For Extreme Networks, the event brought together senior customers, technology leaders, partners, and decision-makers in Paris. The setting was high-level, international, and full of content around cloud networking, AI-native insights, innovation, and the future of technology.
 

But the ambition for this leadership track was different.
 

The goal was not to add another keynote to the agenda. It was to create a moment where C-level executives and technology directors could step out of their daily role, reflect on the changes around them, and talk openly about leadership, innovation, customer needs, and the human side of technology.
 

So the assignment Extreme gave us was clear:

How do you make a room full of senior leaders not only listen, but think, exchange, and connect?

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The challenge
 

A customer event can easily become a sequence of presentations.
 

People arrive.
They listen.
They network during the breaks.
They leave with a few ideas, a few business cards, and a full inbox waiting for them.
 

Extreme wanted something more meaningful.
 

They wanted a leadership track that would give senior customers a reason to slow down, think together, and look at innovation through a broader lens.
 

Not only through technology.
Not only through products.
Not only through market trends.
 

But through people, leadership, customer needs, and the way organizations actually change.
 

That meant the session needed to feel different from a standard conference format. It had to be relevant for senior leaders, practical enough to be useful, and human enough to create real conversation.

 

What we designed

Together with Extreme Networks, we designed a leadership and innovation experience for around 60 C-level executives and technology directors.
 

The afternoon was built as a journey.
 

It started with a real story of transformation. Then it moved into practical work. After that, the group reflected on what it meant for their own leadership reality. And finally, the day opened up toward the bigger question of leadership in the age of AI.

 

The structure was carefully built.
 

First: a real innovation story from Saint-Gobain

The afternoon opened with Janaki Weiden, Global Innovation Director at Saint-Gobain.
 

Janaki shared how applying our I-We-It approach helped create real innovation and meaningful change inside his organization.
 

This was important.
 

Before asking participants to work with new tools or new questions, we wanted to show that innovation is not an abstract concept. It is something that happens when people, teams, and strategy start to move together.
 

The Saint-Gobain story helped make that visible.
 

It showed how innovation is not only about ideas. It is also about mindset, structure, collaboration, and the ability to turn ambition into movement.
 

For the leaders in the room, this created a strong starting point. They were not listening to a theory. They were hearing from someone who had lived the work from the inside.

 

Then: working with real customer needs

After the opening story, participants moved into a practical Jobs-to-be-Done workshop.
 

The goal was to help them look beyond products, features, and assumptions, and explore what customers are really trying to achieve.
 

In small groups, they worked with questions such as:

What is the customer really trying to get done?
Where do they experience friction?
What are they not saying directly, but still need?
Where could new value be created?
 

This changed the energy in the room.
 

People were no longer only listening. They were talking, testing ideas, challenging each other, and connecting their own experience to the needs of their customers.
 

The workshop made innovation concrete.
 

It helped participants move from “What can technology do?” to “What do people and organizations actually need?”
 

That shift matters. Especially in a technology-driven environment, where it is easy to start with the solution instead of the human need behind it.