<html><div>At 09:41 AM 4/29/99 -0500, you wrote:</div>
<div>>Has anyone ever researched Open Space as it relates to
personality type,</div>
<div>>such as Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)? For example,
does OS "fit"</div>
<div>>better for certain personality types than it does for
others? And if so,</div>
<div>>could that be a useful factor in deciding whether to use OS in
given</div>
<div>>applications?</div>
<div>****************************************</div>
<div>To the best of my knowledge no such research has been done, at least
at a level where it might reasonably be called research. My personal
experience is that every single predictor I have ever heard of fails to
predict the workability of Open Space. Indeed every group I have ever
worked with always seems to say in one way or another, "Harrison,
OST is a wonderful idea -- but it will never work with THIS group."
But it always seems to work -- at least in terms of bringing the group to
a point of significant conversation, and usually to the point of
resolution of complex issues. Will it always be so? Who knows. </div>
<br>
<div>In all fairness, I must say that I have little direct experience
with Personality Typing such as Myers-Briggs, largely due I suspect
to the fact that I can never remember the alphabet soup required.
However, at the group level, it turns out that some of the most
unlikely suspects genuinely "get with the program," including
such folks as accountants, engineers, scientists, lawyers, the military
and quasi-military organizations. At the end of the day, I find myself
saying that if a group fits somewhere in the generic classification of
Homo sapiens -- there should be no intrinsic problem.</div>
<br>
<div>Obviously, what may be true for the group as a whole, need not be
true for an individual's reaction. And so it seems reasonable that a
strong "J" (I do remember that letter) might have some personal
difficulty operating in Open Space. However, I am not sure that is
necessarily bad, nor indicative that such a person should not participate
in Open Space. Indeed it may very well turn out to be an extraordinarily
powerful learning experience. I am reminded of a friend, who by her own
account is an archetypical J. Four years ago, she found herself in the
middle of an Open Space I did with the ODN, and her response was about as
negative as it could get. Worst day of her life -- she said. Out of
control, waste of time, etc. etc. However, four years later she sees
things rather differently. In fact she uses Open Space with her clients,
and at a personal level reports a major degree of positive impact. She
has learned to let go of stuff over which she had no control to begin
with, resulting in a massive reduction of stress, frustration, to say
nothing of anger and anxiety related to "folks not doing it
right." She also indicates that she is much more effective in doing
the work she wants to do -- simply by not taking everything on herself
and controlling it into perfection. </div>
<br>
<div>For me, the real issue is not about Open Space as an event or
methodology -- but rather Open Space in the broadest possible sense. In a
word, we live in Open Space, and sometimes that gets very uncomfortable
-- for Js and all the rest of us. The notion that somehow or another we
can create rational structures that will control our destiny doesn't seem
to work very well anymore, and certainly not as well as it used to. This
doesn't mean (for me) throwing up our hand in despair, but
rather learning to operate and navigate in some very different ways,
which are appropriate to the environment we now find ourselves in, and
quite effective when it comes to getting useful things done. Open Space
(the event) turns out to be a very powerful school room.</div>
<br>
<div>Anyhow, I do hope that research can be done on the correlation of
personality type and Open Space. I think we would learn a great deal
about what is going on in each of us as we navigate in Open Space.
However, I would be distinctly uncomfortable with the notion that
personality typing might be used as some sort of a screen for
participation in Open Space. I can see it now -- All Js need not apply.
</div>
<br>
<div>We do know, of course, that there is precisely one way to mess up an
Open Space: Try and control it and think you are in charge. To the extent
that control (worse yet, total control) is or has been an article
of faith with Js -- some degree of discomfiture may be anticipated. And
all the rest of us are going to have different sorts of discomfort. But
at the end of the day, I rather suspect that it all comes with the
territory -- not just the territory of Open Space Technology, but the
open space of the world we all inhabit.</div>
<br>
Harrison
<br>
<div align="center">
Harrison Owen <br>
7808 River Falls Drive <br>
Potomac, MD 20854 USA <br>
301-469-9269 (phone) <br>
301-983-9314 (fax) <br>
email owen@tmn.com<br>
Website
<a href="http://www.tmn.com/~owen" eudora="autourl">http://www.tmn.com/~owen</a><br>
Open Space Institute website<br>
<a href="http://www.tmn.com/openspace" eudora="autourl">http://www.tmn.com/openspace</a></html>