Brian Bainbridge and the fifth principle

Thu May 6 00:44:47 PDT 2010

Dear All,

Something I've been reflecting and writing on is Christopher Alexander's "A
timeless way of building"...

Here's a little clip from it and the 5th we're talking about... ;)

"This hinges on a simple scientific proposition: the great complexity of an
organic system, which is essential to its life, cannot be created from above
directly; it can only be generated indirectly."-p162

Letting the system get to work, with all voices heard, all views invited,
all tangents relevant - the fifth principle of Open Space emerges: "Be
prepared to be surprised."

Warm regards,

Andrew

--
Andrew Rixon PhD
Director
Babel Fish Group Pty Ltd 
Skype: AndrewJRixon 
Mobile: 0400 352 809 
Fax: (03) 8610 0162 
Email:  <mailto:andrew at babelfishgroup.com> andrew at babelfishgroup.com 
URL:  <http://www.babelfishgroup.com/> http://www.babelfishgroup.com/ 

Don't miss the next
<http://www.babelfishgroup.com/CelebratingStoryConference> "Celebrating
Story: Bringing People and Work to Life" conference. Oct 7th and 8th. 

From: OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU] On Behalf Of Artur
Silva
Sent: Wednesday, 5 May 2010 9:10 PM
To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
Subject: Re: [OSLIST] Brian Bainbridge and the fifth principle

Chris (and all, in Melbourne and elsewhere)

I understand and respect your desire to honor Brian, which I used to call a
friend, even if we have met only once. But one single face to face meeting
is enough to develop a solid friendship, especially when one is prepared to
be surprised...

As you all know my relationship with the principles is not easy, and I only
can understand them as "what always happens" if one opens space - or in what
Harrison used to call an "InterActive Organization".

Anyhow, for me, "Be Prepared..." is not something that always happens. Is a
king of recommendation to open oneself to the space being opened.

My counter suggestion comes like this: OST has 1 Law (and a very powerful
one), 4 principles (if we have to accept that...) and one recommendation
(you may chose another name), that from now on can be called "Brian's
Recommendation".

What do you all (in Melbourne and elsewhere) think about that?

Regards from a sunny Lisbon - happy because I will soon met a lot of friends
in Berlin and unhappy as I will not have the possibility to met some others
that will not come this time

Artur

--- On Mon, 5/3/10, Chris Corrigan <chris at chriscorrigan.com> wrote:

From: Chris Corrigan <chris at chriscorrigan.com>
Subject: [OSLIST] Brian Bainbridge and the fifth principle
To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
Date: Monday, May 3, 2010, 9:49 PM

Hello from Melbourne.  I've just opened space at a conference here with Viv
McWaters, Geoff Brown, Anne Pattillo and Johnnie Moore.  We've got a two
day, full on participatory conference on evaluation with 179 people.  40
topics have gone up for our day and a half OS.

It's sweet for me being here in Melbourne, which for me is the spiritual
home of Open Space in Australia (would you agree Brendan?  :-)).  Of course
for me that impression largely comes from the fact that this was Father
Brian Banibridge's  home, and I regret that I never made it here while he
was alive, only able to meet him over the years at various OSonOS gatherings
or when he stopped by our place on retreat or en route to elsewhere.

Brian of course was such a stalwart member of our community...he and Viv
have hosted trainings in Australia for years and of course they took the
mantle of hosting OSonOS X in 2002 after Laurel Doersam and I co-hosted it
in Vancouver. It's such a pleasure to be here working with Viv and our team
in this place, with Brian's presence very much in our mind.

And so as way of honouring Brian in our own little way today we took the
unprecedented step of officially adding a fifth principle to the Open Space
canon.  Of course the four principles are very important and probably all we
need, but Brian always posted a fifth one up when he worked: Be Prepared to
be Surprised.   For years I have also made a poster with that one on it and
put it up in the room, but today in my opening I elevated that most
excellent phrase by making it the third principle of five.  It comes right
after Whoever comes... and Whatever happens...  Be Prepared to be Surprised.
And then When it starts... and when it's over...lovely.

It seems a perfectly natural place to put it, and, being here in Melbourne,
it seemed a perfectly natural act to just say out loud "Open Space has 5
principles and one law..."  Viv and I both got a little shiver up our spine,
our own little testimonial to a great friend of our community of practice
whose presence we miss dearly.

So from now on it'll be five principles for me, and in reciting them I
always see in my own mind Harrison's call to simplicity, Anne Stadler's call
to take simplicity seriously (which helped Harrison get the principles right
- that IS the story, right?) and Brian's mischievous imperative to be open
to surprise.

So as we prepare to gather here in Melbourne on May 11 for a little OSonOS
with 40 or so local OS-workers, and our community of friends and colleagues
gathers internationally in Berlin, Viv and I invite you to officially adopt
Brian's fifth principle not for sentimental reasons, but just because it
makes sense, and it lightens the invitation in just the right way.

It's all good.

Chris
----
Chris Corrigan
chris at chriscorrigan.com
http://www.chriscorrigan.com

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