an invitation

Michael M Pannwitz mmpanne at snafu.de
Tue Mar 9 12:28:59 PST 1999


Dear Colleagues in worldwide open space,
I sent the piece below to the searchnet crowd and thought
you all should know about the Training in Potsdam, too.
Hold the space,
love and hugs
michael



A Premiere
Future Search Learning Workshop in Potsdam, Germany,
September 6-9, 1999



Once I had been touched by it I was hooked. I didnt realize
it at the moment it happened. In retrospect I know that it
was the spirit of community and empowerement. It touched me
at a gathering of village farmers in India at the moment
their coop was born. I was there on a Peace Corps mission
that had resulted from my determination not to serve in
Vietnam.
This experience changed my life in several ways. Never
again would I pick up on the study of zoology again. From
then on I was on the lookout for work in which that spirit
unfolded that made life so meaningful to me: Organizing
production coops in the Mississippi Delta, union workers in
Los Angeles, neighborhoods in Berlin and now facilitating
large groups in organisational transformation.
Four years ago I heard about future search and open space.
Immediately, I felt the spirit and set out to learn about
them. Thats how I came to go to Mohonk for the Future
Search Learning Workshop in 1996 with Sandra Janoff and
Marvin R. Weisbord and the open space Training that
Harrison Owen and Romy Shovelton conducted that same year
in England.
Convinced that all my colleagues should be trained in these
approaches I talked Sandra and Marv and later also Harrison
into coming to Berlin. That was 3 years ago. The training
with Harrison took place last November. It was fabulous
with 64 (!) participants from Berlin, other german speaking
places, Sweden, Netherlands and five colleagues from
Russia, Poland and Bulgaria.
And now I am in the midst of getting the Future Search
Learning Workshop in Potsdam organized. It will take place
September 6 through 9, 1999. It will have the same
structure as all the other Learning Workshops.
To me it is, however, very special.
It will be the first time that Marv and Sandra offer the
workshop in Germany. In a Germany far different from what
it ever was in the past. Even the recent past has seen
Germany and especially Berlin in the greatest
transformational process ever. And this time a
transformation that promises hope and peace and
international cooperation. A transformation in which I
sense that spirit I talked about earlier.
The quality of the transformation and of our future will
much depend on the growing ability of people to get in
touch with the spirit of community and empowerement. Future
Search is to me one of the important venues.
Therefore I am putting out a call to all of you not only in
the German-speaking countries but to all European neighbors
and all countries on our planet to let everyone know of the
Learning Workshop in Potsdam. It is an ideal opportunity
for people from all over Europe and the world to join and
learn together.
It is especially important that all of you who read this be
aware that Potsdam and Berlin are only 50 miles from
Poland, Moscow is a two and a half hour flight from here,
Prag five hours by train. The centre of Europe has moved
about 500 kilometers to the East since the Berlin Wall came
down. Please activate your eastern european networks. Let
them know that we offer special rates to colleagues from
Eastern Euope in case they have funding problems.
And, of course, come yourself, invite your colleagues and
bring a client!
Sandra and Marv will be speaking English. My experience has
been at gatherings like this that translation selforganizes
and that people will decide on the language they will use
in small groupwork.
We are meeting at a lovely waterfront hotel on an island
right in the middle of Potsdam. September should be perfect
weather. Berlin is just minutes away. The price is
comparable to the rates at the Marconi Conference Center in
California (the equivalent of about US$ 1600). More details
from me, mmpanne at snafu.de. Just drop me a note and I will
send the registration form.








Michael M Pannwitz
Draisweg 1
12209 Berlin
Germany
Tel.: 49 30 772 8000
Fax: 49 30 773 92 464





Michael M Pannwitz
Draisweg 1
12209 Berlin
Germany
Tel.: 49 30 772 8000
Fax: 49 30 773 92 464





Michael M Pannwitz
Draisweg 1
12209 Berlin
Germany
Tel.: 49 30 772 8000
Fax: 49 30 773 92 464

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