Harrison Owen muses on circles, presence and Open Space on the OSLIST: As I have listened to this conversation (a very rich one!) random thoughts came to mind – which may actually fit together? The first one went something like this. We speak, understandably, about “doing an Open Space” – but I suspect that may box us into a corner we need not be stuck in. “Doing and Open Space” implies that we are following a certain set of prescribed procedures, after all Open Space Technology is a method. This is true, but it may also hide a larger truth, …
On the OSLIST, Doug wrote: Chris and all– Fields work… Hosting… living in open space… You seem to have these evocative phrases swimming about you, Chris. Would you be so kind as to wax a little more poetic about them, put some more meat on the bones? They are, I think, getting to the heart of the question that started this thread…. The thread was about whether or not the facilitator can take an active role in an Open Space meeting, and what or why not. It has been a good thread. I responded to Doug this way: Well Doug, …
From Neighbourhoods: Community noticeboards still perform a function in many places, providing just the right channel for some kinds of information for certain kinds of people. Here’s a nice example I picked up recently – plenty of variety with announcements of events, things to be sold, and services to offer.Yes I know, neighbourhood online systems provide this and more, but there’s still something enchanting about the scruffy visible publicness of this as a role for a local venue like a post office or newsagent. I think I’ve seen similar in launderettes and chemists, but not in pubs, which is curious; …
Kaliya Hamlin is getting really noticed for her work promoting Open Space in the tech community. The whole idea of unconferencing has jumped the shark, but there is still an art to doing Open Space. It’s easy but not simple, and Kaliya has been a great guardian of the essence of the process as it grows into the tech world in a big way This article from the Business 2.0 blog is another piece of good attention being thrown her way. Actually there are a rash of articles out these days on Open Space, including one in a publication called …
At the Leading Change conference today, the organizers were fretting this morning about a sit down lunch. We’re in Open Space, so the room is kind of chaotic. We weren’t sure how this would happen, so we carved a half hour out of the agenda, and let people know in the morning that we would need them to be out of the way while the room was getting set up. But this is Open Space, and of course it was also about leading change. Eleven o’clock came around and the groups broke up and trickled back into the main room. …