Monday, March 28, 2005

VP Housing

Context

1. Name of Interviewer/Facilitator: Larry Peterson


2. Date of Interview: March 17, 2005


3. Role of Person Interviewed: VP/COO Event Sponsor


4. Country Where Event Held: Canada


5. Sector/Business: Non-Profit: Housing


6. How Many OST Events Has the Interviewee's Organization/Unit had? 7


7. Theme of This OST Event: Building Community: Working Together Across Community Housing Units


8. Key organisational challenges, issues, drivers for this Event?
-Implementing a new structure for housing management and planning that involves tenant participation
-Engaging tenants in leadership of cross organization issue/theme based working groups
-Increase ownership of new approach and role of tenants of both tenants and staff

9. Date of Event: October 18-19, 2003


10. Number of participants: 350


11. How long was the event? 1.5


12. Planning Process with the Client
a. Number of Planning Meetings?
7


b. Length of Planning Process (weeks or months)? 3 months


c. Number of people involved in the planning of the event? 20


13. Follow-up with regard to this event
a. Was the follow-up planned before the event took place?
Yes

b. Number of Follow-up Meetings 3 with consultant, then a follow-up Open Space


Interview responses

1. How would you describe your experience of Open Space Technology?
-Democratic engagement
-Power sharing
-Equality among participants
A way of acting out the invitation to participate
-Space for activity and for participation
-Energy release, including good will and trust
-Populist
-It literally happens in the workplaces and neighborhood that people get involved



2. Describe the impact of OST on:
a.The people who attended

-Staff felt a little confused or disoriented at first, when they saw that opening up allowed new power to be created
-Then staff listened more and some still tried to manipulate
-Staff actually had to live getting people involved
-Tenants quickly saw real power sharing; they got committed and trusted the process

b.On organizational results

-A Short term ice breaker
-Still trying to get long term benefits, the organization has to change to get them
-Emotional breakthrough
-Concepts developed around community, shared planning, problem solving
-Skilled up a few tenants
-Lost of learning
-Tenant committees established, engaged, will continue
-More willingness to participate

3. How was it different from your experience of other approaches?

-We developed anti-racism study circles. They led to real continuity for a leadership group that had a big impact on the organization. The goal was changed persons and that happened
-OS focused more on the whole organization and we frittered away some of the benefits
-OS is not a project that’s delivered but an educational process

4. Given your experience, in what circumstances would you recommend the use of OS to others?
-Very useful at the opening of a new initiative
-When there is an organizational change or a major shift in strategy or culture that is required.

Asset Management

Context

1. Name of Interviewer/Facilitator: Jean-Pierre Beaulieu


2. Date of Interview: May 2004


3. Role of Person Interviewed: Chief


4. Country Where Event Held: Canada


5. Sector/Business: Business, Finance, Asset Management


6. How Many OST Events Has the Interviewee's Organization/Unit had? 1


7. Theme of This OST Event: Managing Money Better


8. Key organisational challenges, issues, drivers for this Event?

· The acquisition of our firm by our majority shareholder in October 2001 gave the opportunity for Management lead change to restructure the investment platform, consolidating from four independent platforms to one.
· There was a performance challenge. We needed to improve our performance.
· The environment was unconstructive. Silos existed that prevented the flow of information and hampered the efficiency of the investment process.
· An overriding issue: the need for a cultural change from a silo ‘ individual environment to a team-oriented environment.

9. Date of Event: 11/2003


10. Number of participants: 50


11. How long was the event? 1.5 Days


12. Planning Process with the Client
a. Number of Planning Meetings?
3


b. Length of Planning Process (weeks or months)? 2 months


c. Number of people involved in the planning of the event? 3


13. Follow-up with regard to this event
a. Was the follow-up planned before the event took place?
Yes


b. Number of Follow-up Meetings Monthy internal, 2 with consultant


Interview responses

1. How would you describe your experience of Open Space Technology?

There are critical elements that need to be present in order for OS to work. You genuinely have to be interested in a bottom up feedback approach. If it is Management lead by the 5 top guys, it won’t work. If the strategy is top down, stay away from OST.

There has to be sincerity about the process since no one topic is off the table although it is not a free for all. It is within the confine of the theme. I had initial nervousness about how open it was to be but you reassured me when you explain that it was open within the theme boundaries.

For my department, and me the timing was perfect. We needed that process to get the four Investment platforms people to talk together and get going into the same direction.

It turned out to be an excellent team building exercise, good for building relationships.

I felt that there was a constructive amount of peer pressure when building the agenda, i.e. calling the issues. There was no place to hide if you were not getting actively involved while some colleagues were identifying 2-3 issues.

I experienced a high degree of anxiety, as the Space was open not knowing what would really happen and feeling I didn’t have any control on the outcome.

I felt that the participants enthusiasm ranged from low at the start of the event to a high and than to a lower level toward the end of the event. That is because some participants may have been turned off or offended that their «topic» was not selected as one of the top priorities.

I liked the format and the «law of the two feet» which I found very liberating, creating a boundless meeting in allowing people to move freely as they felt they had met their objective in any given session, either contributing or learning some ideas. It is quite unusual for a business meeting. That was very good.

I was very pleased by the outcome.

A question I ask myself is what part does the element of surprise plays in the success of an Open Space event? If you repeat with the same audience, what is the effect?


2. Describe the impact of OST on:
a.The people who attended

Clearly it provided a forum to build relationships. It worked in a group (department) with many new faces. I was very helpful to provide a constructive forum for ventilating issues.

I cannot think of any negative effects/downside. The only thing is that, of course, there would be scepticism if we don’t deliver on the priority issues. We have slipped a little on our agenda over the last months. I will have to pick up on this.

I see a pattern in terms of relationships building before, during and after the OST event. Generally speaking, relationships were at a low before the event. They reached a high during and right after the event to come down to a lower level afterwards. However, that lower level is still significantly higher that it was before the event.

b.On organizational results
Are they that important given the impact on people, relationship building and opening up communication?

We are progressing on our four priorities. We will have completed our work on two of them shortly. We need to get working on the other two. I would give us a 6 out of 10 grade, but that is not good enough.

I can explain our progress on our priorities this way: The two priorities for which the work is completed are closer aligned to our day-to-day work and they had a sense of urgency. The other two are more long-term issues, more strategic issues and we less easily find time to focus on such issues.

We have improved our daily operations and activities that are closer to home and easier to tackle than strategic issues. We have lost some momentum. At first, task force leaders did monthly updates at our investment meetings. Over the last three months we lost our focus. I will bring this back on the agenda, ask for updates. I want to deliver on all four issues within a year of the event and before our next annual session.

The OST event provided momentum to the organisation even outside the selected issues.



3. How was it different from your experience of other approaches?

No set agenda! Building the agenda gets you great alignment. When I think of it, I think you take even more of a risk when you bring in your own agenda. You base everything on 4-5 items you have selected and more or less impose them to the participants.

It really is a bottom up process. There is a much higher level of involvement, which increases the probability of alignment because of ownership of issues.

The flexibility of the process: The law of two feet.

4. Given your experience, in what circumstances would you recommend the use of OS to others?

· When you are at a strategic crossroad.

· When looking for teambuilding.

· At the right time, it would be good after completion of an integration or consolidation of an organization (merger/acquisition). Once we know who the players are/will be so that there is less uncertainty about who stays on board and who is going.

· It is important that the sponsor(s) define(s) what is the scope of the «Openness» through the theme. What is the frame of reference, what are the boundaries?

· It helps to get issues out in the open so you can work on them.

· I am not sure I would use it for maintenance purpose. I would not necessarily do that every six months.

· Don’t use it if you are not in a position to truly listen. There has to be not manipulation, no hidden agenda. Don’t use Open Space if you already know what the answer is/should be.

Tuesday, March 22, 2005

Churc in OS

Context

1. Name of Interviewer/Facilitator: Audrey Coward


2. Date of Interview: November 4, 2004


3. Role of Person Interviewed: Participant


4. Country Where Event Held: Canada


5. Sector/Business: Not for Profit -- Church


6. How Many OST Events Has the Interviewee's Organization/Unit had? 1


7. Theme of This OST Event: What do we care about and what should we do about it?


8. Key organisational challenges, issues, drivers for this Event?
Financial pressures drove the need to re-assess the vision and plan for the future created several years earlier.

9. Date of Event: January 11, 2003


10. Number of participants: 250


11. How long was the event? 1 Day


12. Planning Process with the Client
a. Number of Planning Meetings?
1


b. Length of Planning Process (weeks or months)? 2 months


c. Number of people involved in the planning of the event? 4 plus 2 facilitators

13. Follow-up with regard to this event
a. Was the follow-up planned before the event took place?
yes


b. Number of Follow-up Meetings 1, immediately following the event


Interview responses

1. How would you describe your experience of Open Space Technology?
-- Positive, invigorating, challenging in positive way, engaging, democratic


2. Describe the impact of OST on:
a.The people who attended

--sense of well being ,energy, enthusiasm, more receptive to change , willingness to embrace change

b.On organizational results


-- Acknowledgement that within the congregation there is a core element of people who find it hard to change.

3. How was it different from your experience of other approaches?

-- Recording multiple voices that were heard and people felt they could possibly impact the change

4. Given your experience, in what circumstances would you recommend the use of OS to others?
Visioning
Dysfunctional teams and organizations
Stalemates
Major conflicts and factions within the organization.
Places where people need to find common ground.