I did it - My First OS

[douglas germann]

Yay Bui!

			:- Doug.

On Tue, 2009-04-28 at 10:55 -0230, Bui Petersen wrote:
> I did it.
> 
> I facilitated my first Open Space on Saturday. As expected, it was small 
> (only 7 people including myself). We only had 3 hours for discussions 
> and action planning. Thanks to the great suggestions on this forum, I 
> created the following schedule:
> 
> 9-9:30 Opening (agenda creation)
> 9:30-10:10 Session I
> 10:10-10:50 Session II
> 10:50-11:30 Session III
> 11:30-12:00 Opening for Action
> 
> I did as brief an introduction as I could while still covering all the 
> points. 11 topics were posted. Several were combined. It was interesting 
> that the most central topic happened to be posted first and that 
> everyone joined that discussion. I think that probably everyone needed 
> to part of that discussion. This session also went way over time 
> compromising the time left for other topics. However, I don't think this 
> was a problem because the other topics didn't need as much discussion 
> once the first one had been thoroughly dealt with. I kept reminding 
> myself of, "Whatever happens is the only thing that could have."
> 
> As I am an integral member of the group, it was interesting staying out 
> of the discussion. I had told the group that I for the most part would 
> play a butterfly role. Someone suggested that I participate more 
> actively but I don't think there was any need since everything I thought 
> of saying, was said by someone else.
> 
> When it came to the Action Planning, things did not work quite that 
> well. I think there was to little time for reopening the space and 
> people generally got confused about what to do. It would have been 
> better if there had been a substantial break before that. When I noticed 
> the confusion setting in, I decided to facilitate more actively by 
> helping to identifying action items and people responsible for them 
> (actually all I did was write on a flip chart what people were saying). 
> If there had been more time, someone else might had figured out to do this.
> 
> Overall it was a great experience. Not all the topics were "officially" 
> discussed but they were touched on enough for everyone to be happy.
> 
> Being my first time facilitating OST, I was surprised by the the amount 
> of preparation needed with signs, schedule etc. For such a small group 
> and only 3 hours, it seemed to be overkill. I think I will simplify it 
> next time. Ideally we should be able to open space every time we meet, 
> without having to be so regimented about it.
> 
> Thanks you all for your wonderful suggestions and support.
> 
> Bui
> 
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