Givens (was: Already-thereness, Empowerment and Such)

[Artur Ferreira da Silva]

Hello dear Joelle

Thank you for your marvelous story. I really liked it. I am not so sure if
you will like my conclusions from that story.

I think that I have already referred in the past the quotation from Piaget
that I translate as "Givens (or data) are never given to us; they are
created by the theories that allow us to see them" ("Les donnees ne nous
sont pas donnes;..."). So I imagine that in your story I have seen mainly
what my theories allow me to see ;-)

At 13:44 18-02-2003 -0500, Joelle Lyons Everett wrote:

>In a recent Open Space I facilitated, the director did not give a very clear
>description of the organization's situation in her opening remarks.  So, on
>the second morning, a young member of her staff posted a new session.  He
>said, "I will convene a session for anyone who wants to come, and I want to
>ask the questions that are on my mind.  I hope that someone from the
>leadership team will be there to help me find the answers."
>
>The director agreed to do that, and most of the group was in the session.  He
>asked his questions, the director answered.  And a young woman went to the
>flip chart, saying "I'm just going to write down what we know about this."
>An hour and a half later, everyone's burning questions had been answered
>(although even the director had no answers about some of them).  And the
>group had two sheets of flip chart paper listing what we might call "the
>givens" of the situation.
>
>I do not think that they were the givens of the director or the leadership
>team, but they were a description of the complex and changing reality of the
>organization and its relationship to funding agencies, staff and clients. I
>liked the woman's use of the term "what we know about this"--I think this is
>a more-accurate phrase than "givens."


I agree with you that "what we know about this" is much better than "givens".

But your story is a marvelous example of how the young man felt empowered
to ask some pertinent questions, precisely because the "givens" were not
stated by the manager in the first place. And in "what we know about this"
what is most interesting is the word "we" and not "what she (the manager)
knows or thinks she knows". Collective empowerment this time.

So in the list of "one more thing not to do" one thing to add is probably
"never ask the sponsor to state the givens - this will disempower the group
and close the space we are supposed to open"...

There is no scientific revolution, I think, without someone that throws
away the "givens" of the past theory. And there is no organizational
transformation, I think, without someone(s) throwing away the "givens" of
the previous period. Giving away the givens, one may say.

How can we open the space if we previously asked the sponsor to close the
space, by "giving" the "givens"? How can we later facilitate empowerment if
we are helping the manager to disempower the people in the first place?

I imagine that we are all in agreement in what concerns the essential and
what I feel uncomfortable about is only the word "givens". And after all
what is one word? I give it up...to all of you...

Artur

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