OW design questions

OW questions

Morning Ivan, Isabel BoG and Raff

Just a quick one - as were going through some design discussions there are a few issues/questions we'd like to ask y'all about.

Is this an accurate description of the OW process? (It includes some questions)

• · All tools/equipment purchased and stored on site (on view to inspire the participants)
• · All 153 participants, mentors and facilitators congregate ( 120 participants, 18 technical mentors, 15 Facilitators including 2 Directors)
• · Opening speech by Directors ( does this include giving them sight of a list of work contracts with deadlines for completion available to the new organisation??)
• · Directors retire to their room
• · FE observe and report back on happenings
• · Participants organise themselves and make request to the FE for access to development fund, tools and work contracts
• · A small development fund, tools and contracts are made available (Can we design a work schedule to predetermine the activities they will take on – i.e. a contract to dismantle the mezzanine by the end of week 3 – or is it entirely up to the participants to decide on the order of delivery?
• · PE begins to deliver on the contracts in an unorganised way
• · A combination of the lectures on the Theory of Organisation, the learning via 'objectivised activity' and the introduction of the tools of scientific self management enable the PE to begin to organise themselves effectively
• · The sense of 'ownpowerment' develops rapidly as progress is made
• · The PE experiences shifts in organisational shape as the workshop progresses and continues to improve the effectiveness of delivery
• · The process of 'emancipation from mental slavery' is underway!!!
• · Freedom!!!

Many thank yous

The beautiful new home for the OW enterprise takes root...

Well, things are moving forward set speed at the moment here!

When we submitted the OW project for appraisal the biggest cloud hanging over it's feasibility was the uncertainty over the future of the Marsh Farm Community Enterprise Centre (CERC). As the home for all of the OW projects this uncertainty was raised by the appraisers and urged that we think about other options - particularly as the MFCDT board, the council and "all key partners" supported its demolition and rplacement with a much smaller CERC - which would not be able to house some of the areas of enterprise our research has identified as excellent OW candidates

So our decision to align the OW with the development of the new CERC building was high risk and bold - but now looks wiser by the day as events around the CERC feasibility process continue to prove the truth. Today we recieved artists impressions of the finished article - and what an impressive looking building it will be!

People who were maybe gullible enough to believe the cost estimates, condition assessments and business case made by 'the professionals' advocating its demolition would have had serious doubts about the refurbishment option. But they have been completely amazed by the total viability of the plans for the new CERC, which has proven beyond argument that it will not only be sustainable - it will be a flagship in socio-economic, environmental and ecological terms - and all the more sustainable as a result of the long, hard struggle we have had to undergo to keep the vision alive.

So, next steps are:

• OW panel will meet within 14 days
• GO East and NDC committee (parallel appraisal) within 28 days
  
• the MFCDT board meet on June 23rd to agree the CERC refurbishment option - killing off the demolition option once and for all
• align the beginning of the OW with the beginning of works on redevelopment of the building
• head for a July start to the OW preparations
• August - OW starts - incorporating CERC based works such as taking down of the mezzanine, preparing the play area space, renovation of the front entrance (landscaping, fence removal etc) building of a dividing wall for the garage and envoronmental centre
  

So the OW aligned with taking the first small steps of the CERC redevelopment will see a community transformation like nothing weve ever seen before in the UK. At the same time it will provide the new born enterprise with sure footings, putting it in pole position to continue carrying out as much of the CERC and Central area transformation as possible

Marsh Farm Outreach - Regenerating Regeneration

A LUTA CONTINUA - A VITORIA CERTA

Glenn

Dealing with opportunism

This blog is proving to be helpful. Thank you owistas-in-residence.

Opportunists will be always sitting on the fence, looking at both sides and ready to jump to the side of the winner just before the defining battle takes place. When they see the wind pushing our sail ahead, they will pretend that their are on our side. Sometimes they may even help us here or there, always keeping their boss informed of what they are doing, so that they get a green light or "permission" to do this or that for us (whilst feeding information to the boss in the meantime: what are we doing, what our strategy is, what do we think, what do we say, what is going to be our next move...)

At each juncture the enterprise, (in this case our Facilitators Enterprise) must analise the complex of forces that are at play, for and against the project of the enterprise: in this case, what are the members of the panel, what position they are likely to assume, are they for the OW project? are they "neutral"? are they against the project. Those that are with us: are they going to stand firm throughout? are they likely to give in when the boss puts pressure against the project? what are the interests that make them to sideline with us? Those that are aginst our project: For what reason? are they likely to change sides if explained this or that? what interests make them to be against our project? can we accommodate them, without compromising our principles?

Mind you. Opportunism may also be within our ranks, and Vigilance has to be excercised for the enterprise to be able to unearth it and identify it, and once identified, criticism must play its part and proper measures must be taken to make sure that decisions are enforced. For example, not washing the tea cups, not doing the Critical Analysis, not accomplishing tasks are manifestations of opportunism. The first one, the simplest of all, if not done, creates bad blood in some of us. At the beginning this is a small, very small crack in our Unity and Discipline. Even though small, it is big enough to turn some of us into internal enemies of the enterprise, and without realising it, if these problems continue to go unchecked we should not be surprised if we find some of us co-operating with the external enemies of the enterprise against the project of the enterprise.

The essence of the Critical Analysis, therefore, should be to look into those issues and to set the strategy accordingly. When we are talking only about a set of tasks to accomplish, like the past Festival for example, it is simpler. Now it is a different game altogether. We are getting into deep waters and those that are against the OW know for sure that they have to stop us now, before it is too late.

ONE LOVE! Ivan

Pirates on the High ND SEA

You know those times when you KNOW that somebody aint being upfront about stuff but they have to pretend to be helpful? That was the way it felt today - there are a couple of people about who would rather not see the OW happen because they have their own plans for the resources set aside for it and because they are serving the agenda of other players who they think its good to 'keep in with' for their own careerist self interest.

These pirates will end up walkin their own plank though... just as they deserve to.

As ever, the weakness of their own naff position make even the PROSPECT of an OW shine like a bright star of hope. Their constant and recorded failure to mobilise communities, create work or end hopelessness despite the billions of pounds invested is a track record I wouldn't want to be defending

VIVA the OW

VIVA OWNpowerment

VIVA JAH

OW meeting today

We are meeting today with Lysle Osborne, Ishaq Kazi and Maria from Marsh Farm Trust.

After todays meeting the OW application goes forward to a local residents panel, the committee from Marsh Farm Trust board and regional government office for approval with the hope of starting work in July

Its been a long and winding road but its about that time...

The Object Teaches Us

Thanks Ivan

So there we have it - a great example of 'the object' teaching us,because it was the stresses and strains of having to mould the OW according to chops and changes which highlighted this point and gave us the insight to fully understand it

Im so glad your souls are feeling lighter now - JAH LIVE!!

Glenn

Now we are talking Brothers!

YESSSS BROTHERS, YESSSSSS, That is it! This is Objectivised Activity! It is the people deconstructing the mezzanine and learning to relate with each other in the process. Learning from the screwdriver, learning from the disassembled panels, learning to store them together and to construct something it its stead! In Africa we faced the need for a lecture room to start the TO lectures. Then, we did not do the lecture hall BEFORE the workshop. The participants did it as a workshop activity.

Ever since we came back home after our stay in the UK our souls have been heavy because we felt that even though we made big steps forward in the OW design process, we still had not achieved the design as we understood it, but we could not do more at the time. It was "the object" to play its part after we were gone. Now it all came back to you and I am in stitches as I write! YESS BROTHER! i VIVIDLY REMEMBER WHEN I TOLD YOU HOW EASY WAS TO DISMANTLE THE MEZZANINE, AND WHY THIS WAS IDEAL FOR THE ow PARTICIPANTS TO DOI IT. Then, in this process, they will travel from the naive to the critical, and from the critical to the organizational and we are done! Another thing is that with this newly acquired organizational consciousness they will keep only one bug, umbrella enterprise, or to split it into ten or twenty, and do films, or records, or a farm, or landscape designs, or printings, and ping pong off course!, all 0of these and much more in the process.

We are taking time, but bless the time we are taking, because we are really getting there! One Love, Ivan

Thoughts on 'Objectivised Activity' and taking down the Mezzanine

Yesterday in chattin with Matti we had one of those discussions which I thought Id share with y'all on this chilly but nice sunday afternoon...

When Ivan and Isa were here, we walked around the CERC building with them to assess different spaces to see which bits of the CERC were the most OW suitable. When we got to the big mezzanine platform where the playpark is going to be installed I and I were buzzin on the prospect of using it during the OW. But then we told them that our plan was for the mezzanine to be removed and the space made ready BEFORE the OW begins, so that the playpark staff crew could emerge from the participants, children could use the facility during the workshop etc> I didn't place too much importance on it because when Isa was saying "this is perfect" I thought she meant the layout of the rooms etc - but I was wrong.

That night Ivan phoned and me n Matti went over to Thrales Close for a chat. Over a cup of tea and some nice biscuits I and I expressed their concern about the danger of the OW breaking into small groups focussed mainly on their own area of enterprise - rather than acting as one large group on a shared task which can be broken down and used to facilitate the emergence of 'organisational consciousness' and 'entrepeneurial literacy' within the large group

At the time and after some discussion I felt we overcame this to some degree by stating that surely the "shared task" was 'the regeneration of Marsh Farm', that we could spend the first week of the OW collectively organising the Um Festival Do Amor, and include a few collective activities like marketing drives - we thought all of these could be our 'glue contracts' before moving into smaller groups?

Anyway me n Matti were refocussing our thoughts in light of that which we all know too well - that the timing, the need to align OW with CERC happenings, the need to catch the summer, the Tudor Trust funding, the Job centre shinanigans and the MFCDT red tape delays have all combined to cause us to yet again revisit the design of the OW.

We knew that all of these factors mean that the playpark space being ready for an August OW is now all but impossible, so we've been forced to look again at inclusion of the deconstruction of the mezzanine and preparation of the playpark space taking place DURING the OW so that the Playpark can be fitted and ready to roll by the END of the OW rather than before it starts.

This, in turn, means that we will have to revisit the OW technical plan and work breakdown structures we did whilst I and I and Raff were here.

So we were in there deep, reasoning about this when I recalled that when we were walking around the mezzanine structures with I and I, at one point Ivan pulled me aside and said "let me show you why the deconstruction of this mezzanine platform is such a great OW activity"

He took off a strip of plastic cladding cover and began counting the screws which hold the glass panels in the temporary workshop spaces together. He began counting and said "one, two, three, four, five - there are six screws for every panel". He then began counting the panels, the number of actual workshops, the number of ceiling tiles in the area we were standing etc.

Then he said to me "do you understand man?"

To be honest - I thought I did at the time and probably said I did - but I know now that I didn't really get the point he was making. It's only in the past few weeks and days since having to refocus our design thoughts and then that chat with Matti yesterday that I now think I really get it.

The point we now think Ivan was making (and please add any comments which help to make this clearer for us Ivan, Isabel Raff, Gav) was that the task of taking down the mezzanine and preparing the space is an ideal OW activity precisely because its so easy to break down in those terms - i.e. the number of single actions an activity will take (in this case such as undoing a single screw, removing a single panel, how long that action takes, what tools are needed to perform the task etc). This makes doing the 'work breakdown structure' (wbs - remember that?) for a task like this relatively simple - and its the availability of the WBS which allows Ivan and Isa to direct the participants to organise themselves in an efficient and collective manner during the OW.

We remembered the sessions we had with Ivan on 'Taylorism' - or 'Scientific Management' techniques, where every single big task (removal of the mezzanine) is broken down into individual motions (screws, panels etc) and studied for ways of making things happen more efficiently? Ivan said that "the problem with Taylorism was that it required workers not to think, but just to do - thinking was for the planning department".

The task in the OW is to capacitate the large group in use of these Scientific Management techniques + introduce Gannt charts (work plans), co-ordinators etc in a way which will see 'ownpowerment' within the group to make efficient and cohesive decisions from the bottom up.

There is also something really important going on in the social psychological field during this collective learning process. I dont quite understand this to the fullness yet, but methinks a decisive shift in levels of consciousness amongst the group takes place - from 'naive' or 'critical' to 'organisational'. This happens as a result of the act of the large group ending up being organised enough to deconstruct the mezzanine in a highly efficient way - a single activity which not only capacitates us in large group self management and organisation but which also leads to a highly visible act of physical transformation with a brilliant send result that will buzz the whole community - a playpark for the yardies!

And finally a question for the Maestros....Ivan, Isa, Raff Gav - Does 'Objectivised Activity' describe the act of learning of vocational skills by 'doing' (like the saw pushing against the grain of the wood example you gave us long ago Ivan) or does it refer to the organisational learning Im ranting on about here as well?

Well thats a bit of a Sunday rant there, but thats why I started this blog - to capture and share these kind of thoughts as they happen and hopefully to generate some feedback and other people's ideas

S'all good

G

Organic Design Tings

The latest design changes we're having to make to the OW has made me feel like I want to say something about our journey through these trials and tribulations.

Somehow or other it ALWAYS turns out to be the case that the delays lead us to make changes which only serve to massively improve the end result, as is defintely the case with delays caused by the Option 1 campaign, the CERC design process and now its the mezzanine deconstruction issue.

I was discussing with Matti today about how Ivan and Isa had tried to get over to us the importance of a 'mezzanine type experience' as a means of achieving the socio-psychological gains of the OW, but methinks we were so stuck on the playpark opening at the start of the OW we never properly took on board the crucial message IandI were trying to get across to us.

Then events which look like bad news when they happen (tudor trust) and stringent timetables force us to review the plan and instead of collapsing in a heap it all just gets better than ever it seems to me! Either im an eternal optimist or theres a greater designer than we are at work here?

Anyway, hopefully another thing this blog might also help us get over is the problem where some of us naturally discuss stuff in smallish groups around our houses etc. This will always happen but if ideas are shared on here as they are happening then all discussions become much more inclusive metinks...

Im feelin it - wot about u?

G

G

Recording the Change

This blog has been set up to provide a place where those of us who are blessed to be in the process of facilitating the UKs first ever 'Organisation Workshop' in Marsh Farm can collectively record the experience as it is happening...

There's loads of good reasons why keeping a diary is a good idea - especially so when there's the prospect of seriously positive spiritual/social/economic change on the cards as we all believe there to be

But agreeing it's a good idea is one thing - actually remembering to contribute regularly enough to be worthwhile is another thing altogether. I've tried keeping a blog myself before and only ever used it once then forgot I'd ever started it, so lets see if a 'collective blog' makes any difference.

If it does work - then I'm sure that this blog will record a radical transformation of not just our own community organisational health but also of the way community economic development is done here in UK Plc - and that has to be a good thing.

So, all you Outreach massive - this is an invitation to use this blog on a daily basis - even on an hourly basis if you want! All posts are relevant - happy, angry, serious, funny - its an open forum to record the experience as it is for us..as its happening

Lovage and Respecticus

G