Today was the second Friday meeting at Red Rock Coffee that we ran two different tables to accommodate a group of more than 30 attendees. We did some more planning after last month and asked Lenny Greenberg of Assistyx and MB Dean of Douglas Partners to act as a facilitator at each table. We appreciate their support on this very much.
We feel that the promise of serious conversation is best supported by table sizes of no more than 16. In the Red Rock Coffee (Mountain View) and Omega Restaurant (Milpitas) venues we have the space to support two tables and will do so as advance registration indicates demand.
In Palo Alto we are going to limit the table size to 14 to allow for a comfortable fit in the room; we may try something different in Sunnyvale. The two table format seemed to work well, the informal networking after the formal conversation ended at 10:30 lasted another hour and there was good discussion–and some occasional laughter–at both tables.
We will continue to experiment and welcome any suggestions.