Announcing the Green Business Camp UnConference
We’re so excited to unveil Green Business Camp to you. Like you, we’ve been to MANY diverse conferences, presentations and seminars focused on green business. And although many of them have been wonderful and very informative we frequently left thinking “did that help me make progress with my business”, or “well, now what? How do I apply this new learning to me and my business?” Plus, we always felt like we managed to meet many of the other attendees; who we’re certain had some great experience and knowledge that we could have learned from.
From BarCamp to Green Business Camp
With this in mind, we decided to create our own event based on the creative spirit of BarCamp (a pioneering “user-generated” event born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment). We’ve created a mashup of BarCamp, green business, added a few additional tweaks …. and Green Business Camp was born. We’ll bring you the same powerful environment of creative, collaboration, and knowledge sharing, where you’ll make new business contacts and friends.
Let us tell you a bit about what Green Business Camp is …
Green Business Camp is a participation-oriented, entrepreneur-driven, one day “unconference” in the San Francisco Bay Area dedicated to the growth of green business. It will be taking place at the Greenv Sustainable Center in South San Francisco on Thursday April 30, 2009 from 8 am -5 pm. This event will give you the opportunity to network, collaborate, and share knowledge with 100 top green business owners and entrepreneurs in the San Francisco Bay Area. Ready to attend? Check out our registration page.
Never been to an Unconference?
Then you’re in for a lot of excitement! Green Business Camp isn’t your typical conference filled with PowerPoint presentations. Instead, in our innovative event program the participants themselves will create and lead event sessions. This will bring out the best ideas of the group and allow everyone to share knowledge and resources with other green businesses. Have a topic you would like to lead a discussion on? Want help with a business challenge you are facing? Or, perhaps you want feedback on a new idea or venture? Submit a discussion topic and get your own brainstorming team to help you.
This video gives you a taste of what an unconference is like. (One difference will be that their attendees are giving short pitches on their new startups, we’ll have breakout sessions for group discussion and brainstorming on topics selected by event participants.)
Most of the agenda will be created by participants during the first hour of the event. We’ll be pulling topics from the above document or you can bring business topics for discussions that you want to lead or participate in. All of these topics will be voted on and organized into a schedule and from there you will choose which you want to attend. From there, the topics that were voted on will be discussed in a 45 minute breakout session of approximately 20 people. By the end of the day you will have attended 5-6 of breakout sessions where you’ll have met a few dozen other interesting green businesspeople.
The day will kick off with a special “Art of Networking” workshop to give you tools and techniques to more easily make new business contacts and future business partners during the event. We’ll end the day with a nice and relaxing wine tasting reception. OK, now join us!
Sill not sure? Sign up for our newsletter and get on-going updates that will keep you informed. See you at Green Business Camp.
Comments
2 Responses to “Announcing the Green Business Camp UnConference”Sustainable/Ecofriendly/Green packaging would be a useful topic. Especially for those businesses that do a lot of shipping.
I am truly energized and inspired by everything this conference and ‘un-conference’ is about. It would be wonderful to have a ‘virtual’ way to participate and learn via teleclass or the like, for those like I in Cleveland still working to overcome economic and health challenges. I have wonderful family there and it would be terrific to work out a way to attend. Many thanks for your economically inclusive rate structure. My own social venture company (Kade Social Ventures) is just getting off the ground and I am just happy to have been in the midst of a sustainability rennaissance here in Cleveland, OH the past six years. I am most interested in helping to effect social and environmental justice in a meaningful and prolific way, co-creating with others to effect the changes so sorely needed here in this city and region. Thanks so much for all you do and represent!
Many Kind Regards and Best Wishes,
Sudhir Kade Raghupathy
Principal
Kade Social Ventures
Founder, Net Impact Cleveland
Board, Neocitizensleague.org
Partner, REALNEO.Coop