Knowledge Café: Number of Participants The ideal number of participants is between 12 and 24

The standard Knowledge Café process is designed to cater for between 12 and 24 people.  For smaller or larger numbers it does not work so well for a number of reasons.

For less than 12 people, certainly less than 9 there is not the diversity of thought and energy in the room for the Café to work well.

And over 30, it loses many of its benefits as it is less intimate, takes longer, microphones are needed, and you cannot form a circle, etc.

But with a little ingenuity and adaptation, the Café can be run for any number of people as long as the associated limitations do not compromise the Café purpose.

One simple solution as the number of participants gets large is to run two or more cafes concurrently – even in the am room – maybe like this one for 100 people.

Let’s explore this in more detail for a range of sizes:

• Very small (3 to 5 people)

Pair people in twos rather than threes or fours

• Small (5 – 12 people)

…

• Medium (12 – 18 people)

…

• Ideal (18 – 24 people)

This is the ideal size

• Large (24 – 50 people)

Starts to get difficult but not impossible to form the circle

• Very Large (50+ people)

Impossible to form a circle

Microphones needed

Loses intimacy

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