[OSList] The Question
Daniel Mezick via OSList
oslist at lists.openspacetech.org
Mon Feb 1 05:06:57 PST 2016
Greetings to One and All,
Koos strongly implies these items are essential to OST:
* Law of Two Feet
* Absence of any agenda at start
...note that I purposely do not say, I avoid saying: "..at start of
Opening Circle" or "...at start of opening circle", or ....
.... well, you get the idea (I think.)
I wonder who joins with Koos on these two points. I wonder if there are
other essential items.
I wonder if it is heresy for Koos to speak with authority on what is
essential to OST, and what is not.
Regarding dogma, if there is a culturally enforced rule here prohibiting
dogma, this rule is "dogma about dogma,", or "dogma qua dogma."
Savez-vous pourquoi? Est-ce pas?
Daniel
Koos says:
And: there are gatherings I have seen and other gatherings that people
have talked to me about, that were called Open Space but did not open
the space very much. Because *there was **no Law of Two Feet*, and/or
because *there was a preset agenda*, that kind of thing.
*There are a few things that make up the essence of Open Space* and if
you take those away, you can of course go ahead and have fun with your
meeting, but don’t call it Open Space.
On 1/31/16 2:54 PM, Koos de Heer via OSList wrote:
>
> Yes, what Michael Herman said.
>
> And: there are gatherings I have seen and other gatherings that people
> have talked to me about, that were called Open Space but did not open
> the space very much. Because there was no Law of Two Feet, and/or
> because there was a preset agenda, that kind of thing. There are a few
> things that make up the essence of Open Space and if you take those
> away, you can of course go ahead and have fun with your meeting, but
> don’t call it Open Space.
>
> There can be a lot of reasons to play with the format and adapt it.
> Nothing wrong with that. But I know that for folks who are used to
> conventional meetings and the old corporate way of managing an
> organization, it can be a pretty scary thing to do an Open Space. And
> more often than not, these folks try to combat their fear by adapting
> Open Space into something less scary. Usually, making it less scary
> takes away the essence of Open Space. Those are, at least in my book,
> the wrong reasons to play with the format. And in those cases, I
> become one of the “elders” who say: don’t tamper with it, because it
> is not going to work. And for good reason.
>
> Koos
>
> *Van:*OSList [mailto:oslist-bounces at lists.openspacetech.org] *N**amens
> *Michael Herman via OSList
> *Verzonden:* zondag 31 januari 2016 19:12
> *Aan:* paul levy <paul at cats3000.net>; World wide Open Space Technology
> email list <oslist at lists.openspacetech.org>
> *Onderwerp:* Re: [OSList] The Question
>
> This whole story about a split between OST and opening space, this bit
> about unchanging dogma is a big mystery to me.
>
> There is what is written in the User's Guide. And then there is what
> all of us do. I can remember exactly one instance, almost twenty
> years ago, when anyone said to me "that's not open space cuz it's not
> what's written i the book." That was in person, but i've never
> actually heard any such thing on the list.
>
> And I see LOTS of changes and adaptations. What was written as 3 days
> has been experimented down to 3 hours or even less. Convergence still
> happens, but non-convergence happens probably more, and other
> convergences, too. John Engle taught us to open with skits instead of
> posters, and oral reports instead of typed notes. We've mixed OST
> with appreciative inquiry. I once sprinkled six breakout sessions into
> a formal, powerpoint-heavy corporate top leadership retreat week.
> Ralph Copleman came to the list once for ideas on how to open space or
> do OST on a beach without walls. Anne Stadler and friends
> experimented with ongoing, quarterly open space practice. Others of
> us have run OST-like tracks inside of traditional conferences,
> sometimes as part of the conference plan and at least once as a
> totally emergent experiment that ran on nametags that said "ask me
> about open space" and a pop-up community bulletin board wall in a
> hallway. Daniel Mezick has opened a new frontier in adapting the
> practice of open space tech to agile adoption.
>
> Brian Bainbridge, who once told me that he read a little bit of the
> user's guide before every time he facilitated an open space meeting,
> also came to this list with a report about how he'd just stood at a
> podium, on a stage, looking out at decidedly-not-a-circle sitting in
> cushy fixed seats, given a little opening invitation briefing and had
> people streaming across the stage to post their topics on some sort of
> temporary wall. And that was it. No breakouts, no proceedings, no
> open space? Not a chance. The group buzzed about those topics
> through the rest of their conference, in lots of standard sessions and
> the usual coffee breaks.
>
> The thing that stands out for me about these things, other than that
> they never got written up in any of harrison's books, is that they
> happened -- they weren't hypothetical, mental exercises we did on the
> list. They were real live practice stories first. This tells me
> that, true to the intro of the original user's guide, anyone can go
> and experiment and bring the story back for conversation and
> learning. When we talk in theories and generalities, including about
> dogma, dogma arises. When we talk about the real things we did and
> what seemed to happen as a result, there is no room or need for dogma.
> There is only the work of understanding what's happening(ed). And
> then everyone in the conversation can choose whether to repeat or
> adjust that experiment, in any other situation that might show up.
>
> There are all these new things that have been tried and shared, and
> there are also many common threads and practices. I see no benefit in
> or need for tagging the common ground as dogma OR for things
> differently only for the sake of novelty. In practice, the only thing
> that matters is what we actually do and how it works. What we think
> is happening, what we believe might work, and all manner of
> intellectualizing and theorizing is just so much distraction, until
> somebody actually puts it on the ground in the center of a circle or
> flashmob or stage.
>
> As you're describing these two apparent sides, Paul, I really can't
> figure who's on what side. It seems to have something to do with
> being older or newer in the practice, but that doesn't really explain
> it. I know I have been called at various times both purist and
> heretic. I think that might be true for many of the folks i've
> learned from, my elders, and also many of those I call peers in the
> practice. I wonder if what you're labeling dogma isn't really more
> about depth of experience and rigor of reflection and analysis. When
> the conversation is focused on practice, more than theory, those with
> more experience have more stories to share. As long as we keep
> focused on practice, there's nothing wrong with that.
>
> I think it might be that when we wander out into questions like "What
> is Open Space Technology," and get away from what anyone is actually
> doing, in practice, experience ceases to count and those with more
> experience are seen as just dominating the conversation with their old
> stories. "What is Open Space Technology" is a groundless
> conversation. Nothing wrong with that, but in removing itself from
> the ground of practice, it leaves us no way to evaluate anything that
> comes in response. In this way, it invalidates lived experience. If,
> instead, we ask "How are we explaining the practice of open space to
> clients we want to hire us?" ...or something like this, past
> experience is valued again, to show us what's worked and not worked.
> We can see patterns in how the things we've said and how they worked
> have been able to change and evolve. We can make guesses, choose from
> the options and go test each and all of them directly, for ourselves.
> History and new experiments are equally needed and valuable.
>
> For all the talk about dogma, I have no idea what any actual dogmatic
> definition of OST might be. The user's guide is a historical artifact,
> a concept paper, and by it's own admission only a restating of a sort
> of older, universal concept. It's a beginning point for our community
> that needs neither abandoning or sanctifying. We just need to keep
> proving it out, in practice, in the space we open here, between
> experience and experimentation -- neither one better or more important
> than the other. It's the going back and forth, in practice, that has
> made and can/will continue to make us stronger.
>
> Learning and contributing, passion and responsibility, breathing in
> and breathing out, four principles and one law, and now, if you
> will... experience and experimenting. another slice of "mutuality" --
> the co-existent, inter-informing play of apparent opposites -- arising
> in open space.
>
> Michael
>
>
>
> --
>
> Michael Herman
> Michael Herman Associates
>
> 312-280-7838 (mobile)
>
> http://MichaelHerman.com
> http://OpenSpaceWorld.org
>
> On Sun, Jan 31, 2016 at 10:11 AM, paul levy via OSList
> <oslist at lists.openspacetech.org
> <mailto:oslist at lists.openspacetech.org>> wrote:
>
> This was my attempt at this a while back. It still feels relevant
> to Daniels's question...
>
> best wishes
>
> Paul Levy
>
> Open Space Technology opens space. That might sound a bit strange,
> or even a bit obvious, but bear with me. I’ve said that for a reason.
>
> In the Open Space Technology community of practitioners and fans
> I’ve encountered over the last twenty years, there is a strong
> behavioural pattern of not changing the first and original version
> of Open Space Technology. Harrison Owen called it a technology –
> it is a way of doing something that does this: opens space. SO why
> change it? If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
>
> Open Space Technology, as you’ll find it taught today, is just
> about exactly the same as it was back in the ’80s.
>
> Now, back to “Open Space Technology opens space”. What on earth
> does that mean?
>
> It opens space for a conversation. It opens space for
> self-organised exploration of an issue of importance to a
> community. It opens space for getting things done. And often a
> hell of a lot of things do get done from an Open Space event.
>
> There sits a group in a circle, and when the space opens and they
> self-organise, using the minimal structure of the Open Space
> Technology process (marketplace, principles, rules etc), all kinds
> of stuff then bursts into the physical space from the previously
> hidden world of Spirit, (Or Potential, if you prefer), realising
> all kinds of action in space and time. In other words, practical,
> useful and usable action results. Open Space Technology has
> achieved that again and again and again and again and again and …
> (insert tens of thousands of ‘agains’ here). No, it really has.
>
> So, as I said, Open Space Technology er… opens space.
>
> Over the years, this hardly changed technology has added a new
> principle, and tinkered with the wording here or there.
> Anticlockwise “walking of the circle” has crept in, and the odd
> talking stick has popped up, and an Eastern gong brings back
> attention to the circle. But, at its core, Open Space Technology
> is a technology that has never had (nor, according to its fan
> base) needed, an upgrade.
>
> Indeed, whenever an upgrade has been suggested, the elders in the
> Open Space movement tend to sigh knowingly and then kindly offer
> “Aw, shaddup and open some space already!”. If that sounds like a
> generalisation, I invite you to read the Open Space discussion
> list over the years and you’ll find plenty of evidence of “don’t
> change a thing”.
>
> Suggestions for change will come and go with the passing of mortal
> facilitators, but Open Space technology is either as timeless as
> love, or will pass away, unchanged, in its own good time.
>
> At recent OSONOSes (What is THAT?, I hear you ask – it’s an Open
> Space meeting ON Open Space!), I discovered that a lot of people
> like the fact that Open Space Technology is largely still below
> the radar of mainstream organisational intervention and meeting
> theory. It quietly piles up its tally of successfully opened
> spaces without much care for detailed research into its practice
> and efficacy. It lies largely outside of journal based scrutiny,
> and, most of all, it lies beyond innovation and tinkering with its
> own process. Yet at two recent OSonOses I met a significant number
> of people who do adapt it, change it, innovate it, and they still
> find that, not surprisingly – space still opens! They feel as bit
> sad that its a golden field of practice that doesn’t seem to want
> to lovingly question its foundations. As a result, what should
> have been a changing, organic building, has turned into a temple
> that moves only its pot plants around.
>
> Yet space still opens. Of course it does. You see, Open Space
> technology opens space. But so do a bunch of other gorgeous and
> eloquent processes. And sometimes (and I heard more than a few
> stories confirming this), dogmatically unchanged Open Space
> Technology limits the opening of space. The officionados would
> claim that it is never Open Space Technology that limits the
> opening of space, but a bunch of other factors. It’s the sponsor’s
> fault, or the facilitator should have done X or Y differently.
> They usually sigh at the facilitator and say “Get over it, and
> just stick to the knitting”.
>
> This is all very (annoyingly) general, I know. But I’ll keep to
> that and see if the generality resonates with anyone reading this
> for now.
>
> I’ve written in detail, elsewhere on this site, how and why
> dogmatic use of Open Space Technology can inhibit and limit the
> opening of space.
>
> I do believe there are archetypal elements in Open Space
> Technology that are pretty timeless or, at least, standing up
> pretty well in terms of relevance and applicability, to the test
> of Time’s passage. Archetypes tend towards timelessness.
>
> In Action Learning, for example, reflection on action is a pretty
> timeless archetype. As Action Learning has evolved into a range
> of approaches, that core concept of the “learning cycle” of
> conceptualisation, experimentation, action and reflection, seems
> to stay relevantly at the core of all the diverse developments.
> Yet how we do action learning has changed wonderfully.
>
> In dialogue work, as another example, the importance of active
> listening remains and pervades, even as the field of practice widens.
>
> In Open Space technology, the archetype of the circle remains and
> has a deep living quality, wherever space is opened. Equally, the
> spirit (if not the wording) of the principles remains vibrant and
> relevant. The notion of self-organisation sits at the heart of the
> natural world, and is a core, timeless quality of opening space.
> But “Breaking news”, and “Marketplace” and even the role of the
> facilitator, are not as fundamental as many of the elders think
> they are.
>
> At the OSonOses (including the World one) I met people who thanked
> me for challenging the status quo (which wasn’t in any plan of
> mine going in). Some said they didn’t feel they could challenge
> Open Space Technology at these events, nor share alternatives or
> share stories of how they has changed it in practice. I myself
> got some hate mail from an Open Space elder a few years back when
> we ran an OSonOs exploring “Beyond the dogma”. I’m not sure how
> true it is that there’s a norm to stick to the technology like
> glue or feel like an outsider. It’s a big shame if it is true and
> if it becomes true at the WOSonOs in Florida in 2013. There’s
> certainly nothing formal to stop healthy challenge and
> questioning, but quite a few people pointed to a norm that exists
> in the Open Space Technology community, that critique marks you
> out as a kind of “misery guts”, even as a betrayer of a lovely
> elderly gentleman. Basically you are pooping on a party that is so
> benevolent is lies beyond that poop.
>
> Open Space Technology, in its classic form, opens space. Often,
> and beautifully. But it isn’t the only “technology” that opens
> space, nor is it always the best or right one. Also it isn’t only
> technology that opens space. Art also does it. Often, when a
> facilitator is truly in the moment, in an ego-free state of
> service to his or her community, space opens and NEW approaches
> emerge, sometimes beautiful hybrids of Open Space Technology,
> sometimes tiny adaptations, sometimes entirely new fusions,
> versions, forms. Sometimes something entirely close to Open Space
> Technology “escapes” into our practice entirely afresh, especially
> when we have forgotten it!
>
> At the heart of all these approaches I believe is nearly always
> the circle, the principle and love of self-organisation, the
> creative urge towards getting things done, and also a kind of
> acceptance of the rightness of who is there, where we are,
> whatever happens and also, the love of freedom to flow in and out
> of the open space as needed. These are the archetypal qualities
> that have led to Open Space Technology being so powerful and enduring.
>
> But there is no need for chapter and verse, no need for the
> technology to be so rigid in its core design. What is important is
> that potential that wants to be realised can find its way to space
> that has opened for it. Fractured communities that come together
> into circles and then self-organise into smaller circles, before
> reforming into bigger ones again, always linked to the strength of
> that “holding circle” can use the circle to achieve amazing
> things, notably synergy, where we are more together and where the
> circle gives us shared inner and outer focus.
>
> “Whatever” is more important than any Open Space Technology Dogma.
> But not the whatever of laziness and indifference. This is the
> whatever of emergence, of the space that reveals, the circle that
> opens into possibility and then turns possibility into free
> choice, and free choice into committed action in and upon the world.
>
> So, I’ve discovered there are now two overlapping (uneasily)
> communities, There is the Open Space Technology Community,
> employing a technology that Harrison Owen could have tried to
> patent or copyright but didn’t, but has instead offered it freely
> to the world, trusting its beauty and success in the world, to
> leave it unchanged and used as needed in the world. Then there is
> a larger community which is the Open Space community that uses the
> classic version of the technology but also adapts it, and also
> uses other methods, all of which, more or less, open space for
> self-organisation, for conversation and action. I think it’s a
> pity, and also a bit of an emerging tragedy that those at the core
> of the Open Space Technology Community (by no means all of them)
> are not more open to change and innovation from that wider
> community, to be enriched and inspired by it. Because of this, the
> Open Space Technology community now has its own underground where
> people ARE questioning its fundamentals and morphing it, but
> aren’t sharing that openly at its events nor on its discussion
> lists. When they do, there tends to be a benevolent and parental
> closing down by many of its supporters to just leave things as
> they are and put faith in the version that is never in need of an
> upgrade.
>
> Sometimes space needs to open without any stated principles,
> without any structure-polemic, no matter how minimal and well
> meant. Sometimes space needs to open with few if any words.
> Sometimes space opens better in the language of the community and
> not the language of Open Space Technology. Sometimes space opens
> better through artistry, not technology. Sometimes space opens
> without the need for a physical circle, and sometimes even without
> the need for a facilitator. Sometimes space opens with Open Space
> Technology in its original form.
>
> But sometimes that form becomes a wall. The stories where Open
> Space Technology has failed to open space tend to go unreported,
> part of a collusion of niceness. Those stories are there to be
> found, but they are below the radar of the community that has
> confused blanket positivity with the grittier, messier mission of
> Open Space to bring beauty to the world. Avoidance of our pain is
> often both fatal and ugly.
>
> Open Space Technology, when it becomes ossified, becomes
> arthritic. When a facilitator doesn’t just DO Open Space
> Technology, but becomes open space in their own inner activity,
> they will sense what needs to be done, not out of dogma, but out
> of the present needs of the situation. Often this situation will
> call for a traditional use of Open Space Technology. But not
> always. Sometimes we need to open space. And it is beautiful that
> there are so many ways to do that.
>
> What am I suggesting? I’m suggesting it might be time for Open
> Space Technology to open the trap door – the trap door to its own
> beautiful critique. It needs to look more warmly and openly at
> what is growing consciously below its own radar. And it isn’t
> about defending the first technological model from a position of
> elder wisdom. It’s about inviting in the younger ones, the new
> generation. If Open Space Technology lies beyond an upgrade, then
> let that view survive a healthy Popper-esque conversation. But in
> 2012 I met some truly wonderful people who have upgraded it
> anyway. They are the right people, in the right place, at the
> right time, who dance with two wonderful feet into the future. Be
> prepared to be surprised by them.
>
> Something tells me it isn’t quite over yet, Harrison Owen!
>
> Welcome to the open space community. It loves Open Space
> Technology. But it loves so much more too.
>
> (Original article appeared here:
> https://rationalmadness.wordpress.com/2012/12/05/open-space-technology-and-open-space/
> )
>
> On 28 January 2016 at 17:55, Daniel Mezick via OSList
> <oslist at lists.openspacetech.org
> <mailto:oslist at lists.openspacetech.org>> wrote:
>
> What is Open Space Technology?
>
> --
> Daniel Mezick
> Culture Strategist. Author. Keynoter.
> (203) 915 7248 <tel:%28203%29%20915%207248>. Bio.
> <http://www.DanielMezick.com/> Blog.
> <http://www.NewTechUSA.net/blog/> Twitter.
> <https://twitter.com/DanielMezick>
> Book: The Culture Game. <http://theculturegame.com/>
> Book: The OpenSpace Agility Handbook.
> <http://www.amazon.com/OpenSpace-Agility-Handbook-Daniel-Mezick/dp/0984875336>
>
>
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--
Daniel Mezick
Culture Strategist. Author. Keynoter.
(203) 915 7248. Bio. <http://www.DanielMezick.com/> Blog.
<http://www.NewTechUSA.net/blog/> Twitter.
<https://twitter.com/DanielMezick>
Book: The Culture Game. <http://theculturegame.com/>
Book: The OpenSpace Agility Handbook.
<http://www.amazon.com/OpenSpace-Agility-Handbook-Daniel-Mezick/dp/0984875336>
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