andrea resmini

We did it again.
Last year in Rome, this year in Trento.
Last year a one-day gig, this year a two-days opus. What didn't change was the enthusiasm: 230 people attended the free conference, and it looks like they loved what they saw and heard. After some long planning and kung-fu fighting, the Second Italian IA Summit is now behind our back, and it's been a success. Let me tell you why.

But please indulge me: I won't talk about the international speakers, or the presentations, or even the buffet. I want to deal with small details, and tell you about what I think worked swell.

The Tomato

Although the debate is still raging as to whether that was a real tomato or possibly one of the world-famous local apples, I can testify that our inside man and IA extraordinaire, Dario Betti, suggested we use the Pomodoro Technique ^[1] and not the Apple Technique. The basic idea is that a kitchen timer in the shape of a common red tomato provides visual and audio feedback of running time and helps focusing on tasks, at the same time easing out the anxiety. Our dead-brain version of the rather sophisticated technique was welcomed with mild skepticism by some, but in the end it proved to be more than useful and became the Summit's heartbeat, helping our speakers to be both more relaxed and in time. In the whole the Summit, totaling 19 talks, ran just 15 minutes late on both days.

The sinusoid

This year we had more proposals than we expected at the beginning, and this led to a number of difficult exclusions. In the end, the final rooster showed a clear fracture between the more theoretical approach of academic and public administration works and the more client-oriented case-studies of the professionals. Given the fact that we also had a number of carefully chosen international speakers whose work was to frame the different sides of the relationship between IA and innovation, we went for what I call the sinusoid approach and someone else dubbed the grolla effect ^[2]. We checked our time slots, and then built a wave-like rhythm of one international speaker, one in-deep talk, one lighter talk, and then a break. When the schedule imposed more slots, we added a little variation to the scheme, like the 15-minute-talks on Friday afternoon. As usual, no rocket-science, but it worked like a charm.

The Five Minute Madness

As for the Tomato, this is nothing we came up with. We imported it. Straight from the IA Summit and EuroIA. The Five Minute Madness is a freestyle moment, after the closing note, when everybody is free to grab the microphone and speak up. At the international summits we witnessed job postings, conversions, incredible stand-up comedy, pranks, you name it. But, with the notable exception of the bits about the buttered cat paradox ^[3] and the proposals concerning biocombustible, phodopobased renovable energy sources^[4] which inexplicably did not make it to the podium, we were suprised to see how everybody got involved pretty quick in the game and used this unconference-like freedom like naturals. This was an important sign that we brought the message home: the Summit is ours, this is our community.

The community

I said that more than once from the stage: we firmly believe that what matters most is the community-making, as Italy, as too often happens, is lagging well behind the US and the rest of Europe as well. If the First Summit was a wake-up call, the Second aimed at consolidating a community of practice. As Eric Reiss said in his opening keynote, let's be islands no more: can I say we, and I mean everyone in Trento, succeeded? I believe so. Kudos, everyone.

Now, where next?