In my experience open space is based on the belief that we humans are intelligent, creative, adaptive, meaning- and fun-seeking. It sets the context for such creatures to come together knowing they are going to treat each other well. When this happens there is no limit to what can unfold.
Alan Stewart <alan.stewart@flinders.edu.au>
personal communication
Open Space Technology was created in the mid-1980s by organizational
consultant Harrison Owen when he discovered that people attending
his conferences loved the coffee breaks better than the formal
presentations and plenary sessions. Combining that insight with
his experience of life in an African village, Owen created a totally
new form of conferencing.
Open Space conferences have no keynote speakers, no pre-announced
schedules of workshops, no panel discussions, no organizational
booths. Instead, sitting in a large circle, participants learn
in the first hour how they are going to create their own conference.
Almost before they realize it, they become each other's teachers
and leaders.
Anyone who wants to initiate a discussion or activity, writes
it down on a large sheet of paper in big letters and then stands
up and announces it to the group. After selecting one of the many
pre-established times and places, they post their proposed workshop
on a wall. When everyone who wants to has announced and posted
their initial offerings, it is time for what Owen calls "the
village marketplace": Participants mill around the wall,
putting together their personal schedules for the remainder of
the conference. The first meetings begin immediately.
Open Space is, as Owen likes to say, more highly organized than
the best planning committee could possibly manage. It is also
chaotic, productive and fun. No one is in control. A whirlwind
of activity is guided from within by a handful of simple Open
Space principles.
The most basic principle is that everyone who comes to an Open
Space conference must be passionate about the topic and willing
to take some responsibility for creating things out of that passion.
Four other key principles are:
1) Whoever comes is the right people.
2) Whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
3) Whenever it starts is the right time.
4) When it is over it is over.
My favorite Open Space principle is The Law of Two Feet: "If
you find yourself in a situation where you aren't learning or
contributing, go somewhere else." (To me, this includes the
possibility of moving to another level of awareness and participation,
as well as the more obvious one of moving to another activity.)
This law causes some participants to flit from activity to activity.
Owen rejoices in such people, calling them bumblebees because
they cross-pollinate all the workshops. He also celebrates participants
who use The Law of Two Feet to go off and sit by themselves. He
dubs them butterflies, because they create quiet centers of non-action
for stillness, beauty, novelty or random conversations to be born.
Open space conferences can be done in one day, but the most powerful
go on for two or three days, or longer. Participants gather together
briefly in the morning and the evening to share experiences and
announce any new workshops they have concocted. The rest of the
day is spent in intense conversation. Even meals are come-when-you-can
affairs that go on for hours, filled with bustling dialogue.
After a few days of this, an intense spirit of community usually
develops that is all the more remarkable considering that participants
are all doing exactly what they want.
Open Space conferences are particularly effective when a large,
complex operation needs to be thoroughly reconceptualized and
reorganized -- when the task is just too big and complicated to
be sorted out "from the top." On the assumption that
such a system contains within it the seeds of everything that
needs to happen with it, Open Space provides it with an opportunity
to self-organize into its new configuration. For this to work,
however, the system's leaders must let go of control so that true
self-organization can take place.
Open Space Technology is also a delightful, useful tool for any
group of people who are really interested in exploring something
that they all care deeply about. I look forward to its broad use
in organizing communities and exploring public issues.
Open Space is one of the simplest, most brilliant combinations
of order and chaos that I have yet found. It has been applied
in thousands of meetings around the world with between five and
one thousand participants. It can be effectively used by virtually
anybody. Owen has provided excellent instructions in his books,
below.
(For a story of Open Space, see You'll
Never Know Who will Bring In Your Next $20,000,000.)
Harrison Owen, Open Space Technology: A User's Guide
(Berrett-Koehler, 1997)
Harrison Owen, Expanding Our Now: The Story of Open Space
Technology (Berrett-Koehler, 1997)
Harrison Owen, The Millenium Organization (available
for $20 ppd. from H.H. Owen, below)
H. H. Owen and Co., 7808 River Falls Dr., Potomac, MD 20854, (301)
469-9269, fax (301) 983-9314. Print and video resources, training
and consultation.
http://www.openingspace.net/openSpaceTechnology_method.shtml