The Experience Is the Message

Salam everyone! I hope you’re all doing well. Welcome to the next round of the Sunan Weekly Roundup!

This past weekend, I had the honor of traveling to Dallas with a very good, close friend of mine, Samad Husain from Datstra Analytics. We flew out to attend the first ever KufiCon, the Muslim Storytellers Summit, at the Plano Event Center. It brought together creatives and creators from all over the U.S. to share insights and strategies on storytelling, literature, filmmaking, design, media and a lot more.

Amazing individuals like Alex Kronemer, cofounder and Executive Director of Unity Productions Foundation (UPF), and many, many others shared their insights, their struggles and their lessons learned with the up and coming creators in the room.

The team behind it

What I was most honored and amazed by was the company that put KufiCon together. The event management was done by Wondr, a team that includes a dear friend of mine, Hamza Khan, along with Tahmid, Talha and many others. It was amazing to finally meet Hamza after so many years of working together in different capacities, from his time at LaunchGood to the Spark Awards.

What stood out most about Wondr’s work was the focus on the experience. Traditionally, many conferences are really just about getting people together. The program, the schedule, and then, yalla, get out of here. Wondr very meticulously crafted the journey of each person, from the time they entered the doors of the Plano Event Center to the time they left.

You could see that care everywhere. Even before anyone walked in, in the way they shared information on socials and got people excited about the conference. In the slides, and the intro and outro animations for each speaker. And believe it or not, everything was on time.

And they brought in real experts to put that experience together. Manal, a very talented young designer, did a lot of the design work. Ali, from Istanbul, did much of the video side, and it was amazing, world class work.

But what they truly championed was the experience outside the lecture hall. They designed activities for attendees to actually participate in, not just sit and listen. From what I saw at the roundtables, storytellers came together to share ideas, network and get to know each other. Filmmakers did the same. Podcasters did the same. It wasn’t a one way conversation. It was for the creators, by the creators, a space to connect with like minded people and inspire each other to make a bigger impact around the world.

Now, anyone who’s been on the other side of event management knows how extremely difficult this is to pull off. You’re being pulled in literally a thousand different directions. The audio on a video isn’t working. A speaker is running 10 minutes late. You need more seating. Someone asks you to turn the lights up because it’s hard to take notes. And at the very same moment, one person tells you the hall is too hot while another tells you it’s too cold.

So when the attendee never feels any of that, you know a team did the work.

If you’re holding a conference or an event and you’d like to take your game to the next level, do reach out to Wondr at madebywondr.com.

It’s an amanah on us

In reflection, it’s very beautiful to see more of these conferences popping up. I feel it’s an amana on us as creators, as leaders, as thought leaders, to share whatever lessons we’ve learned and help pass that mantle. Not that we are any greater or more talented than anyone else. But sometimes, all it takes is someone just two steps ahead to help guide the way.

When we share our lessons and experiences, the next generation of talent can inculcate them into their own practice. After all, we are standing on the shoulders of giants like Shaykh Muhammad Alshareef, rahimahullah, who launched AlMaghrib. He was, I would argue, one of the first scholars in our space who really understood the power of branding and the power of marketing to amplify his message. What always amazed me were those beautiful CD sets. The design. The creative titles. Even just the way he would tell the stories. He did it with such sidq and such thoughtfulness that, in a way, it was itself a form of dawah. We’re standing on the shoulders of giants who’ve done amazing work in filmmaking, in the creative space, in media and in sports.

So the question becomes: how can we take those same creative fundamentals to amplify our message, and connect more people to the beautiful and amazing work being done?

Let me ask you: who is someone in the creative space that you look up to?

Time to Level Up!

Sajjad Husain

Founder & CEO, Sunan Designs