[OSList] Follow-Up and Flow in Open Space

Sat Mar 23 13:53:15 PDT 2013

What a wonderful conversation!
Oh - I am loving it!
Thank you!
Nici Richter
Johannesburg, South Africa

On 23 March 2013 14:56, paul levy <paul at cats3000.net> wrote:

> Dear colleagues
>
> Someone suggested I post this and I'd be delighted with some reflections
> on it...
>
> warm wishes
>
> Paul Levy
>
> Follow-Up and Flow in Open Space...
>
> *"Time runs backwards in the spiritual world."*
>
> No, don't stop reading. Not yet.
>
> There's a lot of debate in the field of emergence focused on "when things
> open up, how do you close them down?".
>
> In the realm of Open Space, often the textbook reply is not to close down
> at all but simply to open some more space for closing down...
>
> In other words, if we are worried about outcomes from an open space - what
> will happen back at base, the actions, the commitments in practice, then
> all we need to do is to follow up with an invitation to another Open Space
> that focuses on the question of action. So you need at least two open
> spaces to get stuff done.
>
> Another view is that one should trust the open space itself - whatever
> happens of course is the only thing that could have. And many open spaces
> do self-organise sessions about action so... just trust the process. It
> always works.
>
> A third view is that these are paying clients we are usually talking
> about. As facilitators we can't just leave the organisation "up in the
> air", walk away and let them do what they will with the space we've opened
> up! Many facilitators then reach for the post-it notes, often in the last
> hour, and start to draw out (or bleed?) actions from the meeting. All kinds
> of clever prioritising and voting ensues. Elsewhere I've suggested this
> might be a counter-productive way of going about things.
>
> Now, here's an alternative view and its based on the idea that time runs
> backwards in the spiritual world. No! Stay with me. Just for a bit longer.
> Imagine you put what went "before" you (past), before you (in front of you.
>
> For those of you still here, read on...
>
> I am going to suggest that follow up is often best at the start, not after
> the event. I've tried it. It works. If the client is very concerned, even
> at the planning stage, that action must result, then, of course, include
> the invite to decide and commit to actions in the invitation to the open
> space. Make that call to action explicit and that will help to set the path
> for the right people to come. Some open space invitations are very "theme"
> focused and it is easy when we immerse in self-organising conversation, to
> forget the element of our will that sometimes sleeps a bit when we go into
> the head space of sitting in circles, self-organising the content of what
> is often talk, talk, talk.
>
> So, build the reminder of action in the invitation before the event. Put
> action before the event, not after it.
>
> Yet even then it is easy to forget when the space opens. Not always, but
> often.
>
> Now, stop reading if you don't like apparent craziness.
>
> Try this. Before the event, invite those coming to share what they think
> the actions should be arising from the Open Space. Ask them to come up with
> actions before the event has started. This can be done online or at a
> pre-meeting. Get the actions out. When an open space is commissioned, it is
> often because a critical issue or challenge in the organisation or
> community has given rise to it. It is born out of restlessness. And
> restlessness is often takes the form of blocked flow. People often know (or
> think they know) what the actions and priorities are. Not everyone, but
> some. They may not be correct, but they sit there, bubbling behind the damn
> of "not yet" or "no".
>
> If certain actions have already been fixed and decided by leaders, be open
> and transparent and build them into the invitation. If the actions are to
> be arrived through community and organisational input then use a method to
> surface them - but not after the open space - BEFORE it. The reason is
> because a lot of the future already sits as potential in the word, hidden,
> waiting to emerge. Human beings often tap into this and know what needs to
> be done, before they explore how, and verify why, sometimes deciding
> against anyway. The bubbling potential underneath is the potential for
> "realisation" and it is mostly about action. The release of potential is
> often exhilarating. Often at open space events, that potential for action
> gets lost in the self-organising gorgeous chaos of of emergent head-talk.
> Especially in the West.
>
> Get them out on the table BEFORE the event. Put them up on the wall. THEN
> open the market place. The suggested "follow-up" actions will then be
> "incomes" not "outcomes" of the event. They will be there, not bubbling
> underneath, but instead shared consciously, and they will irritate and
> inspire. And often sessions well self-organise around them. By the end of
> the day, what we put "before" us, before the event started, now stand
> "Before" us as commitments after the event.
>
> Trust the self-organising nature of open space and also trust the inherent
> knowingness of the human collective and individual will. There's often no
> need to worry about actions not arising from an event, if we accept that
> those actions were largely already there in the collective story and flow
> AND genius of the community.
>
> Some of those actions going in will be thrown out, others re-affirmed,
> others changed and played with, and new actions will also come into being.
>
> I'm not suggesting this for all Open Spaces. Actually it works best where
> action forms the main part of the invitation, is vital to the sponsor and
> the community and also where there's an intuition that many of the actions
> are already known and the open space overall theme is really more about the
> who, when, where, why and how.
>
> Put the ending at the beginning, the imagined actions as the inspiration
> and input. Then space will open around what we already think and feel needs
> to happen. It might not. But then, again, it just might.
>
> But please, ditch the post-its and the after-event prioritising. It has
> nothing to do with opening space.
>
> I believe that when we start an emergent conversation we may well have a
> blank page. But usually organisations and communities travel along
> timelines of past into present into future that are more like tapestries
> than lines. Linear is but one way we experience life. Yet past is always
> playing into the present, the future in the form of the unrealised and the
> potential inspires us in the know. Often something in the future will be a
> direct transformation or culmination of something that began in the past.
> We are also past, present, AND future, which is more of a picture rather
> than something linear. In open space, the action often precedes the word.
> Allowing those actions to speak in the past of the open space often creates
> a marvelous alchemy of flow where past and future meet in open space in the
> present.
>
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-- 
Nici Richter
Strategist
Sustainable Strategic Insight
http://www.sustainablestrategicinsight.co.za/

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nici.richter at gmail.com

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