Subdivide large groups into communities of interest.
technique — attributed to Adrian Segar
Segar's unconference techniques work best at one hundred participants or fewer. For larger gatherings, the move is to subdivide. He cites a five-hundred-person medical-office conference where the obvious split was by medical specialty: ten groups of fifty by oncology, obstetrics, and so on. Each subgroup operates as its own unconference. The principle is that scale is achieved through replication, not through enlargement. The same lesson appears in The College of Extraordinary Experiences (nesting circles of trust) and the Jeffersonian dinner (multiple tables of ten with one facilitator each). The unit of facilitation has a working limit; scaling means more units, not bigger ones.
For convening designers and conference organizers running larger events that want unconference-style participation. The technique requires good prior data about how participants segment into communities of interest.
scale, subdivision, medical-conference, communities-of-interest