If you have attended college, a film festival, or a conference then you have probably sat in on a panel where selected individuals with arbitrary specific knowledge or accomplishments sit on a raised platform and speak to an audience. Sometimes, at the end, the audience, which is seated in less comfortable chairs and banned from eating or drinking is allowed to ask questions.
The audience is, from my personal observations, usually, and almost expected to be, awed by what the panel members have to say. However, more often than not the audience has had more probing and creative questions and insights than the panel members.
This prompts two thoughts for me. First, what does it take to become a panel member? I ask this not just because I want a more comfortable seat, free food, and more attention, but because they seem to be passionate about what they do. They know people that are passionate. They interact, joke, and take risks.
Second, how can we capture the energy, minus the typical hierarchy, of panels in every day life?
My answer to this is “spontaneous panels.” Panels that start on a park bench with one panelist, and are allowed to morph. Ideally, passers by will join and add their two cents.The success of this idea, or the institution of this idea to be more specific, rests on the willingness of my peers to participate.