Doing introductions with over 200 people

[Ria Baeck]

From the AoH emaillist, summer 2014:

Hi all,

I have a client that is a network organization for folks across the country (US) doing innovative policy work on education. When they started having national meetings about 50 people would attend. They did individual introductions:

where from

accomplishment

what they want to learn, etc.

Now they have 200 people attending so clearly they can't do a round of introductions that takes less than 2 hours. 

Challenge: they want to surface specific things people have accomplished in their city/states or are working on so people can find connections. There is also a range of age and experience in this group. 

Any ideas for how to do this in a way that quickly informs the whole group?

Also, any ideas for ways of building this visually or harvesting the connections throughout the 2-day meeting?

Thanks so much!

Julie

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Hi Julie,

I sometimes use nametags in a bigger format where people can put three things they stand for or they are working on or something like this. So when you meet someone you can quickly have a glance at their nametag and get some more information. Also I let people create their own nametags so put many colourful (good readable colours of course) pens on a table next to reception. Often the first conversations start right there as people are curious to read what others put on their nametags and why.

One thing I've seen at OuiShare Fest in Paris was the Passion wall. You can find a video here on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fp4CexHbWDw

This wall was a big blackboard and you had two people standing in front of it explaining it. They took a photo with a smartphone App which allowed to put your e-mail address in a QR Code. This was printed out and put onto the wall along with something you said was your passion. Over the course of the days they asked more and more people to do so and found some connections and highlighted them with arrows. Also they saw the connections and got back to people with an invitation that at this and that time in front of the passion wall there would be a group having a conversation about a particular topic. If you need more information about this I can put you in touch with the person here in Germany who organised it.

Have a lovely day.

Kind regards from

Dina

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If you use lanyard nametags you can have people do triads to discuss what they are most interested in and them write their name on one side and their question on the other. 

In a room of 200 people it is unlikely that you would ever remember anyone in particular. Pit them in Open Space and they will quickly collaborate and learn the names of those who they need to work with. 

Chris

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For me, beginnings are about building the energy of relationship and connecting the field.

Something I often do, with groups of 20 to several hundred, is:

• whenever possible begin in a circle (even if it requires a couple of rows)
• have 8.5X11 paper and pens and ask everyone to write, in large letters, their name, where they are from, and response to one important question
• mill around the room in silence for about 5 minutes, just acknowledging each other and reading what they have written
• dropping into trios for 10 minutes or so to inquire a bit further into the responses to the question
• repeat once or twice, depending on time constraints
• harvest into the whole what people heard -- or found themselves saying -- that was really helpful

I always use nametags.  My memory sucks.

Cheers,

Bob

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Oh, I love that idea Bob, thanks!!

Keep them coming...you guys have some great ideas. Thank you!

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Dear Julie,

what we sometimes do - and I'm not sure, if it helps you here; but maybe it's an inspiration - is that we ask people to place themselves in the room around a specific center, i.e.  geographically (where were you born? where do you live?)

this is often done as introduction and the people see each others, where they are located in the room. It might also work out, if you let them place themselves in a kind of portfolio (Business - education and local and internalinal as two axis) or how they are interested in things and so on.

I'm not sure, if this helps you but maybe you get a new idea, what might work.

If you do somethign like that, please let me know, how it worked.

 

Best regards

Thomas

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The technique below I've used with 20-30 people so not sure how it will scale; it may spark your thinking.

Quick Way to Map Who is in the Room
http://www.ndcollaborative.com/blog/item/networking-map

This is a nice one to complement other person to person introductions. You put up big pieces of white paper with the questions you want to connect people on. People add in topics and put their name next to it. Others add their name to existing topics or add new ones. These stay on the wall & people can keep adding and referring back to it to find others they'd like to connect with.

Beth

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Hi, everybody!  I agree that name tags can actually help with networking throughout an event.  With more professional clients or events, they’ll likely want pre-printed name tags.  If you have a lot of people signing in at the same time, pre-printed helps speed the process up a bit.  Plus you can make sure the name tags are legible (large first name, smaller last name), add the person’s organization, add your logo, etc.

One thing we’ve done at most NCDD conferences is to offer a whole slew of different badge ribbons that people can attach to their name tags.  Many people want to add their “sponsor,” “presenter,” “member,” etc. ribbons — but some really have fun with it and add a whole bunch of ribbons.  We always order fun ones like “Philosopher,” “Runs With Scissors,” etc.  And we’ll get special ones made for programs we’re running that particular year, like a “Youth Dialogue” program, and to help people know when someone is a “New Member” or “First Time Attendee” so they can help show them some ropes. They’re good conversation starters (“What session are you presenting?”) as well as giving quick glimpses at some things people want to know immediately.

We order them from pcnametag.com, where they’re very affordable. http://www.pcnametag.com/pages/horizontalribbons.aspx  I’ll attach a photo that gives you a sense of what I’m talking about.  Most people will add one or two ribbons, but some people decide to add eight or ten.

I wanted to share that link because this little detail has always worked well for us.  But in terms of Julie’s original question about alternative ways to do introductions, we’re always looking for new ideas for high-energy, effective introductions as well, so I’m very interested in these ideas that are being shared!

One activity I like for the beginning of an event is a “birds of a feather” style networking session. It’s a “light” version of Open Space.  Attendees can identify what topics they’d like to meet others with shared interest around (dialogue in the classroom, trans-partisan dialogue, working with local government, etc.) and then meet for a while, not so much to dig into the topic, but to meet each other and hear what people are working on.  Doing this early in the event increases the likelihood they’ll have more time to connect further later on.

At one of our conferences, we had attendees pre-identify the topics they’d be most interested in connecting with others around, had one of our graphic recorders create a gorgeous map (attached) of where each conversation would take place in the room, and had conference attendees decide where they wanted to sit when they arrived at the conference based on those topics.  The tables were identified with signs with the topic name on them as well, of course.  And we left some tables with blank signs so they could identify additional topics as needed in real time.

This isn’t exactly what Julie was asking for (identifying accomplishments and mapping them), but I wanted to share it anyway! :)  I’m very interested to hear people’s ideas about mapping accomplishments or areas of work.

Two more quick things…

1. In case it’s helpful, my friend and colleague Tree Bressen wrote a great paper outlining different processes that can be used to design transformational conferences.  It’s downloadable at http://ncdd.org/rc/item/4093.  It’s great to use for inspiration and new ideas.

2.  On Tuesday the 29th, NCDD’s next confab call (interactive conference call) is on how to design effective, high energy closing sessions — especially for larger events.  You’re all welcome to join us if you’re interested.  Tim Merry from AoH is one of four NCDD members who will be serving as conversation starters on the call. Lisa Heft is another you may be familiar with; she’s known for using Open Space and other AoH-friendly methodologies.  More info is up at http://ncdd.org/15436 on that confab.  But I wonder if a call on networking strategies for events would be another good confab topic to do soon.  We always do a lot of different activities to promote networking at NCDD conferences (structured as well as non-structured networking opportunities), but I always feel like people want even more networking.  Let me know if you’d be interested in seeing this kind of topic for one of the calls, or perhaps serving as one of the conversation starters if you have a lot of experience in this realm.

Sandy Heierbacher