An inquiry

Herrmann, Thomas thomas.herrmann at telia.com
Sat Apr 15 09:48:35 PDT 2000


Hi Susan
My experience from worklife is that often "ordinary employees" do not take
enough time to work with developing new ways to work or collaborate. I guess
there are many reasons, for example that the management does not support
these kind of initiatives, not controlled and on top of that coming from
below. Collegues may also look at this kind of work as not productive/waste
of time. Therefore I think it is important that the involved organizations
are ready to support the processes started in OS, further on. This should be
discussed with the sponsors before the OS. I do also think that this mutual
interest/commitment of developing the issues at hand should be clear in the
invitation.
Greetings Thomas
----- Original Message -----
From: "Susan Lilley" <susanl at ns.sympatico.ca>
To: <OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU>
Sent: Friday, April 14, 2000 5:51 PM
Subject: Re: An inquiry


> Hello all of you,
>
> I am reading every message posted to this list and learning so much from
all of
> you. What a great resource for ongoing learning!
>
> One question from Birgitt to Chris recently caught my attention and an
ah-hah!:
>
> > In the situation you describe, is there any open space that the sponsor
has
> > opened in the organization for Open Space Technology to be used in?
>
> I understand Birgitt to be saying that an OS *event* needs to reflect an
opening
> of decision-making space *within an organization*.
>
> In my practice, what is more likely to happen is that I am asked to
facilitate
> an OS to bring people together from *different organizations* so that they
can
> begin to work together (partnerships -  intersectoral collaboration and
all
> that). In this case, there is no one board or CEO to open up
decision-making -
> there is no hierarchy there at all. Am I right to think that in this case
the
> decision-making space is already open and just needs to be acted on?
Wouldn't
> there need to be space opened up  for collaboration in every one of the
> participating organizations? Does this need to be clear in a letter of
> invitation?
>
> Should I be thinking about these multi-organizational open space events as
> different in any way from those within one organization? What are the
"givens"
> they must consider in action planning - no structure, no money, no
support,
> you're on your own???
>
> I'm not sure I'm very coherent here but my sense is there is a difference.
I
> hope those of you who have opened space in both types of situations will
be able
> to shed some light on this.
>
> As a follow-up to my last posting - my first open space facilitation is
now
> officially set for mid-May, with another tentatively scheduled for early
fall.
> Both are multi-organizational.
>
> Thanks all for taking the time for sharing your experience and learning on
the
> list.
> ----
> Susan Lilley
> Dartmouth NS B2Y 4J5



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