If you’ve been following jtrigsby.com for any amount of time, you’ll know that BarCamps are relatively new events for me… and I’m a HUGE fan! November 14th folks will gather from around Memphis, and I guess farther away… because I’m going, for BarCamp Memphis 2. After doing such a great job hosting SocalCamp back in September, the Memphis Academy of Science and Engineering has offered their space again for BarCamp!! If you’ve never heard of MASE, check them out.

BarCamp is an international network of user generated conferences (or unconferences) – open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants. –wikipedia.org

So with BarCamp Memphis coming up, I thought it would be a great time to cover a few ideas for how to make the most of your time at this or any other BarCamp style meeting.

Decide On A Goal
What’s your goal for BarCamp? Do you want to meet new people and network? Do you want to learn about a new technology, programming language, or paradigm? Do you want to share some of what you have learned with others that may be interested in knowing?

Having an idea of your goal will help you choose and shape your day at BarCamp. Since the schedule at these things can be, shall we say, fluid… be flexible but stay on target. You will face the choice of two sessions you’d like to attend. Choose the one that best aligns with your goal. If you do that throughout the day, at the end you’ll be much more satisfied with your results!

Participate
Without a doubt, the single, easiest way to maximize your BarCamp experience is to participate! Listen to the presentations, ask questions, pick people’s brains. Throw your own ideas on the table during presentations. Challenge the thinking of the presenters and those around you with your perspective. By engaging in the conversation you invest more in the experience… and you’ll get far more from it. Oh, and don’t under-estimate the person sitting next to you in a session… you never know who they might be!

Meet New People
Even if your goal has nothing to do with networking or expanding your social circles, don’t spend the whole day with the folks you came with, or worse, by yourself! Put yourself out there, introduce yourself, strike up conversations in the hallways and meeting spaces. There will be TONS of talented, smart people there and they are there to share what they know (that’s kinda the point of BarCamp). But you will never know if you don’t talk to anyone.

And for those of you going to BarCamp Memphis this weekend, I’m going to challenge you one step farther. If you see someone sitting by themselves, not plugging in to the power of the group, reach out to them. Invite them to join you and your friends to eat lunch. Ask them their opinions during sessions and discussions. Go out of your way to include the folks that may otherwise miss out on one of the greatest parts of BarCamp! Don’t make me call you out!

Share
BarCamp is about sharing so it just makes sense that you should share, before, during, and after. A couple of ways you can share during the event are

• Live blog the sessions you attend, you’ll get great notes and folks who couldn’t attend will get the good stuff too
• Tweeting hot quotes and topics. Twitter is rampant at BarCamp… be prepared and be sure to use the hashtag!
• Snap pics with that iPhone and post to Flickr. Don’t keep all the good pics to yourself… share!

Follow Up
Sometimes, events like BarCamp can be a little like drinking from a fire hose. Its not really practical to think you can retain everything you hear. So come prepared to take notes about the sessions and about the people you meet. Yeah, I know, it sound hokey to take notes about people, but its ok. I won’t mind if you make notes about me… would you really mind if someone met you and thought enough about what you had to say to take notes? I didn’t think so.

Of course you can make it easy of folks by having a reasonable supply of calling cards available. DO NOT DEAL THEM LIKE YOU’RE PLAYING TEXAS HOLD ‘EM. No, try talking to people first instead. Hear what they have to say, engage in a conversation. Then, if they’re interested, they may ask for a card or you may offer… but them asking is ALWAYS better. BTW, the cards don’t have to be fancy… you don’t have to spend a ton of money getting them printed or making them perfect. Black letters on a white card that you print on your printer at home will do. Just be sure to include the keys: Name, email address, Twitter handle, blog URL. Everything else is gravy, nice is reasonable doses, deadly if too much.

Ok, there are a few tip and trick. Try them out. If you like them, leave a comment below and let us know how they worked for you. If you find a better way, leave that as well, because we’ll all be attending another BarCamp soon!

@jtrigsby

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