New Theme for Next Networking Event: Bring Your Creativity

I've been asked a few times what the theme will be for the next event. After a bit of thinking I decided that while it's great to have themes about particular industries and gets people thinking of new ideas, it would be really great if we could puts all of those great ideas together and create some value to share with everyone. As my emails note the primary intention of the events is to bring together a wide range of minds. That wide range of experience and knowledge can lead to a wonderfully wide range of ideas. So we will try something new: brainstorming.

Here's what I have in mind. While the regular interactive networking is going on, I will have poster boards or something for capturing ideas. We'll set a new topic each month to address and ask everyone to contribute some ideas. So for the first month we'll do something easy, "tips on how to make businesses more green." With two to three dozen diverse people we can easily come up with a list of 100 or more ideas.

This of course won't take away from the regular networking since the brainstorming will be mostly silent (like a silent auction). And since one of my areas of research expertise is creativity, especially in groups, I can take some time in a separate room to facilitate a more interactive brainstorming session if needed.