BJ Wrote: If you're still eyeballing this message, thanks for reading. The writing helped me get greater clarity about ideas that have been rolling just out of reach for a while.
Eyeballs glued - roll on Bj. ho Harrison Owen 7808 River Falls Drive Potomac, Maryland 20845 Phone 301-365-2093 Open Space Training www.openspaceworld.com <http://www.openspaceworld.com/> Open Space Institute www.openspaceworld.org Personal website http://mywebpages.comcast.net/hhowen/index.htm [email protected] To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives Visit: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html -----Original Message----- From: OSLIST [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of BJ Peters Sent: Thursday, May 13, 2004 5:59 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Half-way Technology (longish) Harrison-- I love your reflections! And I have some of my own random thoughts. . . It's my belief that this "halfway technology" paves the way for people (you, us, our clients, etc) who "get it" to take it further (when and if ready) so that we DO work ourselves out of jobs! You continue to give OST as a gift to anyone who wants it and chooses to use it, through your books and trainings. And we recipients, by sharing that gift, by opening space wherever we can, (even though we get paid when possible) are GIVING the gift to those who sit, stand, move, transform, learn, create, act in that space we've held. In the same way that the OST process is ever evolving (by finding effective ways for the spaceholder to do less and inventing more efficient ways to converge, etc.), the creative juices of this community and the larger community of those who have experienced open space will flow, and simpler ways of supporting self organizing and self managing will emerge. I wonder if one of the reasons we rarely hear of long term lasting effect of any organizational intervention is: this is the way it's supposed to be. If change is constant, why do we expect a particular change effort to be lasting? The efforts of the intervention will create results for the moment. The results will contain a mixture of innovation, newness, seeming order, chaos, conflict, confusion, etc. And then another element like management change, economic change, market change will occur and the cycle will begin anew. Wanting long term lasting results is our yearning for control and predictability - both illusions. Some of us know that on a personal, spiritual level, yet grasp for something more lasting in organizations. Probably, I've muddied your waters. However, your reflections stirred something in me. As an OD practitioner for many years, I've often said "I don't know that any organization was ever changed long term because of an OD intervention. And I bemoaned what I've called the short attention span of "management" and felt sad that interventions were so short-lived because that didn't seem to meet my need for adding value. Now I'm thinking perhaps the measurement was wrong. Perhaps the client hired me to stir the stew and see what emerged. Perhaps the people whose lives I touched changed, in part, because of that touching. Lots of feedback has been there to support that. If you're still eyeballing this message, thanks for reading. The writing helped me get greater clarity about ideas that have been rolling just out of reach for a while. Be Peace --BJ BJ Peters Institute for Conscious Connection [email protected] 602.279.4805 "Mutual empathy is the great, unsung human gift." --Jean Baker Miller * * ========================================================== [email protected] ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of [email protected]: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs: http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist
