Anne - How wonderful to "see" you here. Spirited Work was a great experience and experiment. We all learned, with many thanks to yourself!
Harrison Winter Address 7808 River Falls Drive Potomac, MD 20854 301-365-2093 Summer Address 189 Beaucaire Ave. Camden, ME 04843 207-763-3261 Websites www.openspaceworld.com www.ho-image.com OSLIST To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of OSLIST Go to:http://lists.openspacetech.org/listinfo.cgi/oslist-openspacetech.org From: OSList [mailto:oslist-boun...@lists.openspacetech.org] On Behalf Of Anne Stadler via OSList Sent: Sunday, September 28, 2014 10:37 PM To: oslist@lists.openspacetech.org; oslist-requ...@lists.openspacetech.org Subject: Re: [OSList] OSList Digest, Vol 43, Issue 22 My observation: "authority in OS" soon rests with those who show "presence" as defined by Otto Scharmer et al. You can see this appear particularly in multi day OS sessions or when you use OS as a means of organizational governance as we did in Spirited Work (see my writeup in CollectiveWisdomInitiative.org about Spirited Work, an experimental OS learning community of practice.) When people show up, listen deeply and take responsibility for selves and the whole, authority emerges. (My version of Law of Two Feet supports that: take responsibility for what you care about, & use your two feet to move in and out of situations accordingly.) Thanks Daniel for the interesting question. Kind regards! Anne stadler Your Self Occupy 100% A world that works for ALL is a world of love made visible Phone: 206-459-0227 Skype: anne.m.stadler Www.CompassionateSeattle.org www.CharterforCompassion.org www.ProtecttheSacred.org On Sep 28, 2014, at 4:57 PM, via OSList <oslist@lists.openspacetech.org> wrote: Send OSList mailing list submissions to oslist@lists.openspacetech.org To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit http://lists.openspacetech.org/listinfo.cgi/oslist-openspacetech.org or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to oslist-requ...@lists.openspacetech.org You can reach the person managing the list at oslist-ow...@lists.openspacetech.org When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of OSList digest..." Today's Topics: 1. wosonos2015 (Raffi Aftandelian via OSList) 2. Re: Authority Distribution in Open Space (Daniel Mezick via OSList) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Sat, 27 Sep 2014 19:14:19 -0700 From: Raffi Aftandelian via OSList <oslist@lists.openspacetech.org> To: OSlist <oslist@lists.openspacetech.org> Subject: [OSList] wosonos2015 Message-ID: <1411870459.93148.yahoomail...@web140803.mail.bf1.yahoo.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" ditto what chris said. as a co-org'r of a previous wosonos (in another slavic country) happy to share my experience- the good, the differently good, and the quite differently good- aspects of organizing such an event. laramtsa, raffi ****** I am the culturally White middle class American taxpayer, up to my chin in hypocrisy, double standards, a sense of entitlement, and choking on overconsumption, blissfully in denial about how 60% of my federal income taxes go to a military that sustains genocide and ecocide the world over ...all in the name of democracy, freedom, and happiness for all -- a riff off of Thic Nhat Hanh's Please Call Me By My True Names -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://lists.openspacetech.org/pipermail/oslist-openspacetech.org/attachmen ts/20140927/66f1e2f4/attachment.html> ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Sun, 28 Sep 2014 08:37:12 -0400 From: Daniel Mezick via OSList <oslist@lists.openspacetech.org> To: oslist@lists.openspacetech.org Subject: Re: [OSList] Authority Distribution in Open Space Message-ID: <542800f8.9070...@newtechusa.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"; Format="flowed" Hi Harold, You say: /"..I struggle to translate is the concept of coercion and authority from the vantage of "it's all open space". Can we really be coerced? How are we all already "opting in" to empower the "authorities"?/ // /"...Could we just be volunteering for the victim part of our stories?/ // /"...I have some thoughts about this, but I wonder what you would say to such a challenge to the relevance of "authority" in OST?/ Hmmm...interesting questions for sure. My current belief is that authorization dynamics are central to the general dynamics of Open Space. And if it is "Open Space all the time" then authorization dynamics as desribed in my essay are also there... all the time. Regarding the Open Space meeting format: If we begin at the beginning; that is, at the start of arranging an actual Open Space event in an organization, we immediately work to identify and locate someone "duly authorized" by the organization, to do the things the Sponsor does, and say the things the Sponsor says. Someone to occupy the Sponsor role. To do that, the person occupying the role must have substantial authority in the organization, usually of the formal variety. Right? Put another way: if the Sponsor is lacking in authorization, can they actually be effective? Larger question: Can the meeting still actually work? What about the post-meeting follow-through? So here we see how /authorization shows up a the very start of any contemplated Open Space event inside an organization/. One last thing: last time I checked, "victims" are kind of rare in Open Space. Something about the subtext of "the Law of 2 Feet...." "...The Law of Two Feet concept was published in an article by Harrison Owen <http://www.openspaceworld.com/brief_history.htm>, a member of an organization advocating Open Spaces Technology, a model for organizing meetings that's based around open participation. Here's how Owen describes the rule: "...Briefly stated, this law says that every individual has two feet, and must be prepared to use them. Responsibility for a successful outcome in any Open Space Event resides with exactly one person---each participant. Individuals can make a difference and must make a difference. If that is not true in a given situation, they, and they alone, must take responsibility to use their two feet, and move to a new place where they can make a difference." http://opensource.com/business/10/8/darwin-meets-dilbert-applying-law-two-fe et-your-next-meeting Daniel On 9/26/14 6:49 PM, Harold Shinsato via OSList wrote: Fantastic essay, Daniel. I'm a bit freaked out by Harrison talking about his "translator" after diving into T.S.Kuhn's book where he says paradigm shifts require "translators" because new and old paradigm holders live in different worlds, where even common terms may be fundamentally different. What I struggle to translate is the concept of coercion and authority from the vantage of "it's all open space". Can we really be coerced? How are we all already "opting in" to empower the "authorities"? Could we just be volunteering for the victim part of our stories? I have some thoughts about this, but I wonder what you would say to such a challenge to the relevance of "authority" in OST? Thanks, Harold Daniel... You really did it! I think. Your language comes from a place I don't know... which is to say that I probably wouldn't say what you say in the way that you do (duh). BUT when I run my "translator" it comes out sounding pretty good! So... I can't help with the questions you have raised. Actually I think you are doing pretty well on your own, and (hopefully) will incite others to a similarly riotous performance. Thanks! Harrison Winter Address 7808 River Falls Drive Potomac, MD 20854 301-365-2093 <tel:301-365-2093> Summer Address 189 Beaucaire Ave. Camden, ME 04843 207-763-3261 <tel:207-763-3261> Websites www.openspaceworld.com <http://%20www.openspaceworld.com> www.ho-image.com <http://www.ho-image.com> OSLIST To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of OSLIST Go to:http://lists.openspacetech.org/listinfo.cgi/oslist-openspacetech.org *From:*OSList [mailto:oslist-boun...@lists.openspacetech.org <mailto:oslist-boun...@lists.openspacetech.org>] *On Behalf Of *Daniel Mezick via OSList *Sent:* Thursday, September 25, 2014 9:39 AM *To:* oslist@lists.openspacetech.org <mailto:oslist@lists.openspacetech.org> *Subject:* [OSList] Authority Distribution in Open Space Greetings to All, For the past several years I have attended conferences of the Group Relations community, and encouraged others to do the same. I've studied their literature, and harvested some important learning as a result. One of the things I have come to understand a little bit better is the role of "authority dynamics" in self-organizing social systems. Link: www.akriceinstitute.org <http://www.akriceinstitute.org> Over the past several years I've been using Open Space with intent to improve the results of my work in helping companies implement Agile ideas in their organizations. We do an initial Open Space, then the folks get about 3 months to play with Agile (we carefully use the word "experimentation" with management,) then we do another Open Space after that, to inspect what just happened across the enterprise. The initial and subsequent Open Space events form a "safe" container or field in which the members can /learn/... as they explore how to /improve/ together by /experimenting/ with new practices, and see if they actually work. I call the process Open Agile Adoption. Link: OpenAgileAdoption.com This seems to work pretty good. It seems to "take the air out of" most of the fear, most of the anxiety and most of the worry that is created. The key aspect is /consent/: absolutely no one is forced to do anything they are unwilling to do. No one is /coerced/ to /comply/. Everyone is instead respectfully /invited/ to help /write/ the story, and be a /character/ in the story...of the contemplated process change. Open Agile Adoption encourages a spirit of experimentation and play. The spirit of Open Space is the spirit of freedom. Isn't it? In the OST community, we discuss and talk a lot about self-organization, self-management and self-governance. The Agile community also talks about these ideas a lot. So I have some questions. What is really going on during self-organization in a social system? What are the steps? What information is being sent and received? From whom, and by whom? Is the information about /authority/ important? How important? Can a social system self organize without regard to who has the right to do what work? /How do decisions that affect others get made in a self-organizing system?/ Who decides about /who decides/? How important is the process of /authorization/ in a self-organizing system? Is self-organization in large part the process of dynamic authorization (and /de-authorization/) in real time? What /is /authorization? Can self-organization occur without the sending and receiving of authorization data by and between the members? Is Bruce Tuckman's forming/storming/performing/adjourning actually decomposing the /dynamics of authorization/ inside a social system? The essay below attempts to answer some of these difficult questions. I'd love your thoughts on it. Will you give it a look? Essay: Authority Distribution in Open Space http://newtechusa.net/agile/authority-distribution-in-open-space/ Kind Regards, Daniel -- Daniel Mezick, President New Technology Solutions Inc. (203) 915 7248 <tel:%28203%29%20915%207248> (cell) Bio <http://newtechusa.net/dan-mezick/>. Blog <http://newtechusa.net/blog/>. Twitter <http://twitter.com/#%21/danmezick/>. Examine my new book:The Culture Game <http://newtechusa.net/about/the-culture-game-book/>: Tools for the Agile Manager. Explore Agile Team Training <http://newtechusa.net/services/agile-scrum-training/> and Coaching. <http://newtechusa.net/services/agile-scrum-coaching/> Explore the Agile Boston <http://newtechusa.net/user-groups/ma/>Community. _______________________________________________ OSList mailing list To post send emails to OSList@lists.openspacetech.org <mailto:OSList@lists.openspacetech.org> To unsubscribe send an email to oslist-le...@lists.openspacetech.org <mailto:oslist-le...@lists.openspacetech.org> To subscribe or manage your subscription click below: http://lists.openspacetech.org/listinfo.cgi/oslist-openspacetech.org _______________________________________________ OSList mailing list To post send emails to OSList@lists.openspacetech.org To unsubscribe send an email to oslist-le...@lists.openspacetech.org To subscribe or manage your subscription click below: http://lists.openspacetech.org/listinfo.cgi/oslist-openspacetech.org -- Daniel Mezick, President New Technology Solutions Inc. (203) 915 7248 (cell) Bio <http://newtechusa.net/dan-mezick/>. Blog <http://newtechusa.net/blog/>. Twitter <http://twitter.com/#%21/danmezick/>. Examine my new book:The Culture Game <http://newtechusa.net/about/the-culture-game-book/>: Tools for the Agile Manager. Explore Agile Team Training <http://newtechusa.net/services/agile-scrum-training/> and Coaching. <http://newtechusa.net/services/agile-scrum-coaching/> Explore the Agile Boston <http://newtechusa.net//user-groups/ma/ <http://newtechusa.net/user-groups/ma/> >Community. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... 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