In the rapidly changing media world, to succeed, companies can’t just keep pace – the need to look ahead. That’s the theme of the Cynopsis Big TV Conference, taking place September 27-28 in NYC. Drew Corry, MAGNA’s SVP, Group Director, Strategic Investment and Media Research, will be on hand to offer the kind of insights and fresh thinking that can help executives overcome challenges and find new opportunities in today’s ecosystem. Here’s a preview.

What do you consider the biggest threat to the media ecosystem right now?

Legacy thinking and an inability to change quickly. Audiences and consumers shift areas of focus at radical speeds. Combining that with the exponential impact of technology has created a media environment changes on a minute-by-minute basis. This requires clients and agencies to be dynamic and fluid at all moments during the consumer journey. Disruptive technology like AI creates threats and opportunities on a daily basis. Lastly, identifying large cultural moments and scaled audiences having a common experience seems harder to come by versus 15 or 20 years ago. Those are some of the moments that marketers covet.

What is the most important change you think companies need to make to keep pace with consumer behavior?

Given the myriad of communication platforms and touchpoints advertiser have with consumers, having a clear position as brand and voice is critical. Brands need to be able to be authentic when trying to communicate their messages on all platforms, from TikTok, to Snap, to Reddit, to Netflix to Amazon, to NBCU.

You’re speaking on a Big TV panel about Gen Z. What is one lesson you expect the audience to take away from the panel?

While technology has created the opportunity for Gen Zers to have unique individual experiences with their media, it remains important for brands to create and be a part of cultural moments that bond people of different backgrounds around centralized and common experiences.