The Association of National Advertisers is asking marketing professionals to set aside their daily work on Sept. 17 for a full-day program focused on AI skills and the changing shape of marketing jobs. The annual Global Day of Learning, organized by the ANA Global CMO Growth Council, will run from 9am to 5pm with master classes, workshops and conversations built around the theme "The Future of Marketing Work."
More than 20,000 marketing professionals and students from over 100 countries have taken part in the event over the past three years. This year's program responds to priorities identified by marketing leaders worldwide, with AI as the central focus.
"AI isn't simply giving marketers another set of tools," said Nick Primola, Group Executive Vice President at the ANA and leader of the Global CMO Growth Council. "It's forcing us to reconsider what skills matter, where human judgment creates the most value and how the marketing organization itself needs to evolve."
The ANA frames the day as "PTO - Personal Time ON," urging marketers to put aside everyday tools and deadlines in favor of skill-building. The "Push Pause and Power Up" theme is meant to emphasize preparation rather than slowing the industry's adoption of new technology.
Hands-on AI workshops
Cord Silverstein, CEO of IntegrateAI, will lead a workshop on building and deploying Custom GPTs and AI agents using platforms including ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot and Gemini. Participants will develop agents tailored to their own marketing responsibilities.
A separate session will cover synthetic audiences - AI-generated audience panels used to test claims, messaging and creative concepts before human research and market testing. Veronica Ripson, Head of Learning Experience at U of Digital, will lead that session.
For marketing professionals looking to build these skills independently, the AI for Marketing resource collection and the AI Learning Path for Marketing Managers offer structured training aligned with the competencies covered in the event.
Rethinking marketing roles
The program also addresses the broader skills marketers may need as traditional roles and organizational structures change. Raja Rajamannar, former Chief Marketing and Communications Officer at Mastercard, will deliver a keynote on the disruption of traditional marketing frameworks and what he calls the era of "Quantum Marketing."
Rishad Tobaccowala, Co-Founder of The Athena Project, will discuss future-proofing marketer relevance, including the skills and habits professionals will need as AI changes marketing organizations and individual roles.
Other sessions will cover cross-media measurement, challenger brands, creator marketing, B2B growth, sustainability and co-creation.
Why this matters for marketers
The event's value is practical rather than speculative. Marketers who attend will leave with AI agents built for their own workflows, exposure to synthetic audience testing methods, and a clearer sense of which skills will differentiate them as AI compresses routine marketing tasks. For those who cannot attend, the session topics - Custom GPTs, AI agents, synthetic audiences - signal the specific capabilities that marketing organizations are starting to expect.
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