Most organizers book a speaker. The better move is to bring someone into the design of the experience.
TEDxFreiburg. 300 people learning a secret handshake.
Photo: David Junghans
”Jan is our secret sauce for this program!
Karen ElliottConference Planner, AdvantAge Ontario
We've worked with him every year since 2021 because has all the tools to make our program fun and interactive.
A typical conference day
08:30
Coffee and muffins
Waiting
09:00
Welcome and Logistics
Watching
09:15
Thanking the sponsors
Watching
09:30
Opening Keynote
Watching
10:30
Another Keynote
Watching
11:00
Another Keynote
Watching
11:30
Panel Discussion
Watching
...
and so on...
Eight hours, and almost every block asks the same thing of your attendees: Sit still and face forward.
All of it is excellent content.
All of it is also available on YouTube.
Attendees pay real money for the connections and experience.
Not for the content they could have watched from home.
Most organizers see the gap and add a “networking reception”. Loud music, dim lighting, a cash bar, and a room full of people shouting over each other.
It works for the handful who are good at working a room. Everyone else does a lap, checks their phone, and leaves early. For anyone quiet, introverted, new to the industry, or sensitive to noise, it is the hardest hour of the day.
You cannot bolt connection on at the end.
It has to be woven into the design of the experience.
Here are four ways I can help:
#1 Interactive Keynote
A talk where half the time belongs to the room
If you are looking for someone to speak for an hour without involving the audience, I am not your person.
In my keynotes, roughly half the time is spent with attendees talking to each other. They learn something, then they use it immediately, on the person sitting beside them. That is why it sticks, and it is why people leave the room already knowing two or three people they did not know before.
My signature talk is Stop Breaking the Ice, based on my book The Campfire Method.
They walk away able to:
- Recognize why the most popular icebreakers backfire
- Choose the right connection activity for the group in front of them
- Get buy-in from a skeptical room
- Run three activities I hand them on the spot
Best for: opening sessions, closing sessions, and any moment where the energy needs to shift. Works in person and virtually, from 50 to 2,000 people.
”Jan was the opening act and the closing act at our 16th Change Days Festival in Barcelona. He knows how to create connection, and he makes it easy to include the quieter ones. His energy is never overwhelming. Highly recommended.
Jessica BreitenfeldChange Days Festival, Barcelona, October 2024
#2 MC and Stage Host
The person who holds the room between the sessions
A good MC does more than read bios. The transitions are where your event either builds momentum or leaks it. I learn every talk beforehand, prepare real questions for the Q&As, and use the ninety seconds between sessions to get the room talking to each other instead of checking their phones.
By the afternoon, the audience isn’t a room full of strangers watching speakers. It’s a community.
Best for: single-track conferences, awards nights, and multi-speaker days where the program is strong but the room stays flat.
”Human Resource Professionals Association of Canada
Melissa McQuillanHuman Resource Professionals Association of Canada
#3 Connection Experiences
Sometimes people just need an invitation to talk to a stranger
The awkwardness peaks early. Day one, before anyone has found their people. If you can get past that in the first fifteen minutes, the rest of your event runs differently.
So that is usually where I start. A short facilitated session at the very beginning, before the first keynote, that gets everyone talking to the people around them. It can be as little as fifteen minutes.
It also works as a breakout between two heavy content blocks, or right before a break, so attendees carry the conversation into the hallway instead of reaching for their phones.
Typical formats:
- A 15 to 30 minute opener before your first session
- A 60 to 90 minute breakout workshop
- A pre-break connection session that spills into the break
- A closing session that turns the room into a community before people leave
Best for: organizers who already have a full program and need connection woven into it rather than added on top.
”Jan opened our inaugural Inclusive Facilitation Exchange Conference in London with an ice-melting workshop. It was an extremely successful session with fantastic feedback from the attendees, which really set the atmosphere for the whole day. Jan was top of our list when we were putting our programme together, and he delivered everything we had hoped and more. I would highly recommend Jan for workshops and events, particularly as an opening or ending session where maximum impact is needed.
Jenny MartinOrganizer of the Inclusive Facilitation Exchange Conference, London, March 2025
#4 The Campfire Lounge
A physical space at your event where real conversations happen
Not a networking lounge with high tables and a branded backdrop. An actual campfire, built with LED fire, low seating, and conversation cards on every surface.
People wander in during a break expecting to sit down for five minutes. They stay for forty. They tell you afterward it was their favourite part of the conference, and they are surprised by that, because nothing was on the agenda.
The Lounge runs across your whole event. I set it up, I facilitate short sessions inside it at scheduled moments, and the rest of the time it does its work on its own.
What it includes:
- LED campfire installation and seating designed for conversation
- Conversation cards throughout the space
- Facilitated sessions at set times during the day
- Design and setup handled by me, so it is not another thing on your run sheet
Best for: multi-day conferences, events with a sponsorship or experience budget, and organizers who want something attendees photograph and talk about afterward.
Case Studies
What this looks like in practice
The Opposite of a TEDx Talk
Instead of talking for 18 minutes straight, I taught 300 people a secret handshake, and the whole room got out of their seats to use it on each other. That is the pattern I would look for at your event too. One moment that gets everybody moving, and one place for what starts there to continue.
”You were a fantastic "ice melter"!
Katrin BorrmannHead of Curation, TEDxFreiburg
The way our audience went along with it, brilliant! I'll admit it: your handshakes are now firmly in my seminar repertoire.
Booked to open it. Twice.
The organizers brought me in to open the inaugural Inclusive Facilitation Exchange in London. Then they brought me back to open it again the next year.
Both times, the room was full of people who think professionally about inclusion, which meant the usual connection activities would not survive five seconds of scrutiny. Nothing put anyone on the spot. Nobody had to speak in front of the whole room. Participation was a real choice at every step, not a stated one.
That is not a special version I run for some audiences. It is how the method is built, with the quietest person in the room as the design constraint.
”Jan was top of our list when we were putting our programme together.
Jenny MartinOrganizer of the Inclusive Facilitation Exchange Conference, London, March 2025
He delivered everything we had hoped and more. And I would highly recommend Jan particularly as an opening or ending session where maximum impact is needed.
1,001 messages during a pre-recorded talk
A pre-recorded session usually means the audience watches passively and the speaker is somewhere else. We built it the other way around. The recording was designed to hand off to the room at specific moments, and I was live in the chat the whole time.
1,001 messages in 28 minutes, from 319 different people. It never went quiet.
But the volume is not the point. By the halfway mark, attendees had stopped talking to me and started talking to each other. One shared that her staff spend onboarding on their phones. Another asked whether they were texting or taking notes, then offered how she handles it. Nineteen messages were direct replies between attendees who had never met.
”The real best session of this event.
Andrea WoodardFractional Operations Partner
Amazing recording and editing and engagement strategy from Jan, and having him on chat was really special.
”It was very interactive even though it was recorded.
Mariana McNallyLead Recruiter, Randstad Sourceright
I never took the stage
At TEDx Toronto I did not speak at all. No slot in the program, nothing added to the run sheet.
Instead we put conversation starters everywhere people were already stuck waiting. Registration. The bar. The line at the entrance. The queue that is normally a phone-checking void became the place people met each other.
Then the Campfire Chats Lounge gave those conversations somewhere to go.
Sometimes the highest-leverage moment at your event is not on your stage at all.
”Thank you for creating an introvert-friendly space!
AnnaTEDx Toronto delegate
This is not what I expected from attending a TEDx event, but it was definitely my favourite part. I didn't want to leave!
HEY, I'M JAN AND I AM ON A SMALL TALK DETOX 👋
I am a facilitator, trainer, and experience designer, and I wrote The Campfire Method, a book about designing the conditions for human connection in groups.
I am also a people-loving introvert and a recovering shy person. That matters for how I work, because I know exactly what it feels like to be in a room where an activity is moving faster than you are ready for. I design so that person is never the one left behind.
For the last decade, I have facilitated at conferences, retreats, and events across Europe and North America. My work has been featured on TEDx, CBC News, Breakfast TV, Cityline, and HuffPost.
My goal for your event is simple. I want your attendees to leave having met people they will still be in touch with next year.
The Campfire Method
The full framework behind my work, published July 2026. I wrote this practical guide for facilitators and team leaders who want to facilitate human connection without awkward icebreakers.
The real measure of an Event
It is not the applause after the closing keynote. It is how many people buy a ticket for next year before they have left the building.
👋 They belong from the first minute
Nobody stands at registration scanning the room, wondering if they picked the right conference. The connection starts before your first speaker does.
💬 The breaks stop being awkward
Instead of reaching for their phones between sessions, attendees are still finishing a conversation. The hallway becomes part of the programme.
🤝 They leave with people, not just notes
Slides get forgotten. The person they met on day one does not. That is what they tell their colleagues afterward.
F.A.Q.
🤔 Will this work with a sceptical or senior audience?
That’s usually my favourite room. Most connection activities fail with senior groups because they ask for vulnerability before anyone has agreed to it. I start far smaller than you’d expect, and people get a real choice at every step. Nobody is put on the spot, and nobody has to share anything they don’t want to. The quiet participants are often the ones who tell me afterward that it was the first conference session where they didn’t feel like they were failing at networking.
📏 How large an audience can you work with?
I haven’t found the ceiling. The method scales because connection happens in pairs and small groups, not across the whole room. I’ve done this with fifty people and with well over a thousand.
💻 Do you only work in person or also virtually?
There is a certain magic when like-minded people gather in the same room – something that is hard to recreate online. So for the last few years, I made it my mission to become the best there is in making keynotes engaging and memorable – even on Zoom.
So if you invite me to join your event in person or virtually, I will make sure your audience walks away with new insights, lessons, and even new connections.
💰 What does this cost?
It depends on what we design and how many days I’m on site. Most conference engagements land between €2,000 and €15,000. The strategy call is where we figure out the shape, and I’ll give you a number before you have to decide anything.
💡 Do you also offer consulting?
Yes. Some organizers do not need me at the event at all. They need help designing what they are already running.
That usually looks like a few working sessions on your agenda: where connection belongs, what to run in each slot, and how your own team facilitates it. You leave with a plan you can deliver yourselves.
If that is a better fit for your event, I will tell you on the call.
🌎 Where do you work?
I’m currently based in Germany, and I travel across Europe and North America. Being German-Canadian, you’ll also find me in Toronto, Canada, often. If your event is somewhere else entirely, ask anyway. I’ve said yes to some long flights for the right event (Travel and accommodation are billed separately from the fee, at cost).
🙋 We're not sure what we need yet ...
Then book the call. Most organizers arrive with a rough idea and leave with something different, usually smaller and better placed in the agenda than what they first imagined.
