Zooming out BY AIPC CEO SVEN BOSSU AND WESTMINISTER UNIVERSITY VISITING LECTURER MARK BANNISTER
niversities and organised events face a similar challenge : how to create communities in an environment in which on Monday you are allowed to bring people physically together and by Wednesday you need to switch to fully digital ? This is not a theoretical question : local authorities , with the lessons learned earlier this year in mind , want to shift gears quickly – leaving the community impact to be managed by universities and event organisers .
For the sake of simplicity , let us consider university colleges in parallel with organised events , they both aim to bring individuals together for a common cause : to get a better understanding of a topic as a group and to stimulate each other to explore routes which will potentially enrich the subject matter . Sounds like they both have a lot in common . And the key success factor is the same : the interaction between the members of
the community .
Then the ‘ switch on / switch off ’ ban on bringing people together comes in . Fortunately , universities and the event industry have another thing in common : great , creative minds which understand that innovative ideas are a network .
Universities and event venues both understood quickly that platforms needed to be created , allowing them to cope with uncertainty and to have a Plan B on continuous standby . From an event venue ’ s perspective , this allowed them to create a new value proposal : provide event organisers with a service offer which allows them to switch from physical to hybrid and to digital . However , creating connectivity alone , does not have interaction as a logical consequence – a bit more effort is required .
And here , both universities and the event ecosystem need to look outside the box – or rather look into a different box such as the gaming area .
Creating connectivity alone , does not have interaction as a logical consequence – a bit more effort is required .”
The key force of virtual gaming is the creation of challenges which can be shared by a community , allowing that community to grow as a group . Translated into education and organised events , this means models need to be found whereby individuals can team up and jointly accept a challenge – resulting both in the creation of a real community and ( potentially ) of innovative ideas .
A simple model could look like this : a participant attends a set of lectures around a specific topic . At the end , they are presented with a set of challenges related to the topic . However , they will need to create a group of five persons and tackle the challenge together . And they have only 48 hours to do so . The game is on …
AIPC will trial such a model when rolling out its Masterclass later this year and will work closely together with Westminster University on not only creating a model but also monitoring what happens in terms of community creation and , of course , in terms of outcome . Because , in the end , that is what will make us evolve as communities : innovation as the result of ideas being connected .
It is our ambition that by zooming out from digital / physical aspects and zooming in on purpose , we will be able to create value for all the stakeholders involved – especially the students and event participants looking to actively contribute to the creation of a great future .
10 / CONFERENCE & MEETINGS WORLD / ISSUE 109