This week was all about events. The toolbox team worked to put together a module on how to run Nova events for start-up managers. We also got some interesting perspectives from Derek from Startup Grind, the focus group and our first-hand experience at Sunny Fridays.
As someone who usually despises networking events, I've actually grown to like it as each Sunny Friday comes along and I've also learnt a thing or two about organising good networking events.
The thing that I really didn't like about networking events was the superficiality that goes with it. There's a saying that "great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events and small minds discuss people". I would add that in networking events bored minds discuss weather. This used to be the case where a bunch of strangers would meet and try to find common ground by talking about weather and would get stuck in that conversation if one of the parties wouldn't steer the conversation in another direction.
Nova is all about connecting great minds and I think we should leverage our network to organise events that can breakthrough that level of superficiality where people move beyond discussions about the weather, events and people to discuss ideas. I do understand the importance of informal chats and creating a relaxed environment where people aren't forced to talk about certain topics but some guidance can add more value to networking events. My suggestions would be:
- Having some sort of introduction right at the start and a couple of ice breaking questions that get people talking and then they can branch out to other conversation topics
- Having a theme for networking events, especially if we do it on a monthly basis in the Nova network e.g. entrepreneurship, language skills exchange etc
- Having more than just networking - some fun activities e.g. trivia quizzes, photo booths etc to bring engage the attendees a little more
- Crowd sourcing - asking attendees if there are certain topics they want to discuss and allow them to lead discussion groups within the event
I also like the suggestions by Artur in his post and think we should try and experiment with some of those for the next Sunny Fridays and also the Nova experience!
Rucha
As someone who usually despises networking events, I've actually grown to like it as each Sunny Friday comes along and I've also learnt a thing or two about organising good networking events.
The thing that I really didn't like about networking events was the superficiality that goes with it. There's a saying that "great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events and small minds discuss people". I would add that in networking events bored minds discuss weather. This used to be the case where a bunch of strangers would meet and try to find common ground by talking about weather and would get stuck in that conversation if one of the parties wouldn't steer the conversation in another direction.
Nova is all about connecting great minds and I think we should leverage our network to organise events that can breakthrough that level of superficiality where people move beyond discussions about the weather, events and people to discuss ideas. I do understand the importance of informal chats and creating a relaxed environment where people aren't forced to talk about certain topics but some guidance can add more value to networking events. My suggestions would be:
- Having some sort of introduction right at the start and a couple of ice breaking questions that get people talking and then they can branch out to other conversation topics
- Having a theme for networking events, especially if we do it on a monthly basis in the Nova network e.g. entrepreneurship, language skills exchange etc
- Having more than just networking - some fun activities e.g. trivia quizzes, photo booths etc to bring engage the attendees a little more
- Crowd sourcing - asking attendees if there are certain topics they want to discuss and allow them to lead discussion groups within the event
I also like the suggestions by Artur in his post and think we should try and experiment with some of those for the next Sunny Fridays and also the Nova experience!
Rucha
Rucha I totally agree, next Sunny Friday we will implement something interesting.
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