By now, hopefully all of you know we have Chef Community Summits in Seattle (Oct. 14-15) and London (Nov. 3-4) this Fall. Always some of the most engaging events of the year for the Chef Community, the Summits are organized as facilitated Open Space events. This helps ensure everyone has a chance to participate, the topics discussed are the right topics, and the outcomes are best for everyone.
But you don’t need to take our word for it. Official Awesome Chef Matt Wrock was kind enough to share his experience at last year’s Summit in Seattle – his first – and what made the biggest impressions on him after two days in the heart of our Community. Here’s what Matt had to say:
“Last year was my first Community Summit and also my first open space event. I was a little apprehensive at first. I’m not a naturally outgoing person and I was envisioning awkward silence as people stared at me wondering why I was not gregariously blabbing or perplexed at my incoherent ramblings.
Turned out these fantasies were unfounded and this ended up being one of the most enjoyable and productive social events I have attended in years.
First, there were a ton of interesting topics and it was easy to find many I was passionate about. Since I was passionate about them, it made it easy to participate.
Second, I learned that the Chef Community is composed largely of just plain “good people” (this was reinforced at ChefConf 2015). I like to think that a good Chef slogan would be:
Chef – I came for the technology and stayed for the community.
People are nice, welcoming and fun to be with. This is a vibe I totally appreciate. I consider myself a stereotypical privileged straight white dude, but it gives me hope for our species when I see communities eagerly grant privilege broadly to those who are not like me. I really think it says something when members of a community are comfortable to be openly different and their fellow community members treat them with respect.
Finally, sessions had real impact. The most notable of these for me was the Test-Kitchen session. This session continued beyond the Summit in the ‘Community collaborative form’, resulting in Test-Kitchen 1.4.
Cant wait to do this again this year.”
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We’d like to thank Matt for not only his time and thoughtfulness in this assessment of the Summit experience, but for all his contributions to the Chef Community. And speaking (again) of Community, we hope to see you all at one (or both!) of the Summits this Fall.