Deep power differentials in OST

[Joelle Lyons Everett]

Harrison, Lisa--

I had one client who decided (without mentioning it to me until the day of 
the Open Space) that her staff was not very sophisticated about working together 
to solve problems, so she provided them with a pre-Open Space workshop, using 
Edward de Bono's Six Hat model.   Not something I would have recommended.

The discussions were somewhat stifled on Day One, due distrust of the 
management team by staff members who felt that the Open Space was only window 
dressing; that the decisions about restructuring had already been made.   

Things opened up dramatically on Day Two, when a very junior member of the 
staff convened a session, asking one or more members of the management team to 
join him and answer his unanswered questions.   I sat on the sideline, holding 
space, and was delighted to watch this young man very skillfully facilitate a 
discussion that shifted the whole emotional climate.   The rest of the day was 
extremely productive (and I heard lots of laughter, always a good sign).

I never heard a word about the Six Hats model for group problem solving!!

Joelle


  

*
*
==========================================================
OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
------------------------------
To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options,
view the archives of oslist at listserv.boisestate.edu:
http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html

To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs:
http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.openspacetech.org/pipermail/oslist-openspacetech.org/attachments/20050716/b600ba10/attachment-0016.htm>