Open Space (sort of) at the 13th International AIDS Conference

[Averbuch]

Lisa,
>From were I see you are a brave and daring lady!.  It is always much easier
to fight in clean settings (and have you ego "shoe shined") ....
and one more thing:
I love your stories. They always make me laugh and they always make me learn
thank you
Tova Averbuch

Holon, Israel




averbuch at post.tau.ac.il





 -----Original Message-----
From: OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU]On Behalf Of Lisa Heft
Sent: Thursday, August 08, 2002 5:26 AM
To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
Subject: Open Space (sort of) at the 13th International AIDS Conference


  Dear wise, thoughtful, playful, kind and courageous colleagues –



  I am now back from facilitating in and for the International AIDS
Conference, which was held in Barcelona, Spain in July.  An amazing
experience.  For one, the people who work against this horrific epidemic.
Scientists, activists, parents, survivors, policy makers, sex workers, and
people with HIV disease – sometimes all in the same person.  You walk across
to world to meet each other (people come from every country and culture,
from all over the globe, from the poorest village to the biggest cities) and
though you are each unique, you share a common sense of sharing in life and
death experiences – you share an intimacy before you’ve even met.  It was
also a magical experience of standing next to someone on the steps, turning
to meet them and discovering that you both do the same thing and that person
is exactly the right person for you to have met right then – Whoever Comes
Is the Right Person and Be Prepared to Be Surprised, indeed.  Plus, we were
blessed at Closing Ceremony to hear the eloquent words of two former
Presidents, Bill Clinton and Nelson Mandela.  Both passionate fighters for
health, access and dignity for all.



  As for the facilitations: I’d come to facilitate skillsbuilding workshops
in 1) how to take in and process all the information overload of a
conference and 2) strategic planning for vulnerable communities.  We
repeated the workshops in English, Spanish and French for both topics (I don
’t speak French, but I helped with logistics and waved my hands a lot). For
the Community Forum session before the official conference opened, the
conference also asked me to take on the role of being the lead facilitator
of a team of 30 international facilitators, in a process which I inherited
from someone who’d designed it – a process that I didn’t wholly agree with.
How would you help 1500 people from all places and languages network with
each other in two hours?  I’m sure you have some OST-style ideas.  Their
(the planners of this community forum) idea was to have everybody stand
under a banner of their continent, with a contact sheet in hand (their goal
was to make 5 contacts).  They also wanted people to break into interest
areas of: Prevention, Treatment and Care, Youth and Young People, Gender and
Sexuality, Vulnerable and Marginalized Populations, Mobility and Migration.
Great topics, and they reflect the different issues identified by conference
organizers. Originally 60 facilitators were supposed to circulate to make
sure that people made contacts one-to-one or in groups of no more than three
people and to encourage them to move on to another group periodically to
make their total of 5 contacts.  Mimes would also circulate throughout the
gathering to help people find their way.



  So you can see how I put this through an Open Space filter.  Not that OS
is the only way; it’s just that their process seemed so similar yet there
was so much control that it might limit greater possibilities.  Well, to
make a long story short (hmmm
all my stories are long stories
), we merged
our thoughts to create an adapted method, with a handout in three languages
and simple graphics indicating the 4 steps participants could take (Make a
sign with your question/issue/topic of passion/interest, wear it or wave it,
people of similar interest will find you, feel free to bumblebee around).
We 30 or so facilitators wore signs that said “May I help you?” in all the
languages we spoke, and circulated about in the manner of a host introducing
people of similar interests at one’s own cocktail party.  Some of us
facilitators added other topics to their signs, such as ‘Ask me where the
restrooms are’ and ‘Kisses, 50 cents)
 Some participants made many marvelous
connections; others felt they never really knew what was happening and took
care of themselves by going home to rest (many had just arrived and were
totally jet-lagged, and the morning had been a series of speeches).  A great
success.  Although I think it would have been better with a ritual / formal
opening and closing, as in Open Space Technology.  So I experienced a little
ego-bruising when some of the great facilitators looked back at the
experience as perhaps needing a bit more opening and closure.  Because in
our compromise with the original design, the organizers did not want Open
Space.  I just snuck in what I could of the OS elements.  So it looked like
I was the lead in a process I designed which was not entirely transcendent.
Heh.  Lisa lived.





  L i s a   H e f t

  Consultant, facilitator, educator

  O p e n i n g  S p a c e

  2325 Oregon

  Berkeley, California

  94705-1106   USA

  (+01) 510 548-8449

  lisaheft at pacbell.net

  www.openspaceworld.com



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