Campbell River BC
Constantly on the road these days. Just did a weekend strategic planning session with the VIATT Board – a very interesting session. We are at the point in our planning where we are developing the structures that will govern this system once we begin to assume full authority next year. This is a tricky set of questions, involving money, leadership, turf and control as we try to find the best structure that will run the system in line with deep community values. And so as we confront this moment, the Board decided to have a strategic planning session to get some insight on which direction we need to go in. However, wise as they are, instead of just inviting themselves to crack the question, each Board member brought two or three guests with them: family members, friends, associates, all of whom are like eagles themselves to each Board member. As a result we had forty people here, all devoted to suported their friends and loved ones in doing this work. The circle of eagles has been called.
We began with some appreciative inquiry into organizational systems that work, following on from the story of VIATT’s emergence and development over the past five years. Then we went into a World Cafe on the subject of what VIATT should be doing, once the Authority becomes a full fledged thing, next year. Finally, we ended with a more or less full day of Open Space during which we talked about the relationships we need to build and strengthen.
It was a rich session, and there is much deep content emerging.
Today, I am back up in the north Island and heading out with mates to the wild west coast. We’re visiting three communities way off the grid tomorrow, one of which, Ka:’yu:’k’t’h, is boat access only. I’ll post photos and thoughts when I’m back near a web connection.
I’ve been out of touch all last week, ensconced in a fascinating five day retreat with an organization that is working hard to make Open Space Technology a part of their basic operating system. We were working at a fishing lodge in Campbell River BC all week overlooking the Discovery Passage, which was filled with sea lions, eagles and a small pod of killer whales. I had very limited internet access, and it was actually a great gift to be unplugged during that whole time.
There is lots to harvest from the trip, and several bits and pieces that I’m thinking through, but here is what is on my mind this morning.
This group is using Open Space on a regular basis to take care of the work that is not in the workplans, not in the budget and not necessarily even directly a part of what their organization seems to be about. But what we learned this week is that Open Space, used in this way, takes care of the “bass notes” within an organization. There is a kind of deeper hum within every organization – call it the culture if you like – that supports the work, generates the working environement and connects to the purpose of each person. People who are highly satisfied with their jobs and organization will often feel connected to this deeper field. They resonate with the bass note, the fundamental note of the chord. When this note isn’t present, it feels like work is not connected into a deeper pattern. Understand here that I am talking not about organizational purpose – it runs below that. It is more like organizational inspiration, operating at the level of the spirit of the place. Making Open Space part of the operating system of an organization results in tuning this bass note, or perhaps sounding it again. We have a chance to open space to breathe a little, get some distance from the mundane tasks of our job and ask some of the bigger questions about who we are and where the organization is going.
The folks in this organization are lucky that the upper leadership wants to see things working this way and has provided them with the time and resources both to meet in Open Space and to carry out the small projects starting next week that keep the bass note humming. And of course, we tuned up relationships as well, brought familiarity and warmth to an organization that is spread thinly across the whole country so that people can remember how we were when we were together, something that helps them continue to work virtually.
And a few travel notes…
- There is a nice little espresso shack in Cumberland, a mining and logging town about an hour out of Nanaimo, in the Comox Valley. It’s right on the main street, less that five minutes off the Island Highway.
- The staff at National rent-a-car in Nanaimo are great. Always friendly, generous with their time, and helpful. They’ll pick you up from the ferry terminal and drop you off, but be warned that although the close at 6pm, their boss told them not to drop people off at the ferry after 5pm. It’s a bit of a pain, and I didn’t know that going in, so there was a 7$ cab fare to the terminal. Not a big deal, but it was a surprise. They were very apologetic.
The Wayfarers
by Rupert Brooke
Is it the hour? We leave this resting-place
Made fair by one another for a while.
Now, for a god-speed, one last mad embrace;
The long road then, unlit by your faint smile.
Ah! the long road! and you so far away!
Oh, I’ll remember! but . . . each crawling day
Will pale a little your scarlet lips, each mile
Dull the dear pain of your remembered face.
. . . Do you think there’s a far border town, somewhere,
The desert’s edge, last of the lands we know,
Some gaunt eventual limit of our light,
In which I’ll find you waiting; and we’ll go
Together, hand in hand again, out there,
Into the waste we know not, into the night?
Photo by zyber
I was in Victoria Tuesday and Wednesday and, in addition to working, found out a few other things about my regular routine there:
- Tuesday’s there is an Irish session (with some other tunes) at the Bent Mast Pub in James Bay. It’s a very friendly session, and a nice social scene. My new friend Jonathan took a few pictures of our tijme together on Tuesday including the one above of me. we even had a dancer join us.
- The best place for lunch on the whole planet bar none is daidoco. It is a little Jaanese place tucked into Nootka Court on Courtney Street. Yesterday I had a beautiful tuna don bowl. The tuna is PERFECT. Seared for a second and then thinly sliced and served over rice dressed with teriyaki sauce. I also had the most amazing little salad with grilled slamon chunks, onion and apple served on a small patty of mashed potato. That description deosn’t do it justice.
- Mirage Cafe on Goverment Street has a great espresso, as good as Cafe Macchiato around the corner. The Blue Crab restaurant at the Coast Hotel where I stay, although much vaunted for it’s seafood menu, does not know how to make an espresso. More on Victoria and Vancouver Island cafes.
- The cherry blossoms are out, and the streets of James Bay are pungent with their scent.
[tags]victoria, daidoco[/tags]
Some photos are just sketches, like a note jotted on a half used page of a Moleskine, or a quick line drawing. This is one of those kinds of photos, snapped as the sun rose behind Mount Baker as I was crossing the Lion’s Gate Bridge on a bus this morning. Spring is coming to the west coast. Flying to Victoria, we passed over a flock of snow geese heading north from Reifel Sanctuary to begin the last leg of their journey to the nesting grounds in the Arctic.