OpenSpaceTechnology – Page 5 – Michael Herman's Blog (2003-2016)

January 18, 2006May 5, 2006

Inviting Goal-Free Community

In January 2006, John Wiley & Sons published Stephen Shapiro’s counter-cultural book, Goal-Free Living: How to Have the Life You Want NOW! Response to this controversial work has been phenomenal, including a cover story in the November 2005 issue of O, The Oprah Magazine and a feature on TomPeters.com.

Maybe you’re already living a goal-free life — in larger or smaller ways. That doesn’t mean you don’t have any goals or dreams or desires… it means you aren’t held captive by them!

We are bringing people together to explore the issues and opportunities for living a goal-free life — personally, professionally, and culturally. I’ll be facilitating this in Open Space, March 18-19, 2006, in Oak Park (Chicago).

Are you looking to collaborate with and learn from others who share a goal-free mindset? Maybe you still feel a bit trapped by your goals, but are finally ready to break free of that pushing? Would you like to meet, support, and be supported by other people who are succeeding in goal-free ways? Please join us in creating a goal-free community of new friends and colleagues!

January 10, 2006August 1, 2016

Four into One

wendy farmer-oneil mentioned InvitingOrganization and the Four Practices, yesterday on the phone, and wondered if we shouldn’t name a fifth practice and dimension, a center space that is some sort of stillness.

my answer… yes. and, but, not like that.

i’ve suggested four seasons, quadrants, practices. and yes, there is stillness, reflection, settling in the first one, opening heart. that requires that heart rest in something, like pelvis and legs, the support and ground achieved in the third and fourth practices. but this stillness is not the thing she was really asking about, i think. it’s not a peer to the other four, not a separate center.

it is bigger. i think it is their union. their all all-at-once-ness without loss of distinction. in terms of strategic questions, it recalls the highest level question is “how light is your organization?” at that level everything runs together, and light is love, clear, fast and power.

so yes there is a center, and a perimeter, and it is also the ground that the whole map is drawn on, the page or the screen. and finally, remember that each of the quadrants can be cut into those same four quadrants, a fractal slide into a space that refuses to be theorized, where we can only just do it. in this fractal view, four quadrants inside of each of the quadrants, we see the all-at-onceness is fully present in each of the four.

there is no fifth season, no new peer to the four, and there is always a center, an edge, a ground and a space that is always present, in each of them in time, and all of them taken together, which is impossible to name. it’s not a fifth or separate practice, but the gift of all practice, then thing that emerges in experience when we do the other four.

and this is the easy, all-at-onceness, all-together, everything works out quality, sometimes called ‘community’ or ‘high learning’ or ‘flow’ or ‘fun’ or ‘spirit’ that emerges when we practice these things in the form of open space technology.

January 5, 2006January 6, 2006

Building Communities Worth Having

You are invited to Building Communities Worth Having, and Open Space Conference, February 3-5 in Portland Oregon. Friends and colleagues Ted Ernst and Brandon Saunders are co-convening this event, and have asked me to facilitate. I’m glad to be along for the ride with them. If you’re anywhere involved in “The Movement” (place-based, cyber-space and/or face-to-face) for building a better world, we’d be glad to have you join us!

It’s being co-sponsored by IBESI, OSDL, ICANNWiki, SocialText

UPDATE: new sponsor… ATLASSIAN

January 4, 2006August 22, 2006

Open Space Practices Refined

I woke up New Year’s Day with new language for what I’ve posted previously as “Open Space Practices”. That is, what is it that I think I’m really doing when I’m facilitating Open Space — or working or just living in it?

opening heart – might be a physical embrace or simply a time of quiet reflection, eventually some theme or purpose might arise. in open space, it is the themes and purposes that arise in the hearts of leaders that we turn into invitations. by opening heart, we discover or rediscover the thing(s) we love. to open heart we almost always need to rest.
inviting attention – might mean getting up on a soap box to speak our truth, or sitting down and really listening to somebody. in open space, the invitation comes from listening and then goes out to invite more conversation. by inviting attention we open new views and sharpen focus. to invite attention we almost always need to ask questions and tell stories, about what was, what is now, and what is next.
supporting connection – could be as simple as a business card, a handshake or walking hand in hand, but might be as complex as social and analytical software tools. in open space we use circle, bulletin board, the law of two feet in a marketplace of ideas and conversations. by supporting connection we make conversation, decision-making, and commitment possible. to support connection, we almost always need to open and hold spaces for people, work, and information to move.
grounding the energy – might be as simple as a souvenir, a journal entry, a summary document or action plan. in open space it’s usually a proceedings document and the actions that it guides, but it could be anything that marks or documents what’s new and different and helps to make it more real and lasting. to grounding the energy we almost always have to take responsibility, for recognizing, creating and/or securing value.

What I like about this version is that the four of them finally seem to match each other, each one now languaged as part of the same whole. They seem simple enough to think about actually doing and complex enough to truly practice. I think they work on many levels, from working professionally with organizations to living intimately with a partner or family. Finally, and most importantly, they seem an accurate account of what I’m attempting in my own life, not just things I’m explaining and suggesting that others should try.

UPDATE: I was facilitating Open Space today (140 CFPs in Austin, TX) and as I’m setting up, I’m restless as usual before the start. What should I be doing? “..oh, yes, just open my heart…” I think, and relax into that. In a few moments, it’s time to start, what to do now? “…oh, yes, ring the bells, invite attention…” and then as soon as everyone gathers, I support connection, with eyes, and briefing marketplace and bulletin board and proceedings typing. This was a short one, so I ring bells at the end of sessions, as reminders, grounding. And invite comment at the end of the day, evening news, evening grounding. We try it again tomorrow. Practice.

December 20, 2005December 21, 2005

Edges of Practice

I liked these reminders that Peggy Holman sent to the OSLIST recently. I think they translate well, beyond the practice of OpenSpaceTech facilitation.

…[some] aspects I think are making a difference for me:
1. Defining the Law of Two Feet as “taking responsibility for what you love”. I no longer talk about the Law of Two Feet as passion and responsibility. While basically equivalent, there’s something very powerful about this framing — it is highly actionable for both individuals and groups.
2. Using silence in the plenary. Morning announcements, evening news, I always begin with silence. This is really subtle and yet I know it matters. It seems to connect people with themselves, each other, and the whole.
3. Time and diversity. These old friends really matter. Two and a half days or more. Time to cook is so vital when dealing with complexity. PLUS bringing together unlikely mixes of people — the whole system — prepares the soil for the unexpected. The more creative the definition of the system the better!
4. Setting bold intention. The more ambitious the purpose, the more the potential energy to transform it contains. It may seem obvious, but I often find myself coaching sponsors to be daring.
I think these aspects bring qualities to the work of creating a fertile field that up the likelihood for good things to happen.

I especially like the first one. Open Space is most definitely, and essentially, about taking responsibility for the things we love… and then letting the rest of the clutter fall away.

December 16, 2005December 16, 2005

OpenSpaceWorld.ORG

It’s a whole new world at OpenSpaceWorld.ORG… enhanced by photos, weblog, new resources archive formatting in wiki, and the convening of a new group of co-conspiring authors to keep the whole place going and growing. It’s been a ton of work these last two weeks, but it really has become quite a nice looking and useful place. Please have a look!

December 9, 2005December 9, 2005

Leadership Experience

I’ve spent the last week or so totally immersed in the redesign and expansion of OpenSpaceWorld.org. The new site will debut in another week, but the learning is already going live.

After 6.5 years of building and managing the site, mostly solo, I’ve created a wordpress-based weblog and am inviting a number of others to co-author and ultimately co-manage the site. Working at the edge of this shift, it’s clear to me that I really don’t want to “let go of control.”

What I do want to do is share my experience and expand awareness. I know much about the site, how it’s built, how it runs, what is possible. It’s this awareness that I really want to expand, to invite others into. I have no need to control decisions, but I do have some sort of inner drive to share what I see and what I know. Then we, whoever comes into the working group, can make decisions together.

So often we criticize a leader’s “need for control” without distinguishing a (perhaps deeper) need for sharing experience and knowledge about the work. Notice that the latter (sharing) requires that a leader’s experience be met by a follower’s respect and attention, while the former (criticizing) implicitly assumes that the leader has nothing special or advanced to share. Of course, the sharing also requires that leaders actually do bring some depth of experience.

All of which has me wondering… Is the churning and flattening of organization crushing experience, eldership and learning? Are we inviting expanding awareness or just working to stay in control? What’s your experience?

December 2, 2005December 2, 2005

Open Space Conference Seeds Sprout

Three years ago, I designed and facilitated an Open Space track of the Agile/XP Universe Conference for programmers here in Chicago. Nice to hear that some of the seeds sewn there have begun to sprout. This report came in recently…

Yesterday, I opened space at the PNSQC conference in Portland OR. (Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference) Ellen Gottesdiener (copied on this email) opened space in July at the Agile 2005 conference, also software-related. In both of those the OS ran concurrently with other sessions. Here in the NW we are planning another software-related regional conference (XP Fest NW) for next spring to be all Open Space, all the time.
The first time I saw Open Space in a conference setting in 2002, Michael Herman opened it for the XP/Agile Universe.
It’s not the ideal way to facilitate Open Space, [conference tracks] but it makes for a more enjoyable and rich conference, IMHO. The more conferences I attend with Open Space tracks, the more impatient I get with powerpoint presentations. Another thing I’ve noticed in conferences that regularly include Open Space…the senior folks and “gurus” tend to show up there and become more accessible than in more formal sessions.

I’d agree with Diana. Better to run the whole thing in Open Space, but sometimes the tracks are a necessary bridge to that. Go, Diana, Go! And perhaps the coolest part about Open Space is that somebody can see it once or twice and then just dive into the leadership for themselves. It helps to have a couple of good looks at it, but after that, it’s just a matter of Practice!

November 30, 2005November 30, 2005

Opening Space for the Infinite

The relative quiet of winter settles in, even in the center of this big and windy city. Newly wireless, freed from my desk chair, I find myself exploring the theology of Paul Tillich from my living room couch.

…since things in existence are corrupt and therefore ambiguous, no finite thing can be (by itself) that which is infinite. All that is possible is for the finite to be a vehicle for revealing the infinite…

Recently I discovered that Tillich was in fact a central teacher for one of my own central teachers (and friends), Harrison Owen, originator of the Open Space Technology approach to meeting and organization. Thanks to Ashley for uncovering these connections via email.

All of which has me returning and reviewing, this evening season, my own work and practice, in Open Space and beyond, as finite version and vehicle for the infinite. I notice that these two inform each other, how I see is what I see. Body as vehicle of perception. Training as vehicle of understanding. Practice as vehicle for confusion. Patient, persistent, opening, visioning, offering, grounding, as vehicle for…

I teeter on, in the open space between doing well and doing good.

November 16, 2005November 16, 2005

Corporate Merger in Open Space

Snippets of a great corporate open space story by Kenny Moore, author of the CEO and the Monk: One Company’s Journey to Profit and Purpose.

Meetings were held, discussions were had and individuals were identified: somewhat akin to the Spanish Inquisition…
The fact that there were almost 400 people in this newly combined I/T department and that they were intimately responsible for the $1 billion savings, all seemed to make the CIO a little edgy, and on occasion, apoplectic. I believe someone also let it slip that his future career was somewhat connected to fixing these “minor personnel issues” as well as delivering on the one billion bucks.
“If you’re truly looking to fix this problem, you’ll need to do something like an ‘Open Space’ to turn this situation around.”
With executive alacrity, he barked: “Well, then, we’ll do it.”
“Do what?” I replied. “Why, we’ll do an ‘Open Space.'”
Plans proceeded quickly. We booked the entire facility, using the Grand Ballroom as the central gathering point for the crowd of 400.
…the gory details…
One off-site event does not a triumphant merger make. Our future success, as a corporate community as well as a global one, does not reside in offering bribes, incentive plans or clearly articulated measurable goals. It lies elsewhere. It dwells within. Confronting people with their freedom is what’s required.
Inviting, convening and listening need to replace commanding, legislating and critiquing.

November 15, 2005November 15, 2005

Practices Updated

My earlier posting on Open Space Practices has been updated to include the following distinctions…

Being Open-Hearted: The vehicle is experience in body (heart, perception); the product is care, a sense of personal passion.
Telling Visionary Stories: The vehicle is invitation (literally, “please join us…”); the product is organization, a sense of focus, future, and desired direction.
Offering and Holding Space: The vehicle is organizing space (elbow room and open markets); the product is inviting, a sense of support and opportunity for movement.
Grounding: The vehicle is direct and personal responsibility (action); and the product is peace, or satisfaction.

Hoping this helps put a sharper point on the newer, briefer, telling of the Practices story.

November 14, 2005November 14, 2005

Innovation: Implement or Invite?

BlawgThink2005 ended with a conversation with NetCentrics’ Jeffrey Phillips about a new product they are bringing to market now. IdeaBank is a central, web-based database for ideas, large and small, so willing to accept new ideas that it even has it’s own email address. Once ideas are entered there, the system lays out a series of steps for developing, evaluating and deciding what should be done with each idea. It’s all actively password protected, so only the right people see the right ideas.

Seems simple enough. Sweep all kinds of ideas, spreadsheets, proposals, down to sticky notes, from technical R&D to creative flashes and suggestions, into one place for purposefully rigorous consideration — and action. But how do you get such a system started? How do you replace a massively complex, organically distributed, and obviously inefficient — but existing — system with a simple, effective and centrally accessible — but brand new — system? Daunting, but not impossible, I think.

But first, tell me one thing: Is Innovation a technical process that can be mapped and automated, or a social process that must be nurtured and cultivated? Can Innovation be implemented or only invited and supported? And what kind(s) of Invitation are required to bring so many diverse views and practices of Innovation together into one new format? Is it enough to invite the data? I’d guess not. But how to invite the people? And how many does it take to tip the new space into active and productive use?

IdeaBank seems as good a tool as any for the technical task. Open Space has taught us much about Inviting the people. Want to Invite Innovation?

November 14, 2005November 14, 2005

Not Ready for Open Space?

Sometimes people tell me “…we’re just not ready for Open Space…” followed by stories of unenlightened leadership, restrictive rules, and scarcity of resources. My response is usually the most polite form of contradiction I can muster. Here’s a good example, from my friend Lisa Heft, of why I always disagree with such comments:

…I attend the annual prison health fair at several prisons, where I set up a circle of chairs so people can just talk and converse and ask questions about absolutely anything that is important to them. Because that is health, too. So this last time I had the pleasure of hosting an all-day talking circle. Or maybe I should call it a listening circle?
It’s the closest thing to Open Space I can get – in prison you cannot do anything that an onlooker (say a guard looking down from a tower or across a prison yard) might interpret as chaos. Therefore, so far I cannot set up a delightful-chaos-of-Open Space situation. But I can do one circle, that lasts for a day, that goes wherever anyone wants it to go.

My disagreements with comments about “not ready” in no way doubt your assessment of how things are in an organization. Rather, I want to stretch the definition of Open Space (from tool to practice) and point out the real potential for productive openings, large or small, in any sort of organization.