This post was mentioned on Twitter by bp3bpm: Blog Post: Set the Date: A #BPM Unconference #bpmCamp http://bit.ly/sYGpg...

agreed, the mix is tricky. but we’re *borrowing* from unconference and barcamp techniques, we are not claiming to be purists by any means. we just want to have a good event and address topics the people coming care about. I’m just a pragmatist so I’ll borrow from what ever seems to work best…

scott

You need to be careful about the mix of prepared content and self-organizing content — you can’t really call it an unconference if there is a significant portion of the former.

I reserved a bpmCamp url as well -but different suffix :) didn’t realize you were the holder of bpmCamp.org ;)

Definitely interested in your recommendations on the Open Space front- I can’t guarantee we’ll go that route but at this point I’m open to all suggestions (after all, how would it be any kind of unconference if we didn’t do that?!). I think that because prepared content will be valuable, we’ll do some of the organizing/brainstorming of topics in advance – but we’ll leave plenty of open time as well. We’ll try to strike a balance – as you say, we’re going to be experimenting a bit.

Regarding single vendor – I can imagine doing a good multi-vendor conference, but I wanted to start with something where there would be little to no boundaries about what could be discussed and everyone would still be on common ground. You can’t talk about specific APIs cross-vendor very easily, or specific scaling concerns, or specific UI tricks or features. So, we’ll give it a try and then take a step back and see how much of it was actually vendor-specific vs. vendor-neutral and that should give us some really good information going forward about what the balance is, and we’ll poll attendees about it as well.

We’re excited. I think this is going to be a really fun event and concept to get kickstarted in our business. After reading steve blank’s “motion vs. action” post, it really reinforced that if we want something to change, we’re going to have to act.

Finally, I just want to thank you for your advice and support, Sandy.

I believe that there is a place for a vendor-independent BPM camp, but using a single vendor’s clients to kick things off is a promising start to test the format. The biggest challenges, I believe, will be encouraging people who are accustomed to being spoon-fed at typical conferences to create and facilitate their own sessions, as well as get the corporate approval necessary for attending an unconference.