Unconferencing SAP and Beyond: Impressions of the First Barcamp at the AoM Annual Meeting

Currently, the Academy of Management (AoM) hosts its Annual Meeting in Boston. The meeting is mainly organized along various Divisions and Interest Groups and follows fairly standard conference formats such as paper sessions, panels (“Symposiums”) and round table sessions. In all of these sessions, topics, speakers and facilitators are defined in advance, establishing a clear hierarchy between session organizers and speakers on the one hand, and the audience on the other hand.

As this year’s chair of the Strategizing Activities and Practices (SAP) Interest Group, I was thus particularly proud that we managed to bring barcamp-style unconferencing ideas to the AoM Annual Meeting. Together with Madalina Pop and Serey Ergene, we invited participants to pitch ideas for 40-minute round table sessions, engaged in “dotmocracy” and joint session planning. By such an approach we sought to create a space that was open for new and unconventional ideas, transcends hierarchies between contributors and audience as well as provides opportunities for networking.

In the end, we ended up with a program of nine different round tables dealing with the following topics:

• Matthias Wenzel: Challenges moving from SAP to MAP
• Krista Pettit: Putting the Practitioner center stage in SAP
• David Oliver: Identity Work and SAP
• Katharina Dittrich: Reviewing in SAP and beyond
• Julia Hautz: Openness in Strategy
• Vern Glaser: Generative AI and Strategy
• Krista Pettit: Strategy as Future Making
• Susan Hilbolling: Methodological Challenges in SAP research
• Milena Leybold: How to make SAP more inclusive as an Interest Group?

Given the positive feedback received by the participants, I expect this format to become a regular part of the SAP program at the AoM Annual Meetings. Please check out some photos of the unconferencing session below: