need of your ideas

Birgitt Bolton birgitt at worldchat.com
Sun Sep 7 17:34:48 PDT 1997


It has been a while since there has been any significant activity on this
list serve. I hope that all of you have had a great summer and are very
busy now in enabling this world to be a better place.

I have need of your ideas and help as I get underway with the launch of a
big Open Space opportunity. If you have the time to read through this (I
apologize for its length) and can give me your ideas, your wisdom, your
input, I would be very grateful. The contract I am negotiating is not yet
signed and this week we will be working out the details, but I know that I
do not know enough at this point on my own to go into the meeting and speak
confidently about what will work. The size of the organization is not
something I've contended with before, and so I keep telling myself that a
16,000 person workforce is just a conglomeration of lots of smaller
workforces, so my experience should be enough.  So, I'll let the story
unfold, and ask for your feedback. My meeting is likely at the end of the
week. I've had one brief conversation with Harrison about this, but he's in
Europe and I have too many unanswered questions about the implementation of
his ideas to be comfortable at this time in presenting them. Conceptually,
I understand, but how to implement especially since I will be seeing this
client through months of implementation stage until the new has gelled, is
beyond what I can now see.

The Desired Outcome

A 16,000 person workforce that is responsible for four major public sector
work functions to transform to  operate as an ongoing Open Space
Organization. As such, they would have high creativity, high productivity,
incredible efficiencies, enspired leadership, and be able to compete in the
marketplace against the private sector to be able to continue
responsibility for the work they are now doing.To achieve the
transformation including solidifying implementation of the new, within a
six month time frame.

The Current Situation

A 16,000 workforce in four silos of activity, with no silo involved with
the other (very different areas of responsibility). High degree of "turf
protection". No or little collaboration even of ideas of how to get through
these times. An antagonistic unionized environment. Folks in general
including the vicepresidents of each silo  in denial that if they don't
achieve the required transformation, that they will be out of business in
one year, with their work being put out for bid in the private sector. This
corporation has been involved in a failed re-engineering project involving
about 30 consultants for the past four years ago. Four years ago, the
client gave a five year time frame for the transformation to take place.
One year is left. Morale has reduced greatly in these four years,
antagonism between management and union runs high. The senior consultant of
the project is keen on bringing me in with use of Open Space, as the one
avenue of possible success that they have left. He knows that he and the
client have nothing to lose by taking the risk with Open Space. They are
with their backs against the wall of this effort or sure death.


The Contract

Not yet signed and worked out in detail, but activities have taken place to
make room for our contract. Several of the consultants have been let go
 ---those who would block the transformation possible through Open Space.
Folks have been told that the transformation would be created through the
use of Open Space Technology and that Open Space would be the means for
operating the "new" organization.

What I know about the operating an ongoing  Open Space Organization. Please
read this and add, edit or anything to challenge my thinking, make it
better.

a.      formal leadership needs to be on board with the concept and supported in
learning to manage in a new way. We have had success with taking formal
leadership of smaller organizations through a leadership training program
that Larry and I have put together, called Open the Space. This is very
much about enabling the leader to know him/herself, and to know him/herself
as a leader looking at risk, vision, community, and management. We also
introduce the use of Open Space Technology for the organization.
b.      formal leadership needs ongoing support so that they don' t shut the
"new" organization down because of fear or because of the inability to
navigate through chaos. They need to be given the tools to learn to
navigate through chaos and to manage in a different way. The way that they
need to learn to manage is very much to facilitate, to be a mid-wife, to
enable. They need to give attention to Spirit and Story.
c.      the purpose of the organization needs to be clear,  throughout the
organization. Where it isn't clear, the organization needs to go through an
exercise to see what they are really about. Story is critical here. This is
where I have followed Harrison's Noah's Ark version of interviews and have
found that it always tells me what I need to know and can in turn validate
with the rest of the organization (interview two people at each level of
the organization asking "who are we" and "who should we be")
d.      the "givens" or non-negotiables need to be clear throughout the
organization. This involves a series of exercises to determine what the
perception of the givens is and then to come to agreement from all of the
lists of what they really are for the organizaiton. This results in a lot
of "de-mything". It is often fascinating to see what people believe the
givens are. Once we know what the givens are, the rest can be agreed upon
to be open to wherever it goes in Open Space. A reassessment of the givens
needs to happen regularly ie: once a year, to see if anything has changed
in this regard.
e.      Assumptions that people have need to be identified and discussed. If we
can get at the assumptions, and help people let go of assumptions that are
not useful in their role in the organization, behaviours tend to correct
themselves. This also raises awareness, expands consciousness about day to
day activities. Again, doing a once a year exercise to look at assumptions
is helpful to clear things up that might become troublesome.
f.      Do a large Open Space once a year in which the issues and opportunities
at that time are identified, discussed, focused into a workable plan.
g.      Do Open Spaces as needed for further clarification of particular issues
emergent from the larger one. These Open Spaces can be done in a meeting
format face to face, or in an "on-line" meeting.
h.      Use technology to enable anyone to know when and where a particular Open
Space meeting will take place and what the topic is. Reports of the
proceedings also to be posted so that anyone and everyone has access to the
information and its progress.
i.      Have an ongoing bulletin board (traditional or on-line) for people to
post issues and opportunities to be discussed in Open Space as
passion/responsibility emerges over time. The means for sorting out how
this is done, how time is given for people to attend, etc. has been
different from organization to organization.
j.      Employee performance reviews (including those of management)  need to
include a section on problem solving initiatives, on maximizing use of Open
Space.
k.      Measurement for organizational success needs to be altered to higher
standards on a number of measures


Note: Open Space events and the ongoing Open Space Organization is bounded
by the purpose and by the givens.  Everything else is open to wonder,
imagination, creativity, making of mistakes, having of outstanding
breakthroughs and such. Much more successful when things are tied back to
the purpose and are clear within the bounds of the givens.

The above is what I have been doing with organizations, replicating very
successfully with small organizations (average size about 80 staff).  And
myself successfully managed in this way with an 80 staff, 300 volunteer
organization over a period of years, so I know it can be done, and I have a
sense of what it takes for the leader to sustain this.

I am having some difficulty conceptualizing this for a workforce of 16,000.





Launching the Open Space Organization

And this takes me to the whole subject of how we get the whole thing off
the ground in the first place.

Harrison's thoughts on this :
Hold a large open space event to "bench-mark" the total organization in
terms of where they are and where they want to go. Total 500 people or two
simultaneous groups of 250 each. Invitations to representative groups
throughout. Once invitation is received, acceptance in short time frame, or
invitation is freed to go to someone else.
1.      From there let the rest grow organically in terms of self organizing
systems. From there on do more Open Spaces according to the need of several
working areas. Results from the first meeting would fall as a) Do-its?way
forward is clear and only need elementary organization to carry it out, b)
Talk-about its?the way forward is pretty clear, but we need some more
information, so a task group is set up to gather that information. Once
gathered, move into do-it?or if it still isn't clear what to do, open some
more space, but now focused on that particular issue, c) More Open Space?if
the way forward is very cloudy, but the importance of moving is clear, the
useful next step is to hold another Open Space around that issue, which in
turn will issue into more "do-its" and "talk about its". To keep track of
all this, use an intra-net with each OS, do it, talk about it being a web
site with all the information. This way anybody can check in on what is
happening.

The discussion that Harrison and I were not able to have was in relation to
all of my questions about this. If anyone on the list has insights re: this
option and how to make it work, or just plain and simply if you have
clarifying information for me, please let me know. I understand all of the
above but I can't quite envision the interplay between what emerges and how
accountabilities, authority, and responsibilities play out. Certain
functions need to happen no matter what. How do we merge (if we do) the old
with the new that is emergent from Open Space? And can anyone clarify about
intra-net sites?

I would like to keep things as simple as possible, and not add steps that
aren't needed, while at the same time I would like to have an
organizational shift that is sustainable and translates quickly into
results for the organization. For me, until I have more input to the above,
I can't quite envision how this actually looks in real life as it plays out
in day to day practicalities and so I need help to get my mind there.

Okay, so the following indicates how my mind does work! Confessions of
being into control more than I like to admit.

1.      Have a meeting with all senior level folks to try to name the Givens in
the organization from their perspective challenging so that those which are
in fact negotiable and not a "given" are let go of.
2.      At the same time do an exercise to look at their assumptions and to
challenge the assumptions so that those which are not useful to the
organization are let go of.
3.      After the look see at Givens and  Assumptions, use these to get
agreement for the bounding of space for the Open Space. ie: whatever isn't
a Given is open to creativity and imagination and participative design to
be explored in Open Space. The Space gets bounded by this, by the story of
the organization, and by the current strategic target which is very much
about efficiencies to competitiveness in the private marketplace or death
as a public system.
4.      Hold an Open Space meeting (2 1/2 day version to allow for convergence and
focusing). But who should be at it. About 500 people? Representative
throughout? Or the senior two levels of  management (120 people). Subject?
This would be bounded of course by the purpose, the current situation of
get with the program or die, and the givens.
5.      Hold a series of Open Space meetings throughout the organization so that
every single person has the opportunity to attend. Work units, usually by
function and location in the City, average 120 ? 160 persons. It was my
thinking that if we hold a total of 100 Open Space meetings over a period
of one month after the larger one, that we would be well launched in each
work area. The dilemma is that I don't know how to tie the bigger first one
into these small ones. And if we don't have the small ones but just let
further Open Spaces emerge organically, we are not going to cause the whole
organization shift that we need in the time frame that we have.
6.      Have all managers go through the "Open the Space Training" that Larry
and I have put together, launching them into styles of management that will
be different and support the new culture. I think these should be before
the first Open Space meeting.
7.      Have Harrison come up and do an Open Space Technology Training  to which
we would invite people who would be resources throughout the structure to
enable further Open Space meetings using internal resources. He cautions
against this being out of the special realm of HR and consultants. I think
this should be before the first Open Space meeting.
Get the computer technology to work for us so that we can have ongoing
bulletin boards and report posting right from the first Open Space to be
ongoing and part of the life of the organization.

So....if you're with me to this point and have any ideas at all, please
send them along. It seems to me that if we do this large a contract and do
it well, that we will have demonstrated something for everyone using open
space to be able to replicate this with other very large clients. In the
context we are living in in Ontario, if this is successful, we should be
able to market ourselves to these large health care corporations who would
are with their own backs against the wall but won't risk with us because
they don't think we have the kind of track record they need.

Thank you for going through this. Thanks for any help you can offer.

Birgitt Bolton




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