership and ideas you share - via any medium - are about creating a connection, not a transaction. We’re not looking for any sales pitches, only thought leadership that moves a subject matter forward.
Provoke, challenge, incite. Be a storyteller
Please don’t play it safe – be daring and be provocative. The best content on our platform always challenges assumptions and offers new (and radical) ideas around age-old issues.
Be original in your format
Panels often suck as they follow the same, dry format. Presentations can be too passive. 1-2-1 interviews can turn into love-ins. What can you do to be different?
Inject some LIONS magic
You know that sparkle? The speech that gives you goosebumps, the article that you end up emailing around your team, the video that truly opened your eyes to new thinking. Please aim to raise the creative bar. You don’t need a rabbit in a hat (who needs gimmicks?) but remember LIONS is the world’s largest gathering of a creative community. Think of your content idea within this context. What would ‘wow’ the creative industry who have incredible content at their fingertips? How does yours stand out a cut above the rest? Offering something new and exciting to the plethora of content available to this industry today. What's your sparkle?