Well spoken Suzanne! Don't think we are smarter, just other experiences to share J.
Tonnie Van: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] Namens Suzanne Daigle Verzonden: donderdag 3 december 2009 13:54 Aan: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Onderwerp: Re: [OSLIST] Open Space and academic research Something else to add to the mix of this conversation. The world, our organizations, our communities; so many system breakdowns everywhere: in education , on environment, economically, socially, etc. No need to list them all! So many places where having the opportunity to "open space" and "invite the gift of time" would help, could transform, add some joy to this beautiful life, deliver higher performance, raise consciousness about what's important and as we know, the list goes on. If only...! If only people could know what they can not know until they "experience" it. And because that is so, they just keep on working harder and faster trying to fix what's not working (so much more of it too) doing what they've always done before because that's all they know. Well...! Well...when you care about Open Space; when you know what you know... that it works every time (even when we think it didn't work, it worked) and you want to do more of it because you have a passion for what you do in this invitational and invisible role that we call facilitator. And then when you are like me, still very much an Open Space student having facilitated only 6 times but participated in a total of 11 since "falling in love" with this process last April because I just knew from my entire life experience that this is not a technique, not a tool box process, it's something much bigger than that. And that's why, "with trepidation", I posted an appeal to help fix the Wikipedia site (without any of the knowledge of a Tonnie van der Zouwen, or a Jeff Aitken, or a Larry Peterson; and without the experience and know-how of those who do so much (like Harrison of course, Diane Gibeault, and Michael Herman managing this wonderful list that gives me a place to speak...doing this, for years!) . So in spite of the butterflies in my stomach when I post here and certainly when I facilitate, I see a need to document, to invent, to create a way to say what we are doing, to describe from a place of conversation where people are at now in that not knowing place...not bend to academia but partner with academia so that some day, when people do a google search (Open Space way of life) on the internet (Open Space way of life) and Wikipedia pops up (Open Space way of life), there will be fewer red flags and it will be a little easier for us to scale that first mountain of "inviting people to do what they can not know until they do it". And while a bunch of people smarter than me on that stuff are doing this (Tonnie, Jeff, and others) , I've got a lot of "Just do it" to do in Open Space. Life sure is grand when you know there's a bunch of folks who speak their mind, care a lot, live in chaos, pain and joy, self organize and share leadership; people who are so plain generous with newbies like me and the welcome I've felt...those are the folks in this Open Space community. Enough for now, passion is exhausting really! :-} Suzanne From: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] On Behalf Of Tonnie van der Zouwen Sent: Thursday, December 03, 2009 6:24 AM To: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Subject: Re: Open Space and academic research Harrison, thank you for your ideas about right and wrong. It is about expectations, but also about our benchmarks for performance. I think I understand what you are trying to say. What happens is the only thing that could have happened. I agree, it's true. And that some control helps is paradoxically also true. We can't control the waves, but we can increase our skill to ride them. I think that is why you share your wonderful stories about your experiences, and that is why learning about technique of wave riding (from academic research or other practices) might help too. For me those practices are part of the self-organizing world as well, and they helped to bring us where we are now. Still leaves me puzzled about your remark, wherein I sensed some regret, about the ignorance of academics for 25 years of Open Space. I think that will change if some researchers care and feel responsible. I do. Also part of the self-organizing world. Will it make things better? I hope, that's why we Open Space, isn't it? Tonnie Van: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] Namens Harrison Owen Verzonden: donderdag 3 december 2009 1:03 Aan: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Onderwerp: Re: [OSLIST] Open Space and academic research Going "Wrong" is an interesting thing. My "wrong" could be your "right" It all depends. So when I hear about Open Spaces that go "wrong" I always wonder what the expectations were. As for self-organizing systems - they always (in my experience) try to "optimize." That would be called "search for fitness." And in the great sea of life, everything works out . but some of it can be quite painful. I think that comes with the territory, and no small amount of the pain comes from the fact that things did not work out the way we desired. Funny thing: The Cosmos was not created for our pleasure and benefit, I think. Or put another way - I think self-organization always aims at High Performance (by definition) - and some make it and others don't. Or at the very least, some do not perform as well as others - which is how we derive our benchmarks for "High Performance." Could there be another way? Maybe. And for sure if the "Ruler of the Cosmos (Him/her/It)" had consulted with us early on, doubtless we could have come up with something better. But I am not sure about "better." Seems to me that for all the warts, pain, foibles, weirdness, false starts, etc. - it is totally amazing that we are all here 13.7 billion years from GO! - Albeit some of us are complaining about how bad things are. Personally, and all evidence to the contrary - I think it is wonderful! Harrison Harrison Owen 7808 River Falls Drive Potomac, Maryland 20854 Phone 301-365-2093 Skype hhowen Open Space Training <http://www.openspaceworld.com/> www.openspaceworld.com Open Space Institute <http://www.openspaceworld.org/> www.openspaceworld.org Personal website <http://www.ho-image.com/> www.ho-image.com OSLIST: To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives Visit: <http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html> www.listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html -----Original Message----- From: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] On Behalf Of Tonnie van der Zouwen Sent: Wednesday, December 02, 2009 9:42 AM To: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Subject: Re: Open Space and academic research Hi Harrison, For sure, I'm having fun doing my research. Talking to you and many other people who are experimenting with Self Organizing systems for High Performance (an interesting reframing of my Large Scale Interventions for sustainable change, to what extend do we mean the same?). I really appreciate your sharing of insights and experiences, the great gift of your books. Actually the experiment is repeated many times, by many practioners, matching conditions and following procedures (that is what I call interventions) for high performance results. My point is that it doesn't always bring high performance, and that things can go wrong. We don't talk about the ones that didn't produce good results in publications. To put the cat among the pigeons: If we want to be taken seriously in the academic world, maybe the invitation should not only be "repeat the experiment", but also "come and review our experiments, what performance did they bring and why?" Finding out how the power of self organization can be utilized and assisted even better or more widely. Tonnie Van: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] Namens Harrison Owen Verzonden: woensdag 2 december 2009 13:26 Aan: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Onderwerp: Re: [OSLIST] Open Space and academic research Hi Tonnie - My experience for the last 25 years is that OS has been a marvelous natural experiment that I just fell into. My hope would be that any and all curious people (people with curiosity - which hopefully includes academicsJ) would have as much fun as I have. Truthfully, my interest in Open Space is less focused on large group interventions, indeed any kind of intervention, but rather on the function and power of self organizing systems and the ways in which we might utilize and assist their gifts. The message of Wave Rider was not that Open Space creates High Performance (although I think it does), but rather that High Performance is a function a well performing Self Organizing system. Open Space (for me) became a critical (but not only) part of the experimental environment in which I considered all that business. You will notice that I set the book up as a report on that experiment, detailing the experimental conditions, procedure, and results to date. The invitation is to run the experiment for yourself. All the questions you raise are totally valid and should you run the experiment I am sure you will find your answers - which may or may not accord with the answers (results) I found. But that is the nature and fun of a good experiment. So how will you know? Just do it and find out. Have fun. Harrison Harrison Owen 7808 River Falls Drive Potomac, Maryland 20854 Phone 301-365-2093 Skype hhowen Open Space Training <http://www.openspaceworld.com/> www.openspaceworld.com Open Space Institute <http://www.openspaceworld.org/> www.openspaceworld.org Personal website <http://www.ho-image.com/> www.ho-image.com OSLIST: To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives Visit: <http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html> www.listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html -----Original Message----- From: OSLIST [mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu] On Behalf Of Tonnie van der Zouwen Sent: Wednesday, December 02, 2009 6:13 AM To: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Subject: Open Space and academic research Dear Harrison, Yesterday I was reading (almost) all emails on this list. Learned a lot again. What I kept wandering about last evening is your remark about how little attention to OST is paid so far in academic research and publications. Since I am doing research on large scale interventions (Success factors and effects and a practical guide for effective use of LSI) this triggered me: What research questions would you like to be answered in academic research? What would you like OST to be compared with? Then I realized that touches the question: How to see OST and what is it used for? In your book Wave rider you give examples of OST as a method for creating high performance systems. The practitioner in me reacts: Ok, I know it works, let's do it. The academic researcher in me sais: He, interesting, how do I know the high performance system is there? How long will it last? What is the influence of the length of the meeting? Does it ripple off, why/why not? Et cetera. We had two conferences with researchers, practitioners and clients about my research on success factors and effects of LSI. Thanks again Harrison for contributing to the online conference. In the discussions, especially in the live conference on September 17th, a wide gap showed between LSI practice and academic tradition. I think that explains part of the relatively little attention in academic research. Some practitioners say: "we don't need evidence from research, we already know it works", or "research will never be able to grasp the magic of .." . While some researchers say: "It is all self reported success from founders and practitioners with an interest in a positive image", or "If you can't conceptualize it you should try harder". Moreover, you have to work with sophisticated qualitative research methods to do justice to complex situations and the richness of an intervention as OST. It is my opinion most academic institutes still operate in a classic quantitative or linear research tradition. They don't want to burn their hands on what they think wooly stuff, or they simply don't know how to inquire complex interventions. Another problem with finding articles on research on OST is that the phenomenon is labeled with different names. On the level of OST as a large group intervention, or as an interactive method for change more literature is available. But you don't see OST in the title. I gathered a long list of references, so if you are interested let me know. Luckily, there are also practitioners and researchers who see possibilities and added value in academic research. Especially those who combine both activities. What would you want from research? Tonnie Drs. 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