Future Search

[Harrison Owen]

Sorry I am a little late with this -- been having some email problems. And Eric, I can certainly see your point about having more strings for your bow, and more tools than a hammer, lest the whole world become a nail. And at some level, Open Space Technology is one method amongst many others, to be used (or not) depending on the circumstances. However I think this conversation might take place at a different (deeper) level, and the question changes. The critical question for me is always how to create the conditions underwhich a particular group can function in an optimal fashion. In approaching this question, I confess to a certain pre-conception -- that all human systems are self organizing. Or put in slightly different terms -- There is no such thing as a non-self organizing system. There are only some misguided folks that think they did the organizing and control the system. 

I recognize this assertion can be provocative -- but the more I think about it the more I feel comfortable with it. It is true that people spend a lot of time organizing and controlling. But the organization created is really (in my opinion) only a map which will hopefully correspond with the territory. But maps do not create the territory. And once we move from abstract (paper) design to implementation (execution) all the best laid plans  are thrown into a totally self-organizing world, and become just one more piece in the self-organizing stew. 

Optimal function of any organization occurs, in my judgment, when an organization (and the people in it) has sufficient room (space) to operate fully and effectively as the self-organization it is inherently . Restrictions, of one sort or another reduce agility, capacity for adaptation, opportunity for learning (all of which self-organizing systems do quite well). When the restriction is sufficient, the organization will strangle.

So the real question for me is always, How much open space can be offered such that the organization can be fully and effectively what it is -- self-organizing? Some approaches provide lots of space (FS), some virtually none (Strategic Real Time Change), and only one -- all the space anybody cares to deal with (OS).

At the end of the day, it is all about opening space. The only question is how much? Personally, I have never encountered an organization that could not negotiate Open Space. I have met managers, MDs, CEOs who get very nervous -- maybe even too nervous. But that, it seems to me, is their issue. I do try to be helpful -- but to quote another old saw, "You can take a horse to water, but you can't make him drink." 

Harrison


Harrison Owen
7808 River Falls Dr.
Potomac, MD  20854
USA
301-365-2093
207-763-3261 (summer)
website www.openspaceworld.com
Personal Website www.ho-image.com

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Erich Kolenaty 
  To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU 
  Sent: Tuesday, June 13, 2006 6:00 AM
  Subject: Re: Future Search


  Dear Tree and Agneta,

  whatever you may have experienced and whatever you might think about other ways of bringing change into life except open hearts and open space - there is one little thing I want to remind to you:  Open Space always works, if you can fulfill some conditions - we discussed this many times. 

  Unfortunately sometimes you find yourself in a place where you CANNOT fulfill these conditions for specific reasons and you know, that open space WILL NOT work properly. So you have to look for other options and future search sometimes is one of them.

  Paul Watzlawick once wrote a very nice aphorism: "I you only have got a hammer, every problem appears to be a nail" 

  Erich from sunny and lovely Vienna

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