IAA Mission Next Generation
At Speedmentoring 2026 in Basel, up-and-coming talent met with experienced industry professionals—in a format featuring a countdown, scene changes, and plenty of career momentum. The video feels like a trailer for the promise this format holds.
When Experience Meets Curiosity
There are formats you can talk about for a long time. And there are formats that explain themselves within a few minutes. IAA Speed Mentoring falls into the second category. A countdown begins. A bell rings. Three mentees move on to the next mentor. Twelve minutes remain—for questions, experiences, career paths, uncertainties, tips—and sometimes for a single sentence that sticks with you.
The first IAA Speed Mentoring event took place on May 11, 2026, in Basel at Helvetia Baloise. Twenty-four up-and-coming talents from the fields of marketing, communications, media, and the agency world met with eight mentors: Ralf Brachat, Markus Bucheli, Gregor Eicher, Silvana Imperiali, Tarkan Özküp, Nelly Riggenbach, Natasja Sommer, and Alexandra Vatansever.
Chantal Landis played a leading role in co-developing the evening together with IAA board members Guido Trevisan, CMO at Goldbach, and Ismail Wicki, Senior Marketing National Sales at Weischer.Cinema. Wicki also kept an eye on the element that set the pace for the format: the countdown. Twelve minutes per round, then a switch. This ensured that mentoring didn’t turn into casual networking, but rather became a precisely timed journey through shared experiences.
What sounded on paper like a well-organized industry event took on a surprisingly vibrant energy in person. It wasn’t a stuffy event for young professionals, nor was it a condescending lecture on careers—rather, it was a space filled with focused conversations. Sometimes quiet, sometimes to the point, and often very direct.
Supporting Young Talent Without Empty Rhetoric
The strength of this format lies in its simplicity. Young talents come prepared with specific questions. Experienced executives share their career detours, mistakes, successes, and perspectives. In between, the very kind of exchange takes place that is often talked about in the industry but rarely facilitated in such a concentrated way.
Chantal Landis, Executive Director of the IAA Swiss Chapter, describes speed mentoring as a format that is particularly close to the IAA’s heart. She says it is popular not only with mentors but also with the young talents who apply for a spot. Following Zurich and Basel, there have already been inquiries from Lausanne and Lucerne. This suggests that the model could catch on beyond individual cities.
Guido Trevisan, who serves on the IAA Board of Directors and is committed to youth and talent development, summed up the essence of the evening: Young talents should not just listen, but also network, ask questions, and benefit from the experience. Mentoring has also played an important role in his own career—as a source of inspiration, new ideas, and guidance.
That is precisely where the real significance lies: here, fostering the next generation is not treated as an abstract HR issue, but as a personal interaction. Those who want to advance need more than just technical knowledge; they need access, guidance, honest feedback, and people who are willing to share their experiences.
AI, Career Changes, and the Matter of Attitude
The evening revolved, with striking frequency, around three topics: AI, career decisions, and attitude.
Markus Bucheli, the host and Head of Marketing & Market Communications at Helvetia Baloise, was asked particularly often when the right time to make a change was. His answer was nuanced: One shouldn’t rush into leaving, but should first systematically explore what options are still available with one’s current employer.
AI was also everywhere. Not as a buzzword, but as a source of real uncertainty. Tarkan Özküp raised the important point that young and older professionals need to create spaces for discussion where they can talk about new topics in an informed way. Don’t just look everything up. Don’t delegate everything. Thinking is still work.
Nelly Riggenbach put it even more bluntly: «Creativity knows no hierarchy.» It’s the best idea that counts, not the highest rank at the table. Her top tip: critical thinking and questioning the status quo.
The Good Spirit in the Room
What really comes across in the video is the atmosphere of the evening. The mentees seem prepared, curious, and open-minded. The mentors don’t seem to be there just out of a sense of duty, but because they’re genuinely interested. Several of them mention that they’ve learned something themselves.
Natasja Sommer was impressed by the young participants« intelligence, curiosity, and preparation. Silvana Imperiali spoke of their enthusiasm, openness, and wide range of questions. Gregor Eicher described the »great spirit« of the young talents, who had »really put him through the wringer.”.
The mentees, too, took away not just business cards, but concrete insights: authenticity, curiosity, pragmatism, soft skills, and respect rather than simply trying to please others. One sentence in particular stuck with them: «You don’t need to be liked; you need to be respected.»
What Could Make the Format Even Stronger
As compelling as the evening was, one journalistic question remains: How can an inspiring evening be turned into long-term support?
Speed mentoring thrives on pace, intensity, and serendipity. That’s exactly what makes it appealing. At the same time, that’s also where its limitations lie. Twelve minutes can open doors, but they’re no substitute for long-term support. Anyone who truly wants to tackle the promotion of young talent at its roots could make the format even more engaging in the future: with follow-up discussions, small peer groups, an alumni network, or concrete matching opportunities between mentors and mentees. Not as a bureaucratization of the positive spirit behind the program, but as a reinforcement of what was already evident this evening.
A format with the potential to be replicated
The IAA Speedmentoring program demonstrates what industry support looks like at its best: approachable, concrete, and cross-generational. It brings advertisers, agencies, and media representatives together around one table. It fosters conversations that would otherwise rarely take place. And it serves as a reminder that careers grow not only through skills, but also through connections.
Basel was therefore not just another stop along the way. Basel was proof that this format can travel. To Zurich, to Lausanne, to Lucerne—and, in fact, anywhere an industry has realized that the future isn’t shaped by panel discussions, but through direct conversation.
