Thursday, November 17, 2011

What is Open Space? Tova Averbuch´s story: Opening Space to Collective Wisdom


I met Tova in Wosonos Berlin 2010. She shared some days ago on the OSLIST the way she knew about OST and her views. What a brilliant explanation of Open Space!. Here some lines from the TED page and some words on it by other people on the list

In her TEDxJaffa talk, Tova Averbuch explores the at-times contentious relationship between self and whole and proposes a form for resolution: Open Space

Tova has been an Organization Development consultant for 30 years, teaching in the graduate program of Tel Aviv University's business school. She is a facilitator and host of generative group meetings, applying methodologies and perspectives that enable and promote bottom up, cross boundaries and self-organizing processes, to create conditions for the emergence of collective new wisdom and new action in business and in socio-political life in Israel. Born in Poland, Tova emigrated to Israel in 1957 and is committed to promoting and exploring creative dialogue between polarized groups in the Israeli society and between 'center' and 'edge' in human systems.


"...At the risk of "gilding the lily" you speak so beautifully of a living entity - being and becoming,  autonomous and connected, the importance of diversity, wisdom that comes from that diversity, the simultaneous learning and self-organization, a living entity not an economic machine as companies so often are. Our work at Autognomics Institute has been working for over 50 years in the study of  the nature of living entities - you have spoken so eloquently on Open Space and on these foundational principles that show up throughout life - living organisms and the living cosmos in which we live.  Thanks so much for this.  And thanks for this Open Space list of fantastic conversations. You all inspire me to the bones. "

Skye Hirst, PhD (www.autognomics.org)
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The heart of your talk for me was in these words at about 16:30 in:
       “we've achieved a lot; we are in the growing business of making social living systems and not mechanical system. In mechanical system, we must start with clear goals and clear vision and clear objectives and we proceed to get them. In a living system we are preoccupied with being and belonging before we set objectives. A living system will try to root itself, preferably in nourishing environment, and to take time to make sure it's alive before it figures out its destination, and before the horizon is clear.”

This clarifies something I have never been able to put into words and metaphors before. It carries the thought further, and tells us what OS and all true conversation and meeting (see the work of Martin Buber) is about: birthing a living system.

This is a step off into wide open space...and we find solid ground beneath our foot. Anybody want to take this another step?

Tova, do you have similar writings available somewhere?
                               :- Doug.
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Dear Tova This is beautiful. Self organization by living systems
A write-up of the description of open space given by Tova at the TEDx talk:
We are trying to create an infrastructure for human interaction to take place, mainly face to face but also could be virtual, to create organizations that are living systems, not mechanical systems.

Now how do we work in open space? What kind of principles or ways of conduct do we use, that make it possible to come as fully me and yet in the same time to be totally open to others, to all sorts of others, to create a collective we.

From all the methodologies that I know that are opening space I could draw up seven principles or ways of conduct. They are weary simple.

1. You are invited, you don't have to come, but you are invited.
2. You are included, and what makes you included is that you wish to come.
3. You are the right people, no shame, no blame, you are perfect the way you are.
4. It is all done by self organization, no one is telling you what to do, you are making it happen, creating the agenda, etc.
5. Transparency, we do it all in transparency so we can build on the wisdom, of one and another, of layer by layer.
6. We encourage and invite simultaneity and multi version, it dose not have to be in sequential or linear logic, it happens all at the same time, it is great!
7. You are free at all times to be mobile, and let your legs carry you to where your heart and mind wants to be
If we are getting or putting people together and we do not insist that they must agree, then they don't have to fight and compromise. And if we take people and we allow them to move freely, that means that people can self regulate and if they had enough and they feel that the emotion is arising and they can not control it, they can go somewhere else, they can self regulate themselves and they feel no constrain. And in this way of work where individuals can be fully themselves,
they become, as I can see, fully alive, and create collectives that are living systems
and not mechanical or machine like systems.



Eleder BuM31    Mind Mapping-Open Space Technology-Creativity
www.burumapak.blogspot.com (eus)   @Eleder_BuM  (Twitter)
www.in-fluyendo.blogspot.com (esp) www.flowandshow.blogspot.com

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