By Claire Woodward
If you lean introverted, the first question you might ask when invited to go somewhere is… how many people will be there? You need to know if a hiking group will have 3 or 25 people. If it’s 3 people, it won’t be hard to talk with everyone (and you’ll likely already know them) . If it’s 25, you might have to interact with people you don’t know well. If you’re headed somewhere with 100+ people, you might have banded together with a handful of friends to navigate the large group social dynamics.
One of the variables that we collect while observing organizations is how many people show up. We’ve found that most convenings (meetings, events, or activities) are quite small . Looking at data collected between March 2023 and March 2024, we see that having 2-10 participants in a convening is the most common distribution followed by the 10-20 range. In these small convenings, we suspect many participants are interacting with people they already know pretty well
There is a noteworthy number of larger convenings (over 40). Many of these are religious congregations. However, if you think of showing up to an event with over 100 people, unless you lean extroverted, you’re more likely to still interact in a smaller groups. There will be lots of people in small groups that already know each other well. In turn, participants might be able to avoid interacting with new people.
In our data, there is a noticeable drop off in the numbers of convenings where 20-40 people show up. In this range, people might have to interact with new people depending on the kind of convening.
Believe it or not, this trend holds across both in-person and virtual convenings!
We’d love to hear what you think of this finding. The 2-20 range is the most common distribution, so is it the best? The most effective in creating relationships or building social capital? The least intimidating for the introverts of the world? Comment below!
Leave a Reply