(::: LONGISH ::: ) Report on an Open Space event (CO!NSPIRING EUTOKIA)
This mid-day event took place last aweek ago. Friday (XI-19) afternoon. More or less 30 people were at the start (but we had no idea before, as we hadn't asked for registration) and at the closing. 10 conversations purposed and 1 shamanic session also. It ran fine, very well I'd say, for the reactions on and after it. I still have to meet the sponsors for the post-analysis (by the way, some info to read about the meeting with the sponsors after an Open Space?).
I´d like to share now some facts, impressions, and doubts:
The context: most people were coming first time to know this place -EUTOKIA- that was presented all along the week to small groups, officially inaugurated on Thursday, and finishing the week on Friday with the OS with people from the community to envision and cocreate its furure activity. OS was new to (almost) everyone, I´d say.
The OST guidebook and the OSLIST were my main preparaation resources and proved to be so a big help! The OSLIST, beyond being a very productive knowledge source, amazes me for its humaneness and the positive impact it always has in my morale. As I recently a real learning comunity.
The
sitting places/chairs: when I got to the room some hours before the event the sponsors told me that the ones we had plenty of were too formal for them, they suggested some fitness balls but they hadn´t enough of them. I explained them we usually like having all the people in similar conditions as a visulaisation of equity, but those are real creative people who couldn't stand the thing, you know :-)? Finally we came up with a solution: we put
one wooden chair and one blue fitness-ball in sequence, maybe a creative view of equity,... and you know what? Even if we had no idea how many was attending, it was just the same number of places available, 30!
Speaking from the centre went ok thanks to the support and preparation. It got short, I'd say: some 15 minutes, in Basque and Spanish.
The making of the
agenda was a bit harder to me. Yes, I know it isn't about myself, but I kept feeling
unsure (
may be it wasn't really a good idea to have an OS in this situation? maybe the sense of urgence wasn't such? may be my explanations weren't clear enough? should I ask already if there are more subjects? where should I go? where to look? just stay? where?... ) when
time passed slowly between people who came to the centre, wrote and announced their issues, just one by one, with pauses in between that seemed to me very long... 1.... (yes, I said that there was
no plan B and that probed to be a good joke, for the laughters I could hear) 2... 3.... 4...., 5,.... 6,.... till 11 subjects announced by 30 people... in some 25 loooong minutes.
Holding space was a really nice experience, happening to have myself interesting encounters and conversations with people that would come to me and ask: "what could I do...?", "how is it running?",...
Reports: people took notes as I asked in the introduction. These days, as I was reading about OS I realized that such short events (4 hours) would be more fluent, maybe, without this demand. Any views? I siad at the beginning that we would be emailing the written report Even if I said they´d have it at the end, 5 days later, it hasn´t been delivered (the sponsor team had taken the responsibility. Exhausted and very busy after the event it´s getting delayed, I suppose also due to the will to do a really smart thing). Lesson learned. Next time I´ll insist we send it just after the event and leave the smarter report to be published in a website or so later on... I think we left the energy vanish a bit, and myself having avoided my respoonsibility...
Some people from the sponsor´s team made a
mind-map based on the reports, as it was the sponsor´s purpose. It took a beautiful shape at the end. You can watch it
here. As a result of this experience I find that someone with the ability to mind map who is open to
integrate whoever in the making
can add some value in such events. In our situation some more training on mind mapping and structuring ideas woud have been useful for the team. The important thing is that we learnt the lesson!
The closing (Tibetan temple bells do the convoking work in a simple, elegant, even amusing, way, definitely) expressed a need of more: more time for conversations. Going beyond. Deciding about actions to take... It´s clear for me that half a day is too short for this. As OS gets known we´ll have more and longer events, no doubt.
An anecdote: someone had convened two sessions. One of them was quite crowded. The other one was signed in by just one person and did never happen. This person, when holding the device substituting the talking stick told the convener that she was still waiting for the meeting. The convener, a bit embarrassed apologised... I suppose that she could have searched the convener and told him at the time the meeting was supposed to take place... we lost perhaps an interesting conversation on "an unofficial mayors' world conference". May be next time.
Some 25 people in the closing. I say we´ve got the
masher instead of a talking stick and I say we have some 30 minutes to express our feelings and projects. After having passed it over, when the 3rd person or so is speaking, someone comes to tell me "it´s better to put it in the middle". I answer "take the next position to hold the masher and purpose it to the group, if you feel like. So he does, explaining it is freer and more real. But most people ask for the masher to follow the purposed turns (costum? easier to come up with one´s uneasiness to speak in public if you now when your turn is?). Some put it in the centre, but mostly people take it from their neighbour.
When the masher comes back, I invite people to look on people´s eyes as in the opening (is it the same kind of looking?). Delicious silence during this moments. Breathing in calm, due to stand un, oh!, the sponsor still wants to say something regarding to a concern someone expressed in his turn... afterwards, it all vanishes, people stand up and greet each other before leaving.
The part of the closing after looking around the circle in the mates´ eyes is a bit extrange to me. I´d love to listen to more stories...
By the end I felt empty (having being very focused and present in the event for some days) and full (in peace, serene) at the same time. Some hours later, joyful. Some days after it, I feel more confident and positive about the future.
Some people of the sponsor team got quite impressed with the spirit and what they could hear in the closing circle, and said they'd like to have more of this,...
Good news for more opening space in Bilbao and surroundings, I guess.
With enormous gratitude and love,
Eleder
BM31_Bilbao: Mind Mapping-Open Space Technology-Creativity
