Category: events

Opening Space to Remember Harrison Owen

Picture at right of Harrison Owen on a boat, top left image of his white colored house in Camden Maine, lower left Harrison in a circle with fire and port of Camden. Picture via the OSList

Open Space Technology and the amazing people who stewarded it in the world were and are some of my most important teachers. One of them was the person who birthed OST, Harrison Owen, who passed away earlier this month into the largest Open Space ever. There will be an online OS to celebrate and remember Harrison. Here are the details, shared with encouragement to share widely.

Honoring Harrison Owen ~ A community comes together

“Camden by the Sea, Virtually and Globally”

April 8th is when it starts… 10AM Eastern USE Time/7am Pacific US Time

Place and Space: on ZOOM

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/5694939869?pwd=YUY3Q3puekZ5THljNjFoU2dCTjNuQT09

Greetings!

It is time for us to gather and to honor Harrison Owen; to share stories and to express our love for him and each other.

Two weeks have gone by since he died on March 16th, 2024.

Such sadness and grief we have all felt and are still feeling.

The expressions of love and gratitude from around the world for Harrison have been overflowing; the stories of Open Space moving and inspirational. In planning this upcoming virtual gathering, Barry Owen carried the Open Space torch for his dad. Trusting we should leave the space open, not rushing too fast in setting a time and place for us all to meet. It’s how it is when we sit in a giant circle, with lots of space in the middle, writing and announcing our topics. It’s what people have done, head and heart, with such passion and emotion. 

Barry also reminded us in the planning: “to not work too hard”.  It’s what dad would have wanted, he said.

So, he, I and others, have waited until NOW, until the right time to invite everyone. Day by day, the pieces for this future reunion came together.

Why not create a Virtual Gathering that has the spirit of Camden by the Sea? Back then, Harrison would simply rent a space, tell people where and when, and that was it. The stories from those days live on, beautiful memories of Camden Maine, the place that Harrison called home to the very end.

We then called Lucas Cioffi at QiqoChat. Can you help us? We wanted to take a minimalist approach. As always, Lucas was quick to support our ideas.

Together we imagined the Law of Two Feet in action with multiple Zoom breakout areas for conversations and blank spaces to write notes and post pictures. Nothing more. No formal facilitation or hosting, just us, welcoming each other together, holding, and opening more and more space. Trusting this beautiful process of Open Space that is so much more.

Harrison’s presence would be felt, as our official facilitator. After all, he’s already opened the space for us and is holding it still while napping along the way.  

The date of the gathering came to us in a flash. Why not April 8th to get this started, on the day of the Solar Eclipse. There seemed to be such significance to that date, as if a cosmic inspiration, the 8th day of the 4th month of 2024. Harrison at age 88 being the pure expression of an infinity symbol. And indeed engaging 8 billion people in meaningful conversations is a timeless endeavor.

We also decided that there would only be a start time (10 AM, Eastern Time), no end time, again in the spirit of Open Space “when it’s over it’s over” which implies that life in Open Space will never be over.

The intent is that people from around the globe will flow in and out, on their own time zones for a day or two or more. As for every closing circle, it will be over when it’s over.

Everyone is invited: Harrison’s family and friends, our global Open Space community and so many other colleagues and friends from around the world.

Please help us spread the word ~ everywhere, anywhere and in any way.

With love,
Barry, Suzanne, Lucas, and many others 

Patti Digh’s Op-Ed Writing Course

Now, more than ever, we need to be able to express facts, ideas and opinions clearly and persuasively. Here is your chance to learn from a pro. Patti Digh has made a great offer!

NEW CLASS: Learn to Write an Op-Ed that Creates Change STARTS JULY 11

We need progressive voices to show up in the traditional media, on social media, in water cooler conversations… It is not enough to feel passionately about issues like gun control, reproductive rights, child hunger, voting rights, LGBTQIA+ rights, disability rights, and a myriad of other issues. We must also be able to articulate our point of view, clearly and concisely. I’ve been thinking a lot about this as an inveterate op-ed writer since I was in the sixth grade. So I am offering a four-week intensive on writing op-eds (which can also be used as Letters to the Editor, blog and social media posts, etc). I hope you will join me. Our voices matter. Go here for info.

Back when there was “social” in the software…

Picture of the head of a dog (Australian shepherd?) looking at you.
Alan Levine’s blog avatar

Alan Levine noted that he is just past his blogaversary and linked to a post of his from 2006 that I just love. It is a story of how he created an artifact from a presentation I gave at NorthernVoice (a BLOGGING conference, can you IMAGINE that?? We were crazy kids back in the day!). What was magical about this story is how Alan’s recording of my talk rippled across our respective networks and how people added to it and amplified it. (Bev, I loved your notes. Still do! Nick, all these years you mashed it up and now retirement is on the horizon! Who would have guessed!) I think this is when I really became a fan of CogDog, aka, Alan.

A picture of a woman in 2006 with shoulder length curly born hair glasses, holding two bags of Dove Dark chocolates. Photo by Alan Levine.
Photo by Alan Levine of a much younger, shaggier me, sharing chocolate

Alan’s post also has me looking back at years and years of Flickr event albums. Mama mia, there are stories. I often think I have few stories to tell. My problem is simply that I just don’t practice telling them! A little nostalgia… And boy, I was a lot younger back then! And with a lot longer hair. Still sharing the same Dove Dark chocolates though!

Edit a few minutes later: I’m listening to the audio. Still relevant.

From the Archives: Reflections on the FbD Learning Series

Screen shot of four videos from Floodplains by Design's "Collaboration Campfires"

Along time ago and in a place far far away, I supported an awesome network of folks at Floodplains by Design. When the pandemic hit we did a lot of the proverbial pivoting. Network work often entails a lot of meetings and we moved everything online. We ran a series of online facilitation workshops in 2020 and in 2021 and lo and behold today I resurfaced the videos of the sessions. The 2020 series was positioned as “Virtual Coffees” and the 2021 series was called the “Collaboration Campfire!” If you are so inclined, take a stroll through the videos here: https://vimeo.com/user142408470

Here are a few of the things that stand out for me from those two years of constant pivoting.

  • A small but consistent core of community leaders are the glue that enables intermittent and even one time participation to have value.  Our co-chairs and core members provided consistency, stability and network weaving through their wonderful relationships.
  • The community core (plus guests) designs as a TEAM, not the external facilitator designing and delivering. Team design yields experiences that meet a range of needs rather than one championed by a single designer.
  • Find that balance between process and content. Content is essential for the technical floodplains work, but the social bonds between members is nurtured through process. 
  • Vary the process, but not everything, all the time. We used a lot of Liberating Structures and we would try and use a structure more than once, but not the same set or string of structures every time. This gave both comfort (familiarity) and variety. More importantly, it built capacity for folks to go back and use the process on their home turf. Or river, as it were.
  • Don’t over-pack the agenda. Oi, some day we will all integrate this learning into our practices!
  • Reflect and learn after every round. There is always room for new insights and ways of doing things. 
  • Celebrate!

 

From the Archives: Boundaries, Edges and Other Yummy Things

It was super fun to come back and revisit a fine post from Curtis Ogden, Boundaries as Useful Fictions? : Interaction Institute for Social Change. In fact I referenced two quotes from his piece as a panel member for Incite Forum‘s event on taking a step out from work. So I get to use an OLD reference for a NEW post. Sweet. I figured at some point this messing about in my archives would stimulate something like this!

Piers Bocock invited me to join Waahida Tolbert-Mbatha, founder of Kgololo Academy and Chris Proulx of Humentum to talk about our individual experiments on taking time off work (a.k.a. sabbatical, stepping back, sort of retiring, etc.) For background from each of us Piers asked us to write short blog posts (Nancy’s Blog, Chris’s Blog, Waahida’s Blog)

Waahida started us off nailing all of the essential elements for me: how our identities are so wrapped up in our work, how work we love can blind us to the toll it is taking on us/our families, and all the values and expectations we and others put on us – real or imagined. Later in the conversation, her observation about the importance of always developing our successors, and the role of trust IN those folks, resonated to my organizational past experiences and those I see in my clients.

Chris came from the space of mindfulness as a response to this need to take a break and step back. I was struck by him telling the story of going for a three week silent retreat and returning still exhausted, anxious that he was not ready to return from his six week sabbatical (which is supported with company policy at his workplace, Humentum). He reflected that it was probably that retreat that allowed his body to process the burn out and that processing itself takes energy.

Since Waahida hit all the core issues for me, I twisted a bit and used Curtis’ musings on boundaries to frame my story of stepping back. There were two quotes that really illuminated the larger issues of our relationship to work. First was from Buckminster Fuller “You have to remember, every boundary is a useful bit of fiction.” Oh yeah. My workaholism was often a useful bit of fiction. The so called separation of work and the rest of our lives — fiction. Our preached values about work ethics in organizations and within ourselves as boundaries — fiction.

The second quote Curtis included in his post was from the Swiss Social Scientist, Werner Ulrich. “…boundaries and divisions are an expression of what people see and value from their particular perspective.” This immediately had me think of the boundaries created by organizational silos and roles. (See this great reflection from Harold Jarche on Super Connectors — those who work across boundaries). These boundaries both create useful limits and suffocating or even rotting constraints. It also harkened back to Waahida’s comments on trust.

I realize I had put together my little list of tips but never shared it explicitly:

  • Plan financially as best you can to have a cushion to afford a break – right from the start. This is particularly salient in our consumer culture where we save to buy things. We can also save to be and do.
  • Listen for the signals of burnout before the flame out.
  • For independents, if we fear disappearing while taking a break, work with a partner(s) to support each other through rest periods. Reflect and write a bit to keep visible. We aren’t dead. We are taking a break so we can stay ALIVE!
  • Talk about sabbaticals to young professionals. This is not just something for us geezers. How younger generations view work is different. What are the implications?
  • If you are in an organization, make infrastructure changes. Policies and values drive a lot of the fear that in turn drives this myth that if I work longer, it is better. If I can claim more ticks on my to do list, that I am better. By the way, this is killing people who are also carers for their family members, across all generations. There are gender and racial implications that cannot be ignored, especially when policy and role modeling often comes from the privileged top of the org.

Finally, in the q&a phase Tony Brown asked about actualizing some of the insights about valuing taking breaks (and taking care.) I mean, we all loved talking about this. Sure, we are the converted. No one else has time to talk about taking time off!! We might consider tools and simple actions as the way in.

The Liberating Structure Ecocycle came to mind. I’ve been really enjoying using and seeing it used as a personal reflection tool. If we looked at our individual work portfolios, we might notice if and where we are getting out of balance, if there are things we are doing that no longer add value, or things that would add value but we can’t seem to slip into doing them. With this insight, we can more consciously make adjustments, ask for support or change. We could then add the layers in the department, division and organizational level to see how healthy our work practices are, where things add or do not add value and first steps to make needed changes. (A Panarchy view).

Update Tuesday morning – I was reading Patti Digh’s newsletter (look for the subscription link near the top of this page – always good stuff) and followed the link to this post on Mic Crenshaw. Great food for thought about how we choose/are forced to spend our time and how we can be present while we spend that time. It fit with the post above for me. For you?