The most important part of your thoughts here, Harrison, is the notion that any good process reminds people of what's true in life at large anyway. The further a process gets from the authenticity of fully engaged and living, the less effective it may be in the long run. One of my tests for good process is the question: Does it bring to people's consciousness the kind of freedom in connectivity we and they want outside the process? For, there are contrived processes and authentic processes. The more authentic, the more value for the community.
Jack ~~~~~~~~~~ jack ricchiuto two.one.six/three.seven.three/seven.four.seven.five www.designinglife.com / www.appreciativeleadership.org ------------Original Message------------ From: Harrison Owen <hho...@comcast.net> To: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Date: Tue, Jun-14-2005 9:59 AM Subject: Re: Fw: The World Cafe meets Open Space Artur: A gentleman of courage and perspicacity! Asking precisely my question which I feared to pose. . .leading to a wonderment which I share. "I would say that to have TWC before OST has no added value and may help create (or maximize) the freedom shock; and the intimacy created by the "intimate groups" can be good, as you have explained, but it can also be bad in some cases, where the previous small groups (with a fixed number of 4 and a square table) will made more difficult the process of creating the feeling of belonging to a circle of the "large overall community" (all the people assembled) needed for OST to work properly." I have no question that TWC creates a comfort level (or perception of comfort) for certain people who are used to the controlled environments of highly facilitated sorts of gatherings. I also have no question that the level of Freedom Shock may well be less for these people than would have been experienced in OST -- after all there is a lot less freedom, and a lot more predefined structures and processes. But I am not at all sure that TWC will actually ease the nervous ones into the wild open spaces -- and with Artur -- I suspect it may actually make the situation worse, if only because there is an immediate comparison between approaches. Having experienced the friendly control of TWC -- suddenly to be thrown into the radical state of taking personal responsibility for what you personally care about! Frightful!! Now I understand that the conventional wisdom tells us that taking a large group of people (say a thousand or two) into a situation of radical freedom with nothing to prepare them save for a 15 minute recitation of Theme, Principles and The Law -- is guaranteed to produce disaster, or worse. Yet as we all know, millions of people in tens of thousands of situations all over the world have had such an experience and survived. Undoubtedly there are people who found the experience to be quite unpleasant. It is also probably true that these people made their level of discomfort very clear. Yet after 20 years living with folks in Open Space, my experience has been that the vast majority of participants find the whole affair quite useful. At the very least they find it to be productive (work gets done), and for a lesser number their time in Open Space is remembered as a fantastic high. At a personal level, I particularly enjoy those individuals who say at the start (verbally or by their body language), "This can never work!" And then sometime down the road, often before the gathering is over -- they change their tune quite radically. Truth to tell, I find the most resistant group to be potential sponsors and fellow consultants (who have usually never been in Open Space). For me the truly interesting question is why/how do so many survive? Certainly the majority do -- maybe even the overwhelming majority. I think that part of the answer is the speed with which space opens. >From a standing start -- just sitting in a circle -- to active engagement in something like 15-20 minutes. People rushing to the center of the circle to announce their issues, and everybody else listening hard and figuring out what additional issues need to be raised in order to meet their own needs. That burst of activity might last 30-40 minutes, followed by another 20 minutes of total ordered chaos in the Market place -- and it is off to work -- usually with sufficient time for a cup of coffee, restroom break, or phone call. Fast! The point is that before even the most concerned and nervous participants have a chance to "freak out" because it is "not working" -- it already is working!!! What this tells me is that the faster you are able to move from the opening "Welcome" to the actual engagement of working groups -- the better. And for this reason alone, I would never front end Open Space with any sort of "preliminary activity" -- whether that be some form of "community building," ice breaking, or TWC. It is not needed, can be counter-productive, and even under the best of circumstances when the "preliminary" was a most pleasant experience a common reaction from participants (at least in my experience) is something like, "Well that was nice, but why did we waste the time?" Having said all of this -- we are still left with that small (I think) group of folks for whom the Open Space experience remains anathama, unpleasant, or worse. It may sound hard hearted, uncaring, and professionally irresponsible, but my approach over the years has been to respect their feelings and move on. If given the opportunity I am delighted to try and talk them through it and/or give them a hug, but at the end of the day I suspect they will just have to make their own way. I understand that this approach could be viewed as my effort to uphold the purity of OST. Perhaps, but I would like to think that it goes deeper than that. From where I sit -- freedom and the necessity of accepting the responsibility of freedom is not the peculiar gift or requirement of OST, it is just a fact of life. From this point of view, OST is only an opportunity to practice what we all have to do anyhow. Some will do all that better than others, some will enjoy it more, and others less -- but it remains a task of our common humanity. The sooner we get on with it, the better. Harrison Harrison Owen 7808 River Falls Dr. Potomac, MD 20854 USA 301-365-2093 207-763-3261 (summer) website www.openspaceworld.com ----- Original Message ----- From: Artur Silva To: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Sent: Monday, June 13, 2005 9:51 AM Subject: Re: Fw: The World Cafe meets Open Space Peggy: Please see below what I am commenting. I wonder if the "freedom shock" was created by OST or by the fact that OST was preceded by TWC. Interestingly, I made a misreading of your words “had a felt sense of community very quickly" that I first red "had a false sense of community very quickly" ;-( I would agree with you that maybe there are conditions that are suitable for TWC (for instance, the client is not prepared to OST, or the problem doesn't need a solution for yesterday). But if those conditions don't existI would say that to have TWC before OST has no added value and may help create (or maximize) the freedom shock; and the intimacy created by the "intimate groups" can be good, as you have explained, but it can also be bad in some cases, where the previous small groups (with a fixed number of 4 and a square table) will made more difficult the process of creating the feeling of belonging to a circle of the "large overall community" (all the people assembled) needed for OST to work properly. But I agree with you that beginning in small groups the evening session may be something worth trying in some situations. My two cents Artur Peggy Holman <pe...@opencirclecompany.com> wrote: Here's a bit more on World Cafe and OS from Tom Atlee, who just returned from a conference "downunder". (...): > A couple of points on the OS/WC experiment: > > It was explicitly noted that the groups could become more or less than 4 > (the ideal WC size); this is not significant to OSers, but is definitely > significant to WCers. Perviously Peggy wrote: (...) >>A reflection on how TWC affected the dynamic. >>It was clear that people had a felt sense of community very quickly >>through TWC. I think that the move into OS created that condition that >>Harrison calls "freedom shock". It's possible that the contrast >>heightened the shock. That said, I believe the sense of connection >>created during TWC enabled those who were distressed to seek out the >>friends they had made rather than completely check out (of course, being >>in a remote location would have made it difficult to leave!). I wonder if >>that is a benefit of a cafe prior to OS -- >>to create relationships that might support people to stay engaged if they >>have a tendency towards freedom shock? 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