Post Soviet countries

[Chris Weaver]

Fascinating discussion, about expectations set for the roles of "king" and
"subordinates."

I am reminded of a story Birgitt Williams tells about an OST event with
upper-brass military in Canada.  One of their givens for the event was,
"Democracy ends at 4:00 on Thursday."

It seems to me that we must use the power of inviting the sponsor to
determine the givens, and thus to clearly delineate the size and nature of
the open space.  Perhaps clients for whom shared leadership is alien and
threatening would be willing to try OST on a "small" issue with clear and
strong givens.

It may be a long metaphorical leap to OST work in post Soviet countries, but
as a public school teacher, I often received students in my new classes who
were totally unaccustomed to having any authority in the structures of their
education.  In these cases, I learned not to open a "big" space at first,
but instead a "small" but fully authentic space.  Careful debriefing with my
students gave me the information I needed to know what "size" of space was
appropriate to open next, as a good match for their emerging capacity.

Chris


--
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Opening the Space for Inspired Collaboration
P.O. Box 8234 / Asheville, NC 28814 / USA
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----------
>From: György Beck <gbeck at BECKGROUND.HU>
>To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
>Subject: [OSLIST] Post Soviet countries
>Date: Mon, Feb 19, 2001, 11:22 AM
>

> ear Hape,
>
> Thank you for the - bad news. :-) You were reinforcing my experience.
> As far as the German (and I would say German speaking - Austrian, Swiss)
> companies are concerned the rule of management is rather the first version,
> what you called being their king.
> I would phrase it differently: they are not going to be their king as long
> as the colleagues volunteer to be their oeying subordinates.
>
> The initiatives and independent thinking is something, that they think to
> undermine their power.
>
> Another interesting group of expat managers are the South-East Asian CEO-s
> who are very pushy and got used to what they experienced at home, the
> unconditional obeyedness. (And they also have some extreme preformance push
> from home.)
>
>
> There are many German speaking companies in Hungary. Because of the above
> experience and let me admit, my prejudice, these companies are not my
> highest priority prospects...
> Once I worked with a bright Austrian CEO, who tried to "manage" by
> putting "prescriptions" on the company bulletin board and thought it  would
> be accomplished. He was one of the exceptions. It was a hard work to make a
> bridge between him and the Hungarian staff...
>
> Gyuri
>
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