Jon My suggestion would be to phrase the whole thing as a Working Conference. Day I is the set up and time to hear from The Experts. Day II is the day of synthesis and extension when the Real Experts show up. All tied up in a beautiful set of Proceedings which chart the future and capture the moment. Done that one many times and it works.
ho Harrison Owen 7808 River Falls Dr. Potomac, MD 20854 USA Phone 301-365-2093 www.openspaceworld.com www.ho-image.com (Personal Website) To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of <mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu> osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu: <http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html> http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html From: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] On Behalf Of Jon Harvey Sent: Monday, January 10, 2011 9:11 AM To: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Subject: Re: OS & Open Conferences Thanks for everyones responses so far Apologies for not being clear. I will try again: At the moment this conference organising company will send out a flyer for a conference with some speakers morning and afternoon with a few smaller sessions / workshops as part of the day and charge around £400 ($550). People sign up and come along. Notionally people network in the coffee break sessions and otherwise sit there fairly passively. Crucially they will have been able to justify the conference fee, time and travel costs to get there based on the expert speakers on the agenda. I am hoping to work with the conference company to put on a whole day OS instead where the subject is one where everyone is an expert (as it were) with something to offer, gain and invent during the process of the day. They may well have to justify expenses / fee etc on the basis that much learning will be exchanged but not from a list of experts presenting as normal. An alternative would be do this half and half am: talking heads then packet lunch and pm: OS. The flyers will be sent out in the usual way to a mailing list of people in local government. I know that OS always works of course! But do people have any live examples of where the format I am describing has worked and why? Many thanks. (For info I attended a large progressive alliance Netroots UK meeting in London on Saturday and here is my blog piece about it (http://jonharveyassociates.blogspot.com/2011/01/process-matters.html) commenting on why the process could have been so much better. I have some positive feedback from a number of people including Will Straw who runs Left Foot Forward a widely read left wing blog and who was partly responsible for the event. He tweeted: <http://twitter.com/#!/wdjstraw> wdjstraw Will Straw V. interesting take on yesterday's #netrootsuk <http://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23netrootsuk> event by @JonSHarvey <http://twitter.com/JonSHarvey> http://tinyurl.com/processmatters - lots to consider for next year ) Very best wishes Jon From: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] On Behalf Of Harrison Owen Sent: 10 January 2011 13:34 To: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Subject: Re: OS & Open Conferences Jon I am a little unclear what you proposed, but if you are suggesting that talking head sessions might be done in Open Space I think you might find some difficulty. However, if you do a first day of talking heads followed by a day of Open Space that is something that has often been done and works very well. You may get some interesting reactions like Why did we waste all that time with the talking heads? But problems like that are good to have. J Harrison Harrison Owen 7808 River Falls Dr. Potomac, MD 20854 USA Phone 301-365-2093 www.openspaceworld.com www.ho-image.com (Personal Website) To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html From: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] On Behalf Of Jon Harvey Sent: Monday, January 10, 2011 7:10 AM To: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Subject: OS & Open Conferences Dear all I think I have managed to persuade a public conference producer to run (and charge for) one of their conferences using Open Space. I debated with her that the talking heads type of conference with a smattering of workshops (which are usually mini plenary sessions too) could be so much more valuable and productive if OS was used. I said I would enquire if anyone else had done this how did it go what lessons did you draw? This is something of a gamble I recognise, as this will not be quite the kind of issue that has to be solved yesterday kind of context. (Although given the current austerity measures which are sweeping across the UK public services right now a lot of things have to be solved yesterday!) Also the people gathered will be a community of interest (ie they will all have signed up to come to the topic in questions) but not a community / group in any other way... So what do people think can this work has this worked? Many thanks Very best wishes Jon ____________________________________________________________________________ ___ Jon Harvey MBPsS Director " <http://www.jonharveyassociates.co.uk/> www.jonharveyassociates.co.uk ( +44 (0) 7771 537535 ( +44 (0) 1280 822585 <mailto:j...@jonharveyassociates.co.uk> j...@jonharveyassociates.co.uk ¹ Skype: jonsharvey JHAL logo.jpg Helping you connect the prose and the passion to deliver superlative results <http://smallcreativeideas.blogspot.com/> http://smallcreativeideas.blogspot.com/ for ideas about how to improve the efficiency & effectiveness of public & third sector services <http://jonharveyassociates.blogspot.com/> http://jonharveyassociates.blogspot.com/ for articles & ideas about leadership and organisational change from a whole systems perspective <http://twitter.com/JonSHarvey> http://twitter.com/JonSHarvey for conversations, ideas & questions to help build a more ambitious, creative and fair world <http://tinyurl.com/JonHarveyLI> http://tinyurl.com/JonHarveyLI to connect with me on LinkedIn Jon Harvey Associates Ltd Registered Office: Chandos House, School Lane, Buckingham, MK18 1HD Company Number 6661588. 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