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The importance of large groups of 100 to 1,000, based on reactive people

Although very large groups now represent a new horizon showing that it is possible to work with thousands of people and maybe more, large groups of a hundred thousand people are of particular interest for two reasons.

Before beeing very large groups of several thousand or even tens or hundreds of thousands people, groups start with only several hundreds members. It is therefore important to understand the way large groups operate to allow the emergence of very large groups. Besides, many subjects have not for vocation to gather thousands of people. Even if it is necessary to increase - sometimes a little artificially – groups of several dozens persons to exceed a hundred, it's not always always possible to increase all groups beyond several hunders or thousands of people. The work groups of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) which develop each standrads for the internet are typically of some hundred people. Same for the different groups to which the project Imagination for People provides support as a partner and which are interested in identifying and supporting projects for a particular side of social innovation (Fab labs, third places, currencies, innovation in the South, energy, group management ...).
However, these large groups require to take into account the particular reactive and not just proactive persons who in this case are not enough.

In brief

Once a group exceeds a dozen members, each person takes a proactive reactive, observer or inactive posture, and can switch from one to another according to various criteria. We observe in a rather counterintuitive way that the percentage of active persons remains outstandingly even (90-9-1principle): proactive people are between one and some per cent and reactive people between ten and dozens per cent.

We can deduct from it that groups can be identified by the number of members:
  • Small groups up to twelve persons who can be managed in a constraint way (While waiting for an action of each of the various members) ;
  • Intermediate groups between a dozen and a hundred people who require more efforts in management to obtain reactions ;
  • Large groups between a hundred and one or several thousand people who enable to produce collaboratively... under conditions to focus on reactive persons ;
  • Intermediate very large groups of several thousand people among where the proactive members's group is hard to keep coherent ;
  • Very large groups over dozens of thousands people where proactiove persons are numerous enough to make management less constrained ;

Large groups between a hundred and one or several thousand people are of particular interest: they are a must for groups who are likely to become very large, and mostly they are a size that corresponds to the number of people which can be gathered around many specific topics. But they need to take a particular care to members who act proactively (they can be approached in online systems with push tools such a email, Facebook or Twitter rather than pull tools as the web or forums) and not only to proactive people who are not numerous enough.


Mot clé: #taille28

1 alliance. Wiktionnaire [online]. [Accessed 30 January 2014]. Available from: http://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/alliance
2 CORNU, Jean-Michel. Donner : une capacité naturelle mais limitée. In : Tirer bénéfice du don: pour soi, pour la société, pour l’économie [online]. Limoges, France : FYP, 2013. Stimulo, ISSN 2265-7754. ISBN 978-2-916571-87-4. Available from: http://www.cornu.eu.org/news/donner-une-capacite-naturelle-mais-limitee
3 DUNBAR, Robin. Theory of mind and the evolution of language. Approaches to the Evolution of Language. 1998. P. 92–110.
4 GONCALVES, Bruno, PERRA, Nicola and VESPIGNANI, Alessandro. Validation of Dunbar’s number in Twitter conversations. arXiv preprint arXiv:1105.5170 [online]. 2011. [Accessed 30 January 2014]. Available from: http://arxiv.org/abs/1105.5170
5 CORNU, Jean-Michel. Donner : une capacité naturelle mais limitée. In : Tirer bénéfice du don: pour soi, pour la société, pour l’économie [online]. Limoges, France : FYP, 2013. Stimulo, ISSN 2265-7754. ISBN 978-2-916571-87-4. Available from: http://www.cornu.eu.org/news/donner-une-capacite-naturelle-mais-limitee
6 NOUBEL, Jean-François. Intelligence collective, la révolution invisible. TheTransitioner? [online]. 2007. [Accessed 30 January 2014]. Available from: http://thetransitioner.org/Intelligence_Collective_Revolution_Invisible_JFNoubel.pdf
7 BENTHAM, Jeremy. Panopticon; or, The inspection-house: containing the idea of a new principle of construction applicable to any sort of establishment, in which persons of any description are to be kept under inspection: and in particular to penitentiary-houses, prisons, houses of industry ... and schools: with a plan of management adapted to the principle: in a series of letters, written in the year 1787, from Crecheff in white Russia. To a friend in England. Gloucester, Royaume-Uni : Dodo Press, 2008. ISBN 978-1-4099-5202-2.
8This corresponds approximately to the maximum size of a human family, the size of human groups before the establishment of villages in the Neolithic or the maximum size of the small jazz bands that do not have a conductor to ensure direction, unlike "big bands"...
9In constrained environment such as fire brigades in action, a hierarchical level is added as soon as the level n-2 exceeds 12 people (and not the level n-1 immediately dbelow as in the other cases). During a forest fire for example, the trucks of 4 people have a leader each. When it is necessary to mobilize 4 trucks (16 people 4 leaders) a leader of higher grade is named.
10 Règle du 1 %. Wikipédia [online]. [Accessed 30 January 2014]. Available from: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%A8gle_du_1_%25
11 Les observateurs dans les groupes. Fing : groupe intelligence collective [online]. [Accessed 30 January 2014]. Available from: http://ic.fing.org/news/les-observateurs-dans-les-groupes
12This does not happen with reactive people that react to proposals from managers or other reactive people but interact less with each other and therefore do not constitute a sub-group but only a part of the main group.
13 In 2012 the Internet Nouvelle Génération Foundation has developed a tool enabling to contribute by email (push approach) on forums, to set on one's social network (pull approach) when the question is about about collective works such as Digital Question or Digiworks gathering between one and three participants : Réseau social de la Fing. Réseau FING [online]. [Accessed 30 January 2014]. Available from: http://www.reseaufing.org/
14The Adeo group (13 DIY trademarks across the world: Leroy Merlin, Weldom...) tested in 2013 the combination of email and forum in order to send only questions, selections of contributions and summaries to the 1,500 members of the group who were exchanging on the definition of the group's strategy. In that case, everyone would receive by mail the same (limited) information and only the proactive members would search, if they wanted, the details on the forum (pull tool).
15The group on digital prospective from Franche Comt̩ uses a discussion list to exchange, but some members have chosen not to receive mails from the list (eventhough they belong to it in order to contribute). But they receive carbon copies - for the moment in a manual way Рof important emails: summaries and invitations.
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Tools for conviviality

Card's author : Laurent Marseault
Card's type of licence : Creative Commons BY-SA
Description : But which tool to use ? Which is the ideal tool ? Do you have models of specifications for perfect collaborative tools ?
I am often asked these questions.
It appears that the notion of collaborative tools helps us a little bit more over the essential question of the tool.

This notion is proposed by Ivan Illich, philosopher of ecological politics. For him, tools (understood in a broad sense, including technical means, institutions) alienate individuals and deprive them of autonomy. Their generalized use maybe heading to counterproductivity.

3 conditions for tools for conviviality

Illich proposes clear and simple specifications for what he calls tools for conviviality:
  • it must generate efficiency without damaging personal autonomy
  • it must not arouse slaves nor masters
  • it must widen the personal range

These three conditions applied to corporations and to technical means restore the place of individuals, allowing them to be actors in systems on which they have set on. Humans need that, humanity needs that.

The stressful library

In a library of the South of France, employees have today a « thin client » as workstation. It's a computer terminal connected to a server centre. Every night, the computer is done up as new, only personal files are saved. Any software settled by users (when it is possible), any customizations are deleted during the night. This system said to be very efficient by the IT services is considered as unbearable by librarians, generating a tangible psychic sufferings. Attempts of evolution towards more conviviality have been systematically rejected causing the withdrawal of those who were improving their Institution for the users' good.

The map that gives ideas

Freeplane is a small software of mindmapping or heuristic mapping. Used with groups to help them summarizing the richness of their exchanges, it allows to make ideas and their complements visible. Rather systematically it gives desires and ideas to people who have used it. It's a freeware easy to handle, and to divert for new uses. It's the archetypal tool for conviviality.

Cooperation, networks and conviviality

A network, a group which cooperates, joins a process that will need to equip itself and to improve its tools according to the stages of its process. Keeping in mind the conditions needed by tools for conviviality when elaborating organizations and the tools for their management will enable the elaboration of a living, evoluting and learning system. The network, cooperative or collaborative group will become places of learning, of innovations and liberations.
N.B.: free tools are not necessarily for conviviality

To go further:


Credits : outils en chocolat JanneM on Flickr - CC-BY-SA
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Trainer 2.0 : a new way of training

Card's author : Outils-réseaux
Card's type of licence : Creative Commons BY-SA
Description :