[OSList] Signing up for sessions

[Ulrika Eklund]

I smile when I read your fourth point. The struggle. I recognize it myself.
J Its so easy to get going and trying to guess what people want and don’t
want. Also easy to start to try to read peoples thoughts. Starting to value.
And the only thing that happen is that I myself get frustrated. Instead of
holding the space, trusting the people that follow their passion and
responsibility. Nowadays when I let go and trust – the outcome is amazing
and it’s so much more energy saving J 

 

Wish you all a great weekend

Ulrika 

 

Från: oslist-bounces at lists.openspacetech.org
[mailto:oslist-bounces at lists.openspacetech.org] För Rob van der Eyden
Skickat: den 23 november 2011 12:08
Till: 'World wide Open Space Technology email list'
Ämne: Re: [OSList] Signing up for sessions

 

Hello all,

 

I still wanted to share some of my experiences in the Open Space I
facilitated a couple a weeks ago. The event was a ‘Veranderdiner’
(Changediner) that we organize a couple a times a year for a network of
people interested in behavioral change. Topic this time was: ‘What can I do
to make the world a better place?’.  About 20 people showed up.

 

We had positive reactions on the event, lively conversations, new people
met. Valuable experience gained in facilitating an Open Space. All good.
About the Open Space ‘technique’:

·         We asked the participants to set up the circle of chairs for them
self. Worked really well.

·         The agenda we had lying on floor in the middle of the circle.
After a short introduction, I asked the participants for their topics /
sessions. Lot of (very diverse) topics were raised, each put an a paper.
Each paper was put somewhere at the agenda, but mostly not at a specific
location / timeslot. That was probably because I did not put post-its on the
agenda, that could be taken by everyone that wanted to host a session (so
will do that next time). So we ended with a stack of topics suggested to be
discussed, but no agenda yet


·         So on to ‘signing up’: based on the discussion on the OS List, I
decided to ask the participants to sign up for the topics they were
interested in by putting their name on that paper. Result? Nobody did that,
but the buzz did certainly get going. And probably a bit different than it
should, because we did not have clear topics assigned to location/timeslot.
I ‘managed to’ leave it to the group to figure it out. There were some
participants that started trying to organize the whole thing (“let’s do it
like this
”), but in some way several groups formed about some topics (which
were probably all different from the ones posted in the first run) and they
got to work and have a good time.

·         I did feel some struggle within me during the event. Before we got
started one of the participants told me about a (to me very good and clear)
topic he wanted to discuss, but for some reason he did not raise it in the
group, but chose to raise another topic (to me very vague). I felt some
regret, decided to let it go, but when another topic related topic came up,
I did make a reference. That went nowhere, so probably I should have stayed
out in the first place. Later when I listened in to some of the
conversations, I got the feeling that some participants were more involved
than others, so I started wondering ‘why don’t they use their 2 feet?’ and
‘should I remind them about that possibility?’ I did not. Any other
experiences on that? I had the idea that participants still feel it as not
done / not polite to leave a session
  Guess I am still trying to find the
balance letting the group do it themselves and trying to influence / taking
care of the participants 

·         We closed with a nice ‘talking stick’ closing circle with warm
reactions. 

 

So probably I did not do it all by the book, but still I look back to a
great event and am looking forward to try again ;-)

 

Again: thank you all for sharing your thoughts on signing up earlier.

 

Best regards, Rob           

 

Van: oslist-bounces at lists.openspacetech.org
[mailto:oslist-bounces at lists.openspacetech.org] Namens Rob van der Eyden
Verzonden: dinsdag 8 november 2011 21:30
Aan: 'World wide Open Space Technology email list'
Onderwerp: Re: [OSList] Signing up for sessions

 

Wow! How good to see how ‘alive’ this open space community is. Thank you all
for all your valuable thoughts on signing up. I will try to find my way
based on your suggestions and I will share my experiences with you
afterwards.

 

Best regards, Rob

De Veranderarchitect B.V.

Rob A.I. van der Eyden
"Change is disturbing when it is done to us, exhilerating when it is done by
us" (K. Moss Kanter)
Parkietstraat 30, 1171 HV  Badhoevedorp
M:  <tel:%2B31%20%280%296%20512%2072%20127> +31 (0)6 512 72 127
robvandereyden at veranderarchitect.nl
www.veranderarchitect.nl <http://www.veranderarchitect.nl/> 

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