Sheila, this sounds like my own experience. Suggesting an OS in a situation of conflict came through my mouth in the summer of 2004 "rather naively", and this really opened the door to my new career I am now in the midst of building, enjoying it tremendously.
My hints for you would be: - Prepare seriously. - Ask your questions to OSLIST. - If you want, ask for somebody with more experience to be your personal coach in the background (and offer to assist him/her in an OS in exchange). I had a wonderful experience preparing for an important event with Florian Fischer who helped me by email and telephone whenever I had questions, but who was very clear that I was to be the one up front. (We had later agreed that he was to do the German part, me the French part. But he was so clear on me being the one up front that 2 days before the event, he withdrew for serious health reasons... Whatever happens... I managed, learned great lots through the process, and I even got a second chance with the same sponsor and the same team, which was a full success for all of us!). - Great would be to assist somebody in an OS in the next few weeks in order to come closer. - Enjoy the adventure! Love, Catherine Catherine Pfaehler Senn Open Space Facilitation & Coaching Kellersriedweg 8 CH - 2503 Biel +41-(0)32 - 365 68 41 [email protected] -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- Von: Sheila Beauchemin [mailto:[email protected]] Gesendet: Montag, 5. März 2007 22:54 Betreff: Using Open Space to Break Negitations Impasse Hi again, I have a client that is involved in negotiations around a multi-million dollar project. Negotiations between the parties have broken down and discussions are now in the hands of lawyers and really not going anywhere anytime soon. There are of course, lots of small "p" politics involved. I have been working with this client on other related issues around policy development and program frameworks but in the course of discussion this impasse in conversation came up. I mentioned that possibly what is needed is an opportunity to step aside from the current focus of discussions and provide some space to take talk about the issue in a different forum. There was some interest in this notion and now of course I am wondering what door I have likely naively opened given what a neophite I am in the open space world. What words of caution can you provide related to using OS in highly conflictual situations? When would you say it can be used/should be used? Are there any special considerations and/or preparations? Is it presumptious of me to think I can do this? Should I really just refer this client to someone with deep OS experience and not think about attempting such a thing when I feel I still have my OS training wheels on? Any advice or experiences you can share would be appreciated. Fond regards, Sheila * * ========================================================== [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 * * ========================================================== [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
