Story of a 2.5 day Open Space with an Aboriginal Organization

[Birgitt Williams]

Chris,
this is a fabulous story and I thank you for sharing it. I loved your
daughter's quick knowing of OST. I loved the claiming of OST by the people
you were with. And I loved the sacredness with which you worked. And I loved
that McDonald's was your mirror.

Birgitt

Birgitt Williams
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  -----Original Message-----
  From: OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU]On Behalf Of Chris
Corrigan
  Sent: Wednesday, September 13, 2000 6:25 AM
  To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
  Subject: Story of a 2.5 day Open Space with an Aboriginal Organization


  Colleagues:
  I have just completed a 2.5 day open space with an Aboriginal organization
here in British Columbia with excellent results.  It was an interesting
exercise on a number of fronts, and so as usual I am writing to share the
results and some of my learnings.

  The British Columbia Association of Aboriginal Friendship Centres (BCAAFC)
represents almost 30 "Friendship Centres" here in BC.  Friendship Centres
are organizations that have been around since the 1950s, providing services
to Aboriginal people in the towns and cities of Canada.  During the 1950s,
there was a mass migration of First Nations people away for isolated and
remote reserve communities to the cities as people set out to look for jobs
and better lives for their families.  In short order, these people formed
communities and then community organizations.  Friendship Centres were among
the first to be formed, to provide assistance to individuals and families
making the transition from reserve life to city life.  These days Friendship
Centres provide a huge range of services and programs and in many ways, look
like Aboriginal YMCAs, although not as well funded, and generally not
attracting as much of a middle class clientele.

  Here in British Columbia we are embroiled in disputes about land rights,
aboriginal title and self-government.  Friendship Centres, as Aboriginal
organizations, are trying to find a role for themselves in this debate.  In
order to further their ideas and vision, the BCAAFC hired me to facilitate a
2.5 day Open Space around the theme:  "Aboriginal Friendship Centres and
Self -government in BC."  Executive Directors and Presidents from each
Centre were invited as was the BCAAFC Executive Committee and the staff.  In
short, most of the BC Friendship Centre leadership was gathered in one
place.

  DAY ONE

  We had 41 people, who proposed 36 topics during the opening on day 1 (31
topics were eventually reported upon).  I had the two meeting days divided
in the four sessions of 1.5 hours each with 1.5 hours for lunch.  My opening
was complimented by a prayer from our Elder and an official welcome to the
territory of the Lil'wat Nation, on whose land we met in Whistler, BC, north
of Vancouver.  (We were actually meeting in the same facility where I first
experienced OST five years ago).  As has been my experience, people took to
the process immediately and got down to work on the issues with no trouble
at all.  I had a partner working with me who was learning OST, and he helped
to organize the agenda wall and see about an even distribution of topics
throughout the 8 time slots we had available.  He also remained in charge of
the proceedings for the entire event.

  I received several comments during the first day about the process
including comments about how well it allows everybody to participate and how
free of conflict the discussions were.  One woman said that she had been
coming to these meetings for years and met the same people and never heard
any of them speak.  This was the first time she heard from some of them.  I
asked her why she thought that is and she said it had to do with the safety
that was created.  She felt that because individuals proposed topics that
they were passionate about, a great deal of respect was brought to the
discussions, and that the whole group held the space, not just the
facilitator.  When facilitators work in controlling processes, participants
sometimes feel that they can lose themselves in conflict.  Not so in Open
Space, where the whole group takes responsibility for keeping the space safe
and therefore, conflict is often eliminated, as was the case for this
meeting.  And there were some contentious issues!

  Another interesting comment came for a seasoned veteran of the Friendship
Centre movement, an Elder who has served on the Executive at all levels,
local, provincial and national.  He said that this was the first meeting
where he learned something.

  (As an aside, and by way of demonstrating how easy it is to get into Open
Space, comes this story: My three year old daughter was with me and at one
point, while groups were moving around, she came into the room with her
mother, and asked what the paper and the nice coloured markers were doing on
the floor in the centre.  I told her that people used the markers to write
down things that they wanted to talk about on the paper.  She then proceeded
to dictate to me a list of topics she wanted discussed.  She was interested
in the following:

    a.. How pens work
    b.. How she can get her friend's allergies to go away
    c.. How buildings are built
    d.. How colour goes in
    e.. How the inside of your body works
    f.. How hinges work
    g.. How bones grow back together crooked.
  She then returned to our hotel room with my partner where I am told that
they held their own discussion groups on these topics.  I relate this to
make the point that OST is easy enough for a three year old to understand
with very little instruction.)
  We gathered in the circle for a closing prayer at the end of the day, as
is our tradition.

  DAY TWO

  Day two began in a novel way for me, because we had to change rooms.  Our
large meeting room had been overtaken by a conference of McDonald's
Restaurant's managers from Western Canada (more on this below).  We moved to
a smaller room which involved some work to prepare, but, despite my
anxieties, worked out fine.  Day two began early with a sage smudge and a
prayer.  The smell of sage permeated the facility, and its bittersweet (and
slightly cannabis-like) smell confounded the McDonald's managers who were by
now virtually swarming around our meeting space.

  Playing fast and loose with time, the groups met at 9 instead of 9:30 and
finished at 10:30 for the first session, taking a half hour break before
convening the 11:00 sessions on time.  As the news started to go up on the
wall, one woman commented how different the reports were from the actual
discussions in the groups.  I have always suspected that this is the case
and I wonder if anyone else has figured out how to capture the energy and
passion that forms in the groups and is not reflected in the reports?

  It seemed as the second day progressed, that the group discussions became
more intense and the breaks between discussions became lighter.  This was in
contrast to day one, when people seemed to be feeling their way around, and
were more aloof in both the groups and the breaks.  I can really see how
extending the discussions over two days brings a totally different qualilty
of experience to people.  It is deeper and richer and the relationships
become stronger so that people feel freer with each other outside of the
meeting.

  The whole notion of personal responsibility intensified over day two.  One
participant, who missed convening her session because she was actually
attending to another participant who was suffering a nasty reaction to a bee
sting, used the evening news to apologize for "acting irresponsibly" by not
convening her session.  The apology was offered with great respect and
humility to the group.  It opened my eyes to how serious the
"responsibility" part can get taken.

  As day two came to a close, I checked my "Open Space Evaluation" sheet: a
piece of blank chart paper with the question "What do you think of Open
Space?" on the top.  The paper contained a couple of doodles of a happy face
and a light bulb and these telling words: "It's really round!"

  DAY THREE

  Again, we opened with a smudge and a prayer.  I'm lucky to have these
openings available to me as it aligns people's thoughts nicely at the
beginning of the day and helps ground the crown for the work ahead of them.

  Convergence consisted of the following steps:


    a.. posters with topic names and numbers were placed around the room
    b.. participants read reports (roughly 50 pages) for a half hour
    c.. reflect and use the dots to indicate passion
    d.. some topics were converged
    e.. top dot getters were brought off the wall and placed in the centre
of the circle (there were ten of them)
    f.. I invited champions to come forward to see these through the action
planing phase
    g.. Nine champions came forward and a few more topics were converged.
Convergence was highly conservative, as is my preference.  Only topics that
were closely related were converged.
    h.. The orphaned topic was placed with the others with a meeting space
post it note on it in case anyone wanted to take the issue forward.  As it
turned out, no one did.
    i.. Discussions lasted 45 minutes.  Several participants wished that
they could have had the whole day to actions plan.
  (Note to OST facilitators who may be working with Carrier speaking people:
the word "dot" sounds a lot like the Carrier word "D'ogh" which is a rather
vulgar term for female genitalia.  So when I suggested that folks grab seven
dots and indicate where their passion lay, it resulted in a truly inspired
outburst of belly laughs from one person!)
  The closing circle was profound.  I had wanted to use a talking stick (a
real one!) for the closing circle, but the organization did not bring
theirs.  Instead I used a piece of lava rock.  The Whistler area is covered
in old lava flows and the rocks lie everywhere, pitted from air bubbles that
were trapped in the molten lava.  As it turns out these rocks are great for
using in sweatlodges as they hold heat.  So when a number of people went out
on day two to collect sweat rocks for future use, the BCAAFC ED gave me one.
And I used it for the closing circle.

  I opened by stating that lava is rock made from material that has welled
up from deep within the earth and taken form.  It does not crack under
extreme heat and it is malleable and flexible.  In my mind this summed up
the organization nicely.

  As the rock went around, people shared very deeply.  I was especially
touched by the Elder who said that the process was a new role model for
First Nations communities to show us how we could be together.  Another
participant said that she was tired from the mental strain of the past few
days, and had even forgotten where we were in the month ("somewhere in the
middle!" she said).  Later the ED of the organization remarked that he
thought that this comment represented the fact that she was no longer
thinking linerally.  It fact, the ED recognized OST as a tool with
tremendous possibility for decolonizing First Nations people and communities
because it creates the environment for people the THINK in traditional ways.
I have said that before, and I am buttressed in that belief now.

  Several people saw possibilities for using OST and have vowed to use it.
There was an almost fiercely protective sense that came over the group
regarding the process.  They recognized it as theirs, as one which is, in
both form and content, real indigenous self-government.

  We closed the third day with a prayer.

  Now about those McDonald's managers: There could not have been a more
contrasting state of affairs.  Hundreds of managers were milling around the
conference centre being pampered (almost parented it seemed) by corporate
staff.  The whole place was full of golden arches, and incentive plan
recognition posters.  And their grand kick off event was in the huge ball
room above us as we were closing.  I could hear loud music pounding through
the ceiling, and my partner, who went to have a look, said that she saw all
the managers standing and cheering and  waving different coloured flags.
Then she was told to move away by security guards who were actually standing
at the entrance to the ball room.  It was chilling.  You could not have
imagined a more closed space, one which generated a frightening totalitarian
feeling.  And I don't use the term lightly.  It looked like a nationalist
rally, complete with thugs at the door to keep out the rabble.

  It was the sharpest contrast possible.

  Chris

  PS I will shortly post this story on my website with some pictures from
the event.  It will be at
http://www.geocities.com/chris_corrigan/osstories.html with the rest of
them.

  --
  CHRIS CORRIGAN
  Consultation - Facilitation
  Open Space Technology

  108-1035 Pacific Street
  Vancouver BC
  V6E 4G7

  Phone: 604.683.3080
  Fax: 604.683.3036
  corcom at interchange.ubc.ca
  http://www.geocities.com/chris_corrigan


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