Actually with larger (500+) and longer Open Spaces (2+ days), I like to work with a partner, preferably a woman (me being a man). This balances the energies, shares the "holding of space," and gives me somebody to talk to when I am busy doing nothing. However, I think it is very important to keep in mind that the focus is on the participants and not on the facilitators - which means that "face time" cannot be an issue. Whether you have one facilitator or two, the job is the same - open the space so the people can go to work and get out of the way. At a practical level, I find that more than one person doing the opening can be confusing - differences in tone, style, language patterns can slow things down un-necessarily and move the attention to the facilitators. However, when multiple languages are involved - two people and two languages in the opening can work. Michael Pannwitz and I did this in Wuerzburg with our infamous 2008 participants. But it was not a case of Michael "translating" for me. I made it very clear at the start that Michael was going to do his thing, I would do mine, and hopefully we would arrive at the same place. It seems that we did.
It remains true, however, that in terms of actual need - one facilitator will do, and there are situations where none is just fine. Harrison Harrison Owen 7808 River Falls Drive Potomac, Maryland 20845 Phone 301-365-2093 Open Space Training www.openspaceworld.com <http://www.openspaceworld.com/> Open Space Institute www.openspaceworld.org Personal website http://mywebpages.comcast.net/hhowen/index.htm [email protected] To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives Visit: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html -----Original Message----- From: OSLIST [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Andrew Rixon Sent: Tuesday, May 03, 2005 2:57 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Multiple Facilitator Roles in Open Space Dear All, In traditional forms of group processes there is 'room' for co-facilitation, ie, where more than one facilitator can work together with the group. It appears (based on my limited learnings in Open space) that there is 'room' for only ONE Open Space facilitator within a group? I would be interested to hear your views regarding this. Kind regards, Andrew -- Andrew Rixon B.Sc(hons) PhD Urban Water Infrastructure CSIRO- Manufacturing and Infrastructure Technology http://www.cmit.csiro.au P.O Box 56 (Graham Road), Highett, 3190, Victoria, Australia Tel: +61 3 9252 6363 Fax:+ 61 3 9252 6249 Mobile: 0400 352 809 Email: [email protected] * * ========================================================== [email protected] ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of [email protected]: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs: http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist * * ========================================================== [email protected] ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of [email protected]: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs: http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist
