Re: [OSList] Asking for your wisdom - Leora Tushinski

[Peggy Holman via OSList]

Hi Leora,

I’ll add my two cents to the wisdom already shared. You asked:

...how to "hold" the tension between the "freedom" in the OS method,   and 
“purposefulness” needed in most of the processes .

How can we expect to get to "bottom lines" (get the work done) when we depend 
only on the people who come, and what they decide…?

  And more, how can we avoid   the "loose" rules   lead to "anarchy", 
especially in complex environment? 


Your questions are often asked by managers who are considering bringing Open 
Space to their organizations. They’re great questions.

Such questions have an implicit assumption that managers define purpose and 
rules and everyone else follows, doing what they’re told. In my life 
experience, that assumption is rarely the case. It may be employees have a 
different purpose than their manager but we are all purpose-driven. Sometimes 
we’re conscious of our purpose, sometimes not. 

Another assumption in your questions is that Open Space, because it invites 
people to experience freedom, doesn’t have purpose. In fact, just the opposite 
is true. I find Open Space makes purpose exceedingly clear. That is one of its 
strengths. It is part of what makes OST so radical. It puts purpose out in the 
form of a question, an organizing theme and invites people into freely 
exploring purpose, often from perspectives managers never imagined. People are 
freed to get work done because the “loose” rules liberate them to more 
effectively navigate complex environments. I often find managers shocked by the 
passion and creativity of people. They are far more capable and committed than 
many managers assume.

The essence of Open Space, with a nod to Anne Stadler, who first framed it this 
way, is to take responsibility for what you love. Because the purpose is stated 
clearly, people who choose to accept the invitation to attend know why they’re 
there. So they propose what they need to in order to accomplish the purpose.

Now there are several assumptions in what I’m saying. First, that people are 
there by choice. Invitation, not mandatory attendance, ensures you have people 
who want to be there. Making an Open Space mandatory runs counter to the spirit 
of “whoever comes is the right people”. Participation comes via an invitation, 
not a mandate. A second assumption is that the sponsor(s) are authentic in 
their calling question — they have stated a real purpose for coming together. 
If not, they put the process at risk as that would be an act of betrayal.

You see, Open Space enables a different form of organization. It is not based 
in hierarchy, which is terribly cumbersome in complex situations. OST forges 
self-organized networks, communities, relationships as people discover the 
others who care about the things they care about. In fact, part of the power of 
Open Space is that it re-knits the fabric of community as the needs of 
individuals and the needs of the whole are both served. People find they can 
look to each other for partnership and support in accomplishing purposes they 
care about.

One other item I want to unpack: “if we depend only on the people who come”…I 
have come to believe that, in addition to developing a thoughtful, purposeful, 
meaningful calling question, one of the most important aspects of preparing for 
an Open Space is attending to who is invited. It is the job of the organizers 
to do the work to ensure they have invited people from the whole system. I 
interpret the principle about "whoever comes are the right people" not as a 
"leave it to chance" perspective but rather as a "be at peace” perspective that 
those who show up will figure it out.

As a facilitator, I consider an important part of my job is to work with the 
sponsor/organizing team to understand who makes up the system so that the 
sponsor/organizing team invites them. Harrison describes the people to be 
invited as the "people who care". Since it isn’t always obvious, I take a cue 
from Marv Weisbord and Sandra Janoff and use a rubric from Future Search in how 
I think about who cares. I work with the organizers to identify the people who 
“ARE IN”: with Authority, Resources, Expertise, Information, and Need. And then 
I bring a diversity lens to it to help the sponsor/organizing team to 
determine, which, if any, of these demographic dimensions are important: age, 
race, gender, geography, socio-economics, political perspective, and religion. 
Doing the work of inviting people from the whole system lays the groundwork so 
that you can depend on the people who come. 

Open Space gives us practice in experiencing what networked-based organizing 
feels like. Newtonian science was mirrored in the organizational form that 
emerged during its day: hierarchy. As we come to understand the science of 
complexity, we’re beginning to recognize something that was always there: our 
most effective form for human organizing today is in networks. Open Space just 
helps us do it consciously.

Enjoy

Re: [OSList] Help finding resource, please?

[Elizabeth Price via OSList]

This is it, Marc! Thank you so much. I knew one of you would come through. :-) 
Keep moving forward, Elizabeth

> On Mar 5, 2021, at 8:52 AM, Marc C. Trudeau  wrote:
> 
> Elizabeth, Might you mean Ron Quartel’s FAST Agile (https://www.fastagile.io 
> )? (Downloadable guide at top of that page)
> 
> 
> 
> Marc Trudeau
> mobile 774-641-8302
> 
> LikeBreathin.com  
> 
> Effective teamwork and team leadership feel nearly effortless, Like 
> Breathin’​. Partner with us to experience how.
> 
> 
> 
> 
>> On Mar 4, 2021, at 11:09 PM, Elizabeth Price via OSList 
>> mailto:oslist@lists.openspacetech.org>> 
>> wrote:
>> 
>> Hi, Everyone! At some point, someone shared a document that a tech company 
>> created to structure their meetings in an OST manner. I remember 
>> downloading, reviewing it, and now cannot find it anywhere. All I remember 
>> is that it was awesome and that it was a gaming or creative company in the 
>> US (possibly Silicon Valley based). It was their training handbook on how to 
>> have creative self-managing meetings. I'd love to share it with a director 
>> of a software company. Help? 
>> Thank you!
>> Elizabeth
>> ___
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>> 
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> 

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[OSList] New_Public's 14 "Civic Signals" of Healthy (Digital) Public Spaces

[Marc C. Trudeau via OSList]

In a Webinar now, hosted by https://www.humanetech.com.

https://newpublic.org

Free download of their “14 Civic Signals” research, at first glance, holds 
strong parallels to Open Space, and may provide hints for this group’s work in 
developing healthy virtual spaces.

Cheers!

Marc



Marc Trudeau
mobile 774-641-8302

LikeBreathin.com

Effective teamwork and team leadership feel nearly effortless, Like Breathin’​. 
Partner with us to experience how.




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Re: [OSList] Help finding resource, please?

[Marc C. Trudeau via OSList]

Elizabeth, Might you mean Ron Quartel’s FAST Agile (https://www.fastagile.io)? 
(Downloadable guide at top of that page)



Marc Trudeau
mobile 774-641-8302

LikeBreathin.com

Effective teamwork and team leadership feel nearly effortless, Like Breathin’​. 
Partner with us to experience how.




On Mar 4, 2021, at 11:09 PM, Elizabeth Price via OSList 
mailto:oslist@lists.openspacetech.org>> wrote:

Hi, Everyone! At some point, someone shared a document that a tech company 
created to structure their meetings in an OST manner. I remember downloading, 
reviewing it, and now cannot find it anywhere. All I remember is that it was 
awesome and that it was a gaming or creative company in the US (possibly 
Silicon Valley based). It was their training handbook on how to have creative 
self-managing meetings. I'd love to share it with a director of a software 
company. Help?
Thank you!
Elizabeth
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OSList@lists.openspacetech.org
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Re: [OSList] Asking for your wisdom - Leora Tushinski

[Thomas Herrmann via OSList]

Hi Leora and welcome to OS-list!
Much wisdom has already been shared.
I usually invite my clients to some good pre-work to have clarity on purpose, 
goals and to create clarity on the conditions/givens including clarifying 
support for the continuous process after the event. Then they have the task to 
create an irresistible invitation and spread it as widely as possible, to all 
who may be interested… then trust the principle: Whoever comes…
It’s wise to involve different stakeholders in the pre-work too, so they are 
engaged and ambassadors to spreading the word.
Good luck
Thomas Herrmann, sending greetings from Sweden – please extend my warmest 
greetings to Tova too!

Från: OSList  För leora tushinski via 
OSList
Skickat: den 3 mars 2021 11:13
Till: oslist@lists.openspacetech.org
Kopia: leora tushinski 
Ämne: [OSList] Asking for your wisdom - Leora Tushinski

Hello everyone,

This is my first time in the OSList and I am writing to ask for the wisdom I am 
sure is held in this group.
My name is Leora and I'm a student of "Dialogic interventions in Large group" , 
held by Tova Averbuch and Rotem Ofer.
As a manager I have a challenge (and maybe a fear): wondering how to "hold" the 
tension between the "freedom" in the OS method,   and “purposefulness” needed 
in most of the processes .
How can we expect to get to "bottom lines" (get the work done) when we depend 
only on the people who come, and what they decide…?
  And more, how can we avoid   the "loose" rules   lead to "anarchy", 
especially in complex environment?
I will appreciate your time, attention and wisdom
Thank you
Leora
Israel

050-6207543 (972)

בברכה,
ליאורה

050-6207543
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