Unconferences

[Annamarie Pluhar]

Hello Harrison, 

As always a cogent and interesting response. More or less what I expected.  Except that what I experienced seemed to me to be less work than the opening circle, statement of principles and law,  and then opening of the marketplace. So I'm not clear about how OS is less work than an unconference. 

To Kari's question.  The unconference I attended had maybe 15 round tables holding 8 people apiece.  People sat where ever.  Traditional introductions (we may have gone around the room?), and thank you's to organizers. Statement of the four time periods and an invitation to convene a group if you wanted. The wall was outside  in the hall.  It became apparent to me that for each time session there was at least one person who had a prepared talk by prearrangement. I learned some stuff but certainly didn't feel permission to leave a session if I was uninterested.  It was all about Twitter and therefore many people had their heads into their iphones and such as they twittered about what was happening. That's a different way of attending.

Happy Labor Day eve.  In Southern Vermont we are feeling the beginning of fall. 



Annamarie Pluhar

Pluhar Consulting
Results through effective group process
http://www.pluharconsulting.com
802.451.1941
802.579.5975 (cell)







On Sep 5, 2010, at 9:32 AM, Harrison Owen wrote:

> Annamarie – Unconferences have been around for a bit and as I remember some of the earliest unconferencers included the likes of Michael Herman. So if there is a problem for the OS community I would guess that it is at least partially self-inflicted J But personally I don’t see much of a problem. Actually I see it as part of a much larger grand natural experiment in which we all are learning how to operate most successfully in a self organizing world (the only one we have, I think). In this context there is no “one right way” – but surely there are better and more effective ways. The name of the game is finding these “ways” and the means is multiple  experiments. I would take Unconference to be one such experiment. Measured against the simplicity of what might be called “classic Open Space” (sit in a circle, create a bulletin board, open a marketplace – Go to work) I find the Unconference to be overdone. In short they are working much too hard! This isn’t wrong, just inefficient. However, measured against the standard conference, an Unconference is truly a breath of fresh air. In conversations with unconferencers I suggest that they have made a very good start – and now why not think of one more (maybe many more) things not to do? If we (I) have learned anything in this adventure it is that organizing a self organizing system is a questionable undertaking involving a great deal of unnecessary work. To say the least.
>  
> Harrison
>  
> Harrison Owen
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> From: OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU] On Behalf Of Annamarie Pluhar
> Sent: Sunday, September 05, 2010 8:21 AM
> To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
> Subject: Unconferences
>  
> Hi everyone, 
>  
> DIana's posting of how the Agile community is embracing OS reminds me to ask this community about "unconferences."  I've not seen a discussion of them but maybe there was one predating my joining of the list.
>  
> I've been to one "unconference" and was told about another by a colleague who understands OS. Neither had the careful opening that I think is the core of making OS work. I have had people say "Oh I've been to an Open Space meeting" and when I probed, discovered that it was an "unconference" not OS. 
>  
> Have other encountered this? And is this a problem for OS? 
>  
> Happy Sunday morning. 
>  
>   
> Annamarie Pluhar
>  
> Pluhar Consulting
> Results through effective group process
> http://www.pluharconsulting.com
> 802.451.1941
> 802.579.5975 (cell)
>  
>  
>  
>  
> 
> 
>  
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